HokieUmp

I've spoken about it elsewhere, and I'm of the opinion that walk-up music for kids, house league or otherwise, is a Sign Of Impending Doom For Mankind. Or something. Having said that? Not touching it, as far as getting it turned off or turned down, or otherwise grabbing that oh-so-sh!tty end of the stick. And would suggest that everyone else to the same, and we all "get over it," if you will. Why? Because as dumb an idea as it is - and as bad as some kids/parents musical choices seem to be - it's not REALLY hurting anything. If a pitcher is rattled by music "being directed at him," pitching's not really the position he should be playing. And hey, it's as close to being A Real Ballplayer as most of those kids are gonna get. I might enforce some volume control, and I will definitely make sure it's shut off during play, but otherwise, I will grit my teeth and carry on.

Really wish you hadn't asked that question. I ended up going to the UIL site - Controllers Of All Athletics in Texas - and looking up the softball fees. The same. Now I'm all mad.

That .... is horrifying.

Given what's being talked about, I'd like to provide a play that happened just today in a JV game, and our decision, so that you guys can light me up over how we %$#$@-ed it up, and get the whole budding "Mr" controversy behind us. R1 (I think we had at least R2 as well, but not important for the story), 1 out. Batter pops up into foul ground. F2 circles around and makes the catch, well into foul territory. R1, because JV-ball, was off and running at the crack of the bat, and is WELL away from the base. F2 goes to double him off, and throws towards 1B. The retired BR, ALSO because JV-ball, is wandering around, heading for the dugout, and manages to get get doinked in the head by the throw. After a pregnant "....the hell just happened?" pause by all participants, my partner and I both signal out, and we get R1 for interference by a retired player. A little talk with the O coach, but not heated. It wasn't until a few hours later, on the drive home (this happened in the first of two games), that I thought, "Uh oh. We may have cocked that up." Did we, in fact, cock that up? The knocking down of the throw was unintentional, so I'm now thinking we did. R1 WAS dead to rights, minus the player's melon in the way, but I don't think that helps.

As a (current) Texan, can vouch for this. It certainly dilutes the value of games, once you go past one. In Virginia, I rarely, if ever, worked more than one game in a night. Schools played at their own campus, and JV played M and Th (usually), while varsity was Tu and F. Here? If the district has a central complex, all the varsity teams play there, and JV are at the school. BUT, they then play at least two games, sometimes a 3-bag, at that central complex on game night, thus doing the "one travel fee" deal. If it's a "country school," as I put it, they play at home, BUT they'll do both JV and V that night, *again* needing on one travel fee per umpire. And while the travel fee can make a single game okay, total fees here run behind SE Virginia, at least, if not elsewhere. I won't say what I was making *three* seasons ago, when I last worked in Virginia, mostly because I don't want the other Texan umpires to get mad .... possibly at me. (But if you fellas want to know, anyway, PM me. Just get mad at TASO and the UIL, not me.)

I don't doubt any of these stories, but I'm astounded by them. I've heard all the stories about how we're losing officials in different sports, and I KNOW it's true, and I can see, in the different groups in which I work, it ain't getting any younger. But the idea of doing games alone? School games? I'm gobsmacked by this. I've never worked a school game solo, either in Virginia or Texas, and I'm in my 12th HS season. And the oldest age-group I've done it for is LL Majors/Bronco (11-12) - and that's been the leagues in question were notorious being cheap, NOT because we didn't have the bodies for it. I'm sorry to you guys that have to put up with that crap.

I .... ah .... don't know that I want to work a game with you, 'Stu. My already active imagination is going friggin' INSANE right now.

Actually, I did. Just to ensure there'd be no F*#K-ery with the pitch count. And, because they still were only allowed three strikes within that five pitches. Yes, I know - "hey dummy, three strikes is a foundational plank of the game!" Yes. But. If the whole point is to get kids into the game, playing batted balls and making plays, and running bases depending on situations, why not just let them get all five pitches with which to do something? Maybe that's my inner hippy coming out. But being used to having an indicator, anyway, and wanting to make sure these junior Joe Giardis would keep it in their pants, I used one.

Note that I never APPEALED His Honor's verdict. Rather, I pointed out His Honor's sameness.

..... says the guy that hyperlinks the actual movie scene.

If only. Not that the sign is wrong, more "if only people would read it AND comprehend its meaning." I rose to the pinnacle of our profession last weekend, "working" a coach-pitch tournament. (In my defense, I had a 3-day window with no games, and this time of year, that makes me twitchy. Also, they actually pay legal, US, spendable tender to work the games. I'll happily take $26 bucks to work a 50m drop-dead game. Turns out, I can count to five pitches all on my own!) Anyway, the field I was on had very little foul ground, and the stands were thisclose to the fence. So I got to hear every slanderous description of my character, integrity and heritage. Or would have, if I hadn't been zoning it out. I DID hear about the runs I cost different teams. Joke's on them - I planned that SH*# FOR DAYS before the weekend! Coach-pitch. 8U. We are doomed as a people.

You're not wrong. Thing is: A day may come when the courage of the plate guy fails, when we foresake our partners, and break all bonds with the rulebook. But this was NOT that day. (I couldn't think up enough stuff for the whole speech, so that's all I got.)

