StrikeToWin

I always thought that once you called a ball foul, it stayed foul. Am I missing something?

I agree. He usually has a scorekeeper but they were not there that night. I just don't know why he decided to argue with me about it.

OK, I worked a game the other night with a team coached by the president of the board. Rules are USSSA age division is HS. After the game, I asked the home team (president of the boards team) what they had for score and they had it tied (league games can end in a tie) and the visiting team showed 5-4. In our league, home book is official so I asked to see the book to verify the score since they didn't match. He replied that they didn't keep a book but since they were home team and official score then they were correct. I told him I was going with the visiting team's book since they could show me and he said I was wrong that they were the official score even though they did not have a book and they were not required to keep one either but were still official. I told him he could bring it up before the board and walked away. Why does this crap even come up?

I would love to read this book.

I do appreciate all of the feedback. I am working on timing as it is and now I am needing to work on timing with pulling the trigger. I did hear from the umpires that had the team on the second day of the tournament and they told me that there wasn't a peep from that team the whole day. I guess that's one good thing that came from it.

You don't have to do anything. You won't be on the receiving end of a death stare for very long if you turn your back and walk away. I disagree with this. If you get screamed at from across the diamond by a High School kid you have to knowledge or address it or you are going to lose control in a hurry. Same words somewhat quietly and sans death stair, OK, ignore. But with the info in this post I think you have to address it somehow, probably with "that's enough." Of course, it all depends on tone - but if you feel that this was an intent to show you up, you've got to do something - not eject - but something. How did OP know there even was a "death stare"? If he turns and jogs back to C position (assuming runners on first and second) then no death stare and no problems. Just out of curiosity, would you have ignored the loudly shouted question immediately after you had made your call? Again, this was not a quiet or a conversational questioning of my judgement, everyone in the stands heard him. Had his tone not been as hostile as it was, I probably would've been able to ignore it, but with the volume, I thought it deserved my attention. Plus, at that point the ball was still live and he was holding the ball. Very hard to ignore. I'm really not arguing or justifying myself (I know it can come across like that) but want to learn how to handle similar situations in the future as I am a fairly inexperienced umpire.

FWIW, my partner and another umpire, plus other coaches that were watching the game, said my actions were completely justified and they would have done the same thing. I'm just thinking maybe I pulled the trigger a bit quick. I need to go back to the timing thing that is harped on here. Don't be too quick to make a call. I feel like if I would've stopped and thought for a couple of seconds I may have handled it differently. Also and I know this made a difference that I didn't communicate in my OP, but there had been a catch/no catch situation a couple of plays earlier at 2B that the defensive team was chirping about. I will say that after I ej'd that I didn't have any other grumbling from that team.

I thought after the fact that I may have been a little quick, but at the time, the tone, the action of F3 (death stare) and the game situation all screamed at me that he needed to be done or this might get sideways. I think I could have handled it with a few words to F3 but as he was yelling at me from across the diamond loud enough for everyone in the stands to hear, I felt like I had to take immediate action. How could I have handled this differently?

U-trip tournament, HS division. R1 and R3 , 1 out. BR hits a weak ground ball up the 1B line and F3 comes in to field it. Turns to make a throw to someone covering 1B and sees there is no one there. He dives to apply a tag to BR. I'm in the working are behind the mound and what I see is F3 with an empty glove and the ball in his throwing hand. I'm honestly not sure if he tagged the runner or not but I did not see one and even if he did, he only got him with the glove so I signal safe. F3 immediately jumps up and turns and glares at me while shouting quite loudly "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!" I then made sure all other play was done and turned to the upset F3 and told him he was done. Not one coach ever came out to talk to me or ask me what I saw they just got mad and started shifting people around as F3 made his way to the dugout. I did hear the HC tell someone to call the tournament director. Now, I know this is HTBT but I'm curious if it sounds like I was to quick with an EJ?

Actually, two pitches later he ripped a single into LF and got an RBI out of it. Like I said really weird. I did warn the kid not to do it again and he didn't.

Last weekend I was working an 11U USSSA tournament and saw one of the weirdest things in my limited umpiring career. I had the plate, outs don't matter, R1 stealing. As F1 begins his motion, B1 jumps and turns toward me and the backstop, both feet stayed in the box and the ball hit the back of his left foot. I immediately called a dead ball and sent R1 back to 1B and told the batter to stay in the box and called a ball. Of course the OHC thinks his batter should be awarded 1B. I told him that his batter made no effort to get out of the way and that he jumped and turned before the pitcher even released the ball. I know that this is HTBT but it was just really odd. My questions are 1) Given that the batter jumped and turned with his back to the pitcher before the pitcher even released the ball, would you have kept the batter in the box? 2) Does it matter that this is only 11U? 3) Did I make the right call? I spoke with my partner after it all happened and he had the same thing.

Got my Oklahoma packet the other day and it included a mechanics manual. Had the OSSAA logo on it and everything.

It was between teams and it was not my field but an adjacent field. I didn't see everything that led up to the altercation but knowing the two teams involved, it had to do with trash talking. I did see one umpire physically restraining one player and the other umpire was between the teams at one point. This was fall ball and the time limit was at the end so it wasn't a matter of ending the game, that would've happened in a couple of minutes any way. I just have never been involved in a physical altercation on the field and wasn't sure what an umpires responsibility is when and if it happens.

Have you ever had a fight break out in one of your games? If so, what did you do, how did you handle the situation? What role did you take to break up the fight if any?

When I saw this last night my first thought and first thing I said to my wife was "This will make for some good conversation on UE". Even she couldn't believe they called a do-over. The announcers were even saying something about placing the runner at 1B which would have been the worst thing that could've happened.

Fall ball at our park is really non-competitive. They may keep score at the team level, but there are no standings, we don't turn in scores, substitution rules are almost non-existant, teams must bat the entire line up, run rules exist but once a team has scored 5 runs in an inning or recorded 3 outs, they switch sides and it's 1:30 drop dead time limits. Other than that, we really don't umpire any differently.

I agree that it does, but usually you can tell a majors team from a AA team. Not saying they police the classifications like they should, but they at least try where I'm at. And yes, coaches are still rats no matter the level of play.

I do primarily USSSA tourneys and you can definitely tell the difference in the classes. 14 Majors are a LOT better than 14AA. Do a AA tourney after doing the Majors tourney and you will see the difference.

I actually was involved in a league years ago that had a no removing the helmet rule. I was not an umpire but a coach and if a player removed his helmet before entering the dugout, it was an automatic out. It was in the leagues rules and I have no idea how they scored it, but there are leagues that have that rule.

U-Trip the 3-1 move is a balk.

I actually had a partner make his call and even before the coach had a chance to come out and ask if he could get help, he was calling time and running in to me at the plate. I told him what I saw and we got the call right, but he thought he was probably wrong with his initial call but made it anyway.

I actually attended the Tulsa area clinic last year. I'm assuming it will be similar this year right Jason?

The replay I saw almost looked like he drug his heel across the top of the bag but it was great heads up on watching the foot by F3.

I agree that maybe time seemed to slow down, it just seemed like I processed a lot of information before the SS caught the ball.

I will add that after it hit F5 it went WAY up in the air and F6 was camped under it for 2 or 3 seconds. I had time to glance at F5 and see him moving around and process that there was no blood and also hear a mom yelling at me to call time all before F6 actually caught the ball. It was a weird situation that I think I got right but just wanted make sure.