MadMax

But but BUT, Jonny... It's not just any-ol' "people". To my hashtag, No One Really Cares. Instead, it's Assigners – those who hold all the control and governance over "their" umpires in so far as which games they work, how often (or how rarely), where, and who with... and "Evaluators" – those designated or self-deigned "experts" who impose an arbitrary, ambiguous, inconsistent, and oft-contextually irrelevant "Scale of Value". This is done under the banner of "improving (the) umpires" (whom they evaluate), but more realistically, the feedback they give is vapid, self-serving, and occasionally simply justifies the evaluator's role (or the lecherous fee they might charge). Bottom line – Do (or Wear) What You Need to Do to Do Your Job, "Evaluations" Be D@mn3d.

They’re very likely Bruce Bolts. Bruce Bolt Compression Sleeves Where was Segal working? Cleveland? Navy is in their color palette, and the Clubhouse Manager has these on-hand. Segal opted for these instead of wearing a long-sleeve umpire shirt (which don’t breathe as well as ya think). As you say, simply to protect his skin and promote cooling. Skin that is already getting roasted by the sun’s rays, or is slathered with sunblock, is stunted in its ability to transport heat via sweat to the surface and then allow it to evaporate. Besides that, who’s the only umpire to handle baseballs? Plate umpire – Segal likely doesn’t want to slather his arms with sunblock and have it flow down his arms to his hands – and the baseballs – if he can help it. On a related, but much more sarcastic, sartorial note: “That’s (the wearing of long sleeves under a short-sleeve umpire shirt) a bad look!!! No choice / optimum / playoff assignments for you!” – Any of Several Assigners / Evaluators in Amateur (including college!) Baseball Anywhere in North America I always make a point of this – famously, Gerry Davis was working plate at Wrigley Field, on a 95°+ day, with easily 95% humidity, in sky blue, with a blaze orange cooling towel draped over his neck while calling Bs & Ks!! Every half inning, he’d escape to the tunnel to get refreshed and cooled off, while Will Little administered the official lineup cards from U1. Bright Orange towel. On national television. Is that the “professional look” we fawn and obsess over??? #NoOneReallyCares #TheyDoInMLBWhyCan’tWe?

I have no way of confirming or refuting that, besides just referring to their web-store.

90% chance I know the PU (if you had a name or identifying characteristic). 16% chance it was a Vulture. 0% chance it was me.

You’re now dining at the very table I frequent – Context & Imperatives. If/when an umpire calls Time, at the close of the play, I (as a developer / trainer / etc.) immediately identify the context. I would exhaust you guys with the different scenarios and contexts that we collectively encounter, so to your point – absolute imperatives serve no benefit to anyone. However, what I do not want to see is an umpire – especially a PU – call Time as a crutch to get back to / goto next position, or to perform some frivolous, tertiary-level “duty”… such as (directing to) moving a batting weight, retrieving a loose baseball, being brought spare baseballs, ushering a player back into the dugout… or brushing the plate because some fence-fans are sqwaking about it. Instead, what we should be doing is keeping the ball Live as much as possible, and conjoining tertiary-level duties to instances when the ball becomes Dead. HBP, Foul-ball that takes fielders out of position, Home-Run (over the fence), Runner requests Time to discard equipment, Runner or Fielder requests Time to tie their shoe 🤨… these are perfect instances to then perform one or several of those tertiary duties… Including brush the plate!

You don’t use BCs for that! … … You send check-swing appeals to them!