Just last night, had a HS batter really [redacted] up his reaction, and ended up turning to FACE the ball as it came in, and it hit him square in the chest. I watched him like a hawk, since I really didn't want the sudden-heart-stoppage scenario to come into play. The pitcher, as the compassionate person he'll grow up to be, wanted to argue the batter offered in that reaction, since he brought the bat around. "You threw that ball in the middle of the box; there's NO way you're getting that call." Dick.

Speaking as usual only for HokieUmp, LLC, and not @maven - yes and no for the first one. My instinctive answer is "no," simply because I've learned they're lying liars that are trying to get over, nearly every time, if not LITERALLY every time. (Also because people are not as precise with details of a scenario as they'd like to believe.) But to be fair, because I've seen some of the partners I've had- especially in the traveling road show games and/or house league guys at places I've been - it's entirely possible an equal scenario was handled utterly differently somewhere else. And do I follow up? No. Again, in the traveling road show circuit, they won't know who that last guy was, more than likely. But even taking the "if feasible" into account? Nope. Maybe in a school-ball situation, if I knew who worked it, I might ask, but probably only if I was working with that person later, and would just bring it up in convo. But in the school-ball sitch - to me, that's for the coach to enquire/protest. Even if he just wants to ask, he can approach the chapter leadership, and get clarification. And then THEY can talk to the rank-and-file, like me, about it.

Nothing stops football season in Texas. NOTHING.

Well, MY interp is the same as yours, since we're both TASO. But I'd like to think I was a part of that email we just got. I was at a tournament in Marion last week, and one of the teams was Davenport. Both F1 AND F2 wore bands, and - near as I could tell - they both got flashed *different* signals, and consulted their wristbands. (As an aside: it seems like an overly complicated system, just to throw a pitch - and I've worked with and around intel people a lot of my life.) My partner and I were okay with it - we talked about it the first time we saw them, and said it was okay. The bands were dark, and we determined they weren't distracting. The next crew came along, and disallowed it the next game. These guys felt, with the white of the paper with all the "top secret code" stuff, that was enough white/gray to disallow it. (My partner and I had left, and we didn't pass it on.) It led to a spirited text discussion that evening, with the result that our chapter was planning to email TASO HQ (or TASO Mothership, or whatever it's called), to see what they'd have to say. Now we know. Sadly, it's not being called "The HokieUmp Rule," or "The HokieUmp Interpretation," but that's okay.

Sorry, guys - I must disagree with all of you. Everyone knows The Bird is The Word.

This feels more like a scorer's question, than an umpire question, since I personally stop caring once I make the call. Having said that, I would say it's E6, especially if the timing of the play was such that the throw would have beaten the runner otherwise. Speaking strictly for myself.

For what it's worth, we started down here in Texas, despite losing a week of scrimmages - and a few paying gigs - to snow and/or cold. Tonight, just finished games eight and nine for the week, thanks to tournament play.

Okay, not only has this thread gotten well away from the OP - I should know, having been the author, and we're not talking about baseballs and NOSCAE any more - but it's also getting a little testy. Soooooo, again, because I brought this thread into the world, which means I can take it out AND because I have moderator abilities (blame Warren for that), I'm locking this up.

I haven't had it happen it yet. That being said, a) I have no idea what my state says about it, because b) I have no personal issue with it, and am a big fan of the First Amendment. I realize that might be an unpopular stance. I'm okay with that.

Like you have NO idea. The last snow in the San Antonio area was in 2018, before we moved here. But it was pretty much nothing, from what I'd heard, and it didn't last long, so I was hoping we'd pass our time here not seeing that bullcrap at all. This nonsense.... the TV channel I follow put together a graphic. For nine straight nights, the overnight low was below 32, and five of those nights set records for lows. And look - I know how weak it sounds. But when a February day is normally like 65/43 most every day, that's .... different. If I live a normal lifespan for a person born in 1965, and never see another snowflake again, that'd be juuuuuuust fine.

Well, I guess I'm not following what you're quoting from. I'm not a by-law guy, of anything in my baseball career - I've spent over 36 years as a federal employee, so I don't go LOOKING for that kind of stuff when I'm on "Hokieump Time." Is that Article II from that process? I'm just trying to get to the bottom of that. Pardon my ignorance.

Not only did I lose four scrimmages - not sure I'm THAT broke up about that, especially since I had four others - but I lost three *paying* games last week. And we got a total of NINE inches of snow, with two storms Sun/Mon and Thursday. As they say, "it's been a week." My motto of "winter is bulls---" was only strengthened this week.

For others: TASO is a HS organization, so the idea of saying to a TASO member "if you don't like HS rules, don't work Fed games" is ..... problematic. It makes no sense to stay in a Chapter with that philosophy. For @Donny7, though: are you doing these rules/analysis deals as a leader of a *chapter*, or are you on some state-level part of the TASO organization? I ask as a member, but only in my third year of TASO work - with last year being about 3 weeks long, and this year not even at tournament time yet. I'm not that familiar with the Texas-way, and haven't really looked at ANY by-laws.