Lost the ball, kicked the call

[Umpire in Chief]

Had a rough one Friday...

Through the game I had a few visits in the field by both coaches giving it all for their teams in this well highly contested game. One coach almost found his way to an early departure over-arguing a call when his runner never even made the bag and was tagged out. But I was on rock solid ground on all these calls, and had zero doubt.

Top of 7th. Home up by 2. 2 outs. R2.

BR hits one to left center which should have been caught. F8 didn't get a good jump on it and fields it on the hop.

I can only assume the BR was assuming the ball would be caught because when the ball hit the ground I looked at first to see the runner touch, and he was nowhere near first. I pick up the ball again in flight as F8 has thrown the ball to the plate. I glance at first a little longer at the BR this time and see the runner touch 1st and he's hesitant in going to 2nd, but rounded it hard but began to hold up. I glanced longer to read what he was doing and where I should be heading, but with his indecision. I'm drifting directly behind the mound.

As I turn my head again to pick up the ball I hear my partner give a big "Safe!" But the ball is already in flight to second, and virtually over my head. -- To tell you the truth I didn't read the throw from F8 making the plate at all, or that quickly but apparently it did...

I turn to second, and BAM that play blew up on me. I have a runner on second an infielder holding his glove down on the runner, but I have no clue what happened.

My gut and baseball instinct said call him out, but since I didn't see that I had to call him safe.

Out comes my new BFF to give me an earful.

Amazingly as soon as I opened my mouth to try to cool his jets he ran off the field as quickly as he had run on.

Once again my gut was telling I was wrong.

That runner ended up scoring too tying the game.

As it played out the home team loaded the bases and then hit one in the gap to win the game, so the call had no effect on the game. I just felt like crap.

After the game I'm talking to my partner and he confirmed he had the kid out too.

I think this is an example of me slowing the game down too much in my mind, when it really is going 100 mph.

I've been pretty proud of myself for being able to mentally slow down the game in my head to control my timing and help me make better calls, but this time it bit me.

[JaxRolo]

I appreciate your story in that even the best can kick a call once in a while. I bet it will be a very long time before that ever happens to you again.

Thanks

[Umpire in Chief]

I appreciate your story in that even the best can kick a call once in a while. I bet it will be a very long time before that ever happens to you again.

Thanks

Yes, the best can kick one, but this was me. I'm pretty far down the totem pole...

[Paperipper17]

There's no worse feeling on a baseball field than seeing the end of a play and not knowing how the hell it happened. It's bound to happen to all of us at one point or another...when it happened to me a few weeks ago, it was because the game was moving too slow rather than too fast. R2, 2 out, 13U rec game. I'd been doing nothing but good 11U and 12U travel games and I was not prepared for how far the game slowed down. Grounder to F6. He comes up with it. I start to cheat over from C. He steps. Steps. Steps. Finally starts to throw. I turn, anticipating a banger at first. Instead, I hear a scuffle behind me. Get a BAD feeling. Turn back around and see R2 lying with his hand on the bag and F6 lying on top of him with the ball, both looking at me. I hear the stands start to scream "He isn't even looking! He didn't even see it!"

I had to safe the kid. I didn't see the play, and with OT down by 8 and fading fast, I didn't figure it would hurt. Neither coach complained, although DC came up to me after the game and said his F6 told him the kid was safe. But still, a horrible, horrible feeling...I've since learned not to cheat ahead of the ball.

Your sitch is definitely illustrative of a serious shortcoming in the 2-man system...get into a total cluster:censored: of a play, when you don't know what's going to happen next, and you have to pull your attention away from the ball to check touches and read the runners. That allows situations to blow up very quickly. And with as many games as you've done, to have that be such a rarity, I have to say you're doing a damn good job.

[Umpire in Chief]

In hind sight I was trying to do too much (might I add, unnecessarily). I should have been less concerned with the BR once I (finally) had the touch of first and let the ball guide me to my destination. Had I just gotten the touch and immediately picked the ball back up I would have been fine.

[yawetag]

In hind sight I was trying to do too much (might I add, unnecessarily). I should have been less concerned with the BR once I (finally) had the touch of first and let the ball guide me to my destination. Had I just gotten the touch and immediately picked the ball back up I would have been fine.

"All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes." --Winston Churchill

[mstaylor]

Both sitches are good examples of why you watch the ball and check riunners, it gets you to the right base and keeps from getting wacked with the ball.