As always, context matters. Age, game type, etc. are all factors to consider. Remember, back 2(?) seasons ago, when a MLB batter got Ejected for tapping the helmet w/o ABS Challenge being implemented in MLB yet? Where’d he pick that up? Atlantic League (at the time)… which was using ABS on MiLBUs. That batter had just been called up, and he did it out of learned reaction. Is that an excuse? No. Is that an explanation (as to why)? Yes! Should he have been ejected? Yes, he’s a pro – he should know better. But these are amateurs we’re talking about, and kids at that. Adults (eg. Men’s Amateur)? Eject ‘em, absolutely. Kids, though, are morons. I’m going to give the coach(es) an opportunity, albeit brief, to “rescue” and discipline the kid before I dump him. If we look at college ball, for example, I operate in an environment where I have a churning confluence of levels and rules. Not only do I have a hybrid of OBR and NCAA, but I’ve got NAIA and JUCo players playing alongside D-1 talent, who just came from a season / post-season that has video review. We don’t have video review (yet). Am I supposed to dump a Runner because he starts doing “the headphones” when I call him out at 2B? I don’t dispute the warrant; I bristle at the automatic, the imperative – “I (we) must eject you (amateur < adult)”.

It’s not, in lieu of a complete accounting report. We don’t know what goes on to support those umpires. Are they housed? Fed & watered? Access to medical while employed? Laundry? Uniforms provided? All those things are important; furthermore, they’re overlooked variables when we start comparing these… “Destination Events” against travel, tournament, and local leagues. Tournament umpires get lured in by $75-$100 game fees, but then have to pay for their own housing, food, laundry, etc. So “to soften the dent”, assigners will put guys onto 4-6, 7 games per day! The registration fee is because there is a lack of a vetting umpire organization / association in that region Another factor is that the entity hosting the PerfectGame -brand is anticipating either a skeleton crew of support staff (TD assistants, field marshals, etc), or they’ve been burned before on umpires leaving / forfeiting games. Adjacent to that, PerfectGame is very cognizant and protective of their brand; as such, they’re trying to dissuade (or prevent) umpires from invariably wearing sub-par, sub-optimal, or competing-entity uniforms. Ideally, those uniform items should be provided; however, if anything is provided, there will be umpires who will abuse that generosity. Purchase of those items compels umpires to take care of them, to an extent. Of course, PerfectGame’s brand gets affected, later, when those same umpires invariably wear those uniform items on rival events (“Buh! I paid for these! Buh!”).

Because as soon as we form a “collection” (ie. association / organization / union), any power we have begins to erode due to squabbling about “who should be in charge”, and “who gets assigned to which games”, and “who is “better” than who” (and should get paid / assigned more). Leadership takes (a cut, a rake, a skim, a fee), and invariably and inevitably, someone gets butt-hurt about the operations of said collective. That someone forms their own entity, and subsequently under-&-out-bids the existing leadership in due time, likely sniping umpires from the previous entity by enticing with “better” pay and assignments. Then you get the “loyalty wars”. The machine churns on.

The entire amateur baseball ⚾️ (and softball 🥎 ) community needs education on this simple point – any time when a batted ball (liner, pop-fly, fly, et. al.) is caught, the force is off. Thus, any subsequent outs will occur via tags, appeals, or INT by a member of the offense.

@Kevin_K, I read your story... twice... and I'm "peering around the edges", looking for Rod Serling to walk into the frame. And he went to 3 (Umpire) Schools?? Even at HWUS, where they teach and drill the "Pro Way" into you with such... impression... that 2 umpires should be able to co-operate without signaling, they still cover signaling. Ya'd think that a guy who is all about military protocol would adopt something as rudimentary as hand signals. Did he serve on an aircraft carrier? Improper or non-use of hand signals will get ya killed. If guys ever wonder why I deplore pre-games (I think they're a waste of time and an echo-chamber for poor skills and practices), what you just experienced is Exhibit K. Tub doesn't match the tile. There's no way – no way – he umpired in the Armed Services League, but yet, is declaring "some noise" during a pitch to be "unsportsmanlike". Absolutely not. Nothing of the Armed Services League is "sportsmanlike". Camaraderie-building? Sure. But the Armed Services extend the adage "All's Fair In Love and War" to include ".. and Inter-branch (Athletic) Contests". You're right, but do ya know what two other professions get jaded, and treat others with distrust, contempt and disdain, primarily because they themselves were disrespected in their past? Law Enforcement officers and umpires.

