SCRookie

This is my M.O. in life. Thanks!

Hi everyone. I'm umpiring my first game soon, and I'm very excited and extremely nervous of making a total ass of myself. Here's the catch: this is only Slowpitch softball, fall rec league. I'm doing this to prepare for LL Baseball in the Spring which is what I'm REALLY looking forward to, to support my kid's league. I figured this was a soft-landing to help me get comfortable before LL starts, and practice mechanics, and build up confidence. Would love to hear some stories and some words of wisdom from people who remember their first games and what I should expect and do to prepare. Thanks!

Looking for some USA Softball umpire Polo shirts, prefer Navy but can go Powder blue as well. Also looking for some decent 10.5-11 shoes, base & plate. Thanks for any help!

Wow, fantastic and sound advice @SeeingEyeDog! I am literally writing this stuff down and making sure to live by it, especially in my early days. Thank you for this. Also sound advice, @MRG9999. I did this a bit when working a 8-10 yr old game, at the advice of the coaches, no less, who knew I was new. The idea was that we wanted the game to move along, have the batters swing, and make the pitchers feel good. I thought it was good advice and worked well, though I had a couple of little batters turn and give me a look on a couple of them. I had to chuckle a little. Thanks again guys!

Thank you everyone, @eddieq @Velho @Aging_Arbiter @Richvee for the great advice. @Velho I am in Santa Cruz, LL D39, though I won't begin that until next season. I am preparing to start with NorCal Softball District 3.

Hi all, Brand new to umpiring. Since I was a kid (and not being a super great athlete) I always thought referees and umpires were the most interesting guys on the field. Something about having a graceful command of a game and governing a complex rule set was always intriguing to me. After enthusiastically watching my kids play Little League for 5 years, and watching the umpire's mechanics really closely, I started pouring over rule books, watching videos, and getting as intimately familiar with the mechanics of umpiring as I could. I stepped in to help in an emergency situation this past season when no umpires showed up for a couple of games (the youth ump was not willing to be the PU), and I decided to give it a shot. It was a 9-10 year old division game and nothing too insane happened, but being a total first-timer, I am certain I blew a couple of balls/strikes. However, it was an insane amount of fun and I was hooked after that. Signed up to start umpiring locally for LL and Rec league games, which I am preparing for now. Always looking for some advice for new umpires. I want to do the absolute best job I can, but I know I'm going to blow it more than a couple times starting out. How do you deal with knowing you blew it, and staying positive and motivated? Glad to be here...learning a lot already.