LittleBlue

Remember, if your zone goes against Little Johnny he'll never make it to the majors haha!

I doubt it would be included. Don't get me wrong I'm hoping that it is cause that's a nice mask but it's a long shot.

Not sure they'd include the umpire masks in the but it would be interesting to find out.

If Wilson did offer them that'd be pretty sick but a man can dream can't he?

I actually like that Wilson gave the umps some pink besides them just wearing the pink armbands.

Yeah, don't know who worked the Dodgers-Blue Jays game but he had wrap around pink and tan pads.

Nah I know I'll never get my hands on one, but it's definitely an interesting mask to say the least.

Gabe Morales rocking the pink mask for the Red Sox-Yankees game. Probably wouldn't wear it on the field but I'd love to have it in my collection.

Throwing of the forearms is enough for me to eject him. He clearly wanted to make contact, but as you said the contact was minimal. If nothing else it's unsportsmanlike and gets an ejection from me. No place for that in the game.

I generally talk to them if they're willing to talk to me. I'm a talkative person so I always have something to say. This one JV catcher that I've seen 5-6 times this year has a really good rapport with me and we usually talk about baseball all game long. He's a Mets fan and I'm a Red Sox fan so we talk about our teams and other teams as well. I've had some catchers who just aren't talkative. Everyone is different and so is every game. At the little League level youre probably not going to get many talkative catchers but you may here and there. In the men's league I work I can really shoot the breeze since we're all adults. Sometimes the batter even gets into it. I've had some really good conversations there. In any case the catcher is likely going to be close to you for 7 or 9 innings so you might as well get to know him a bit.

I'm with you on that one. I hate the large stripe on the side. I prefer the subdued white stripe on the black and the black stripe on the light blue. Don't know why they would want to mess with a good thing, but it is a step back in my opinion. Like last year when they wanted them to go to an all black polo. At least that would have been better than a large gray stripe down the side of the polo.

1st play: You have to judge when the play was being made on the BR and where the runner was at that moment. When you determine a play is being made on him, his baseline is defined as 3 feet to his left or right on a straight line from his position to the base he is going to. Since you said that he ran on to the grass in front of home to avoid the tag by the catcher, it sounds as if he was more than 3 feet out of the baseline and should be called out. 2nd Play: Since there was no play being made on the BR, besides the (I assume) attempted put out at 1st, he has no defined baseline, so he cannot be called out for being out of a baseline which does not exist. The key here is to judge when a play is being made on a runner. When you determine that the fielder is trying to tag the runner, he can move 3 feet left or right on a direct line to the base he is going to. If he is out of the 3 feet, then he is out of the baseline and should be called out. As Ricka pointed out, note the difference between OBR and FED when it comes to when to call a batter out for not trying to reach 1st on a D3K.

It most definitely was/is. They always want to "bring legitimacy to all age groups" (president of the league told me that once). I remember some of those games were absolutely brutal and not worth what they were paying for 2ish hours in 95 degree heat. Only call strikes 1 and 2, no walks.......Haha the good old days I guess.......

So the ball came to rest and then the action of F7 knocking over the fence caused the ball to then roll over the fence and into DBT? I think it'd be 2 bases from the time F7 caused the ball to move again.

All Star makes their own throat guard too, so that's an option, but I have no experience with that. I know Wilson make a throat guard specially for their HSM, but, again, I have no experience with that.

I personally don't because the only time I've been hit in the neck/throat with a HSM was on a bouncer and I was wearing a throat guard, so I no longer see the need for it if it's not going to do much. Thay said, I wear one with a traditional mask, so go figure. I had a Wilson 4 inch throat guard on my HSM until I took it off and now use it on my traditional masks.

It's an All Star MVP 2500 with Under Armour logos on it. I had the UA HSM, but I sold it to a friend who was just starting out, because it was too narrow for my big head. I really wish it was a little bigger, because it is a quality mask. I'd assume the UA is the same, because it looks like the only thing changed is the logo. I've seen some UA masks with the same she'll but a different cage on them and I've seen this one. Personally, I like the matte finish more than the gloss finish, but thay doesn't make a difference in protection.

Maybe I read it wrong, but the way I read it was that his partner restricted the coach and then let him rant about it for more than a minute without telling him he would be ejected if he did not comply. Then it was Fleas who had to get involved to get the coach to comply with the restriction, which eventually led to the ejection. If I was the PU and issued the restriction and the coach did not go to the bench in a timely manner, he would be warned and then ejected. I would not let him yell about the restriction for an entire minute.

Sounds like a good ej to me. Your partner didn't seem to want to handle his business, but you took control. Any reason why he wasn't stepping up?

At the local received league where I started they use 2 umpires for 8u boys and girls and they're coach pitch. Still, as the BU move into B and C position.

We talked about this exact thing at our association meeting last night. The general consensus was that if you are 100% sure about your call, stick with it and don't get in the habit of going to your partner on ever call, because it will give the coaches the belief that you will got to your partner on every close call. They see umps on TV getting together and they think we will too, but if you're sure about the call you made, why do you need your partner to make the call? Stick to what you call!

I'm a plate junkie. Love working back there. I'm probably on the plate 3-5 games for every 1 I'm on the bases. When I was working for the local little league as a kid I'd probably work 1 or 2 base games a season. That mentality stuck with me. I also agree with two things that have been said previously. First, I definitely think you earn your reputation on the plate. I find that when I'm on the plate more, I have better games and there are less argument besides the grumble here and there. Second, I agree that it's easier to do the plate and the reason is your mistakes are usually less costly, provided they aren't in a pivotal situation. On the bases if you have to make 3 call in one half inning and kick 1 you're accuracy is 66.6%. When I first started working high school games, my assignors always gave me the plate and I feel like I've gotten better games as a result. In the other leagues I've worked, the plate/base assignments were up to us, so I usually worked the plate and the better games came. That's not to say that you won't get looked at if you do a good job consistently on the bases, but if you miss a call it is magnified because you aren't making as many of them. Bottom line is that it's important to work both the plate and the bases, so you are well versed in both positions and the rotations become second nature, but in my opinion it's better to work the plate.

Interesting. Guess I learn something new every day!

The titanium cage bends easily? Titanium should be stronger than steel, no???