@JonnyCat absolutely nailed the meat of my point. I'll get down to the bones of it... What you speak of, here, is context. Within the context of the specific game you were working, considerate of level, ages, location and everything else, and using the authority you are vested by the rules (and, rules that fit/match the context), you adjudicated it in that way. You used authority; you did not impose authority. There's a difference. In no way am I against what you adjudicated on that (singular) game. What I am against is codifying it as some kind of overarching generalization, or worse, campaigning for it as some kind of imperative protocol... to use in all cases. Case in point: Imperatives in bold. And who is this "trainer", and what makes him an authority so as to dictate what's "correct" and "incorrect"???

And they never* will. It's just not important (enough) to "them". Huh! What a shame! Wouldn't it be nice & effective to have a device that did exactly what we (umpires) needed it to? With digital interface? And reprogrammable to the intervals that "they" keep changing / futzing with / modifying? 🤔 Huh! Maybe it's something the NCAA/NAIA/NJCAA could look into, or commission?

I’m 6’2”, 215lb, and can wear a 44R, but the 44L makes it drape on me properly while wearing the fabulously low-profile DX family of CPs (shameless, shameless plug). My first-ever plate coat was a Fechheimer 46R, and while it did fit me (and the Schutt XV I wore) well, I was… “treading water in it”. In a 44R, with the CP on, the cuffs ride up a bit for my liking, so YMMV. The 44L turned out to be “just right”. If you’re going to a liquidation sale to track one down, or heck – just to determine your size, take your CP along; no shame in that.

Please, @ValleyUmp, please tell me this was copied & pasted from online, in its entirety... From what universe do these two options come, that would or should ever even be considered??!! It is painfully obvious that querier has never attended a professional baseball game, much less a high-end (college, large high school) amateur baseball game. If you truly listen to the game outside the game, you hear this stuff all the time, whether it be tip-telling prognostication or sly, insidious deceit. Example: How about all those fans telling a batter to swing (early, of course), hopeful for a strike out? Are we hushing and censoring them? This is an utterly ridiculous question.

But again... who'd be missing the time (timing) play? Plate Umpire. Base umpire has no bearing on it. And again, in the OUPOP that we obsess over ("don't step on your partner's d!ck!", said so eloquently), who is supposed to give the signal??

Didja perform your best, booming, “That run scores! That run scores! Score one run!!”? That signal / mechanic is much more important than tapping your wrist repeatedly, growing ever more annoyed with your BU partner because he won’t mirror it back like a good little sidekick peon is supposed to! Why? Because it’s an actual declaration that you know the Rule, instead of a vapid, lemming-esque, compliant obsession with “we must communicate pre-pitch because we’ll get dinged on an evaluation if we don’t!” My fellow Vulture and I did a game once wherein we rarely, if ever, signaled anything pre-pitch. It must have been our 200th game together by that time. It just so happened that a MiLB umpire was included on the payroll on that tournament event by the assigner to act as a roving evaluator. That’s fine, that’s the assigner’s prerogative. After the game, the evaluator approached the two of us, proffering feedback; chief amongst it was, “You guys don’t signal pre-pitch. Do you not know the pre-pitch signals?” My fellow Vulture – and housemate – looked at him, then at me, then back at him, to reply, “Max is my roommate”. If you’re working with guys who are, essentially, interchangeable then sure, pre-pitch signaling is a significant part of effective communication. But if you’re working with guys you’re familiar with, pre-pitch signaling – especially one that has little to no purpose for the recipient – is useless. I’ve witnessed valued and competent colleagues give football play signals between at-bats, just to “liven up” the game.

“He signals it…” meaning… he’s the PU? The BUs have no jurisdiction over a Time Play (unless, in an incredibly rare instance of a 3/4/6-man rotation of U1 home). And if, according to Official Umpire Pecking Order Protocol (OUPOP)™, the PU is to be the origin of all pre-pitch signals… then who is the Time Play signal for?? Right, it’s for the PU. He’s signaling himself. So, it’s not needed. The only reason BUs (need to) mirror it is… compliance.

It’s called a brace hand, and its misuse in amateur baseball is due to naive or uneducated mimicry of Big League umpires, especially “established”, long-tenured ones. To be fair, these mimics are often told to do so by amateur association heads and “trainers” who are of the opinion that the Big League guys are idols whose methods and practices convey credibility and validation. The brace hand is employed by a PU who may not be as nimble as he once was, and is aware and cognizant of how lightning-fast a professional catcher will rise up to snap off a throw and needs that “tactile alarm” of feeling the catcher suddenly shift. Some select MLBUs do it as well because they get exceptionally low in their compressed stance, and need that hand as a gauge. In amateur circles, at all levels (with, perhaps, NCAA D-1 as an exception), the brace hand isn’t needed, and is, as many colleagues mentioned, discouraged and frowned upon.

You're too kind, @TheRockawayKid. @wolfe_man is quite correct, that the "new stuff" can't beat the "old stuff". OutWest is a copycat company, and really don't invest, properly or fully, into cultivating a top-quality product. Flying Cross, as a brand, is/was a clothier, and thus their plate coats reflect(ed) the attention to those relevant details (fabric quality, sewing robustness, etc.). Honig's achieved its quality because Honig's had first-hand access to all the Major League uniforms as the official outfitter of MLBUs for 20+(?) years. When your staff personally handles these garments, and performs all the tailoring, alterations, and cleaning for a collection of professionals, wherein appearance and presentation is a premium, you learn and infuse how to build your own version. With that said, you can build your own. I did, for a grand total of $80. Here's what it took: A 44L Calvin Klein -brand summer-weight sport coat, black, with a box split – which means a split on either hip, instead of a center-split. Purchased from a Sportcoat & Suit Liquidation Sale for $25. 3 yards of black fabric, type-matched as closely as possible to the sport coat. $15. Velcro, raw 3" wide. $5. A tailor/seamstress willing to accommodate a unique request, and securely design, fabricate, and sew on billowed ball pockets, reinforce the primary button, and sew on: A) a velcro landing patch on the yoke (for a national flag) and B) a velcro landing patch on the right sleeve (for numbers) (optional C) a velcro landing patch on the left chest lapel pocket for league patch; I use magnets for this one) $35. "Recycling" or "upcycling" a sport coat is such a beneficial endeavor, since you can get a well-made sport coat at a tremendous bargain, and keep it from the land-fill, or being shredded into bulk fill.

Advice? This ain't advice. It's an official edict, especially when using the words "mandatory" and "only... acceptable". This reeks of assumed tyranny, justified through a whole bunch of whimsical obfuscation ("in this combination, do it this way, but in this other combination, do it this other way, but if this other component changes, stand on your head... "). I can assure you – MiLBUs don't (over)think this. We teach our guys to set IP in B-deep each time, every time, with a single alteration to "C-deep" if-and-only-if the count goes to 3-2 with 2 outs. And, in all leagues and conferences I've worked, including Arizona High School, we are compelled / obliged to make a check swing appeal, so it doesn't matter a high hill of jalapeños whether U3 is in B-deep or C-deep, or at D, or scaling the fence in left center field... PU allows/makes the appeal, and the U3 gives what he's got (yes/no on swing attempt). (To the guy issuing this edict – ) Stop building paper crutches, and your umpires will be (forced to be) more aware, alert, and focused on their responsibilities, regardless of where they're standing, instead of fretting about where... they're standing.

How is it that two HS teams are both wearing (virtually) the same uniforms? Isn't there any sort of coordination between the two schools on this one? U3, with R1 only, is set up in C-deep? Not the place to be. Should be B-deep, instead. I know, with 99% certainty, where that field is. St Cloud, Minnesota.

They wouldn't. It's not a Balk... It was, eventually. Just because the screen bug or scoreboard don't immediately reflect it, doesn't mean it wasn't ascribed. The PU didn't even have a chance to flash the new count to the press box or field yet.

How does an umpire crew let a F1 pitch with wrist-tape, wristbands, etc. on the throwing arm?? 🤔