Hockey Style Umpire Masks

[MT_Blue]

Hey all,

 

Ive tried searching this a couple times and am not finding a definitive answer, but how many different types of HSM are there? I know of three, being the Wilson Shock Titanium series, Allstars MVP series, and then the default that ASA sells which is the Schutt HSM Umpire. are there any others? all of my searches have come up empty...

 

Ken

[Mike Prince]

Diamond made one.

[guyinaredhat]

heard this guy made one...

 

[coachump4]

The one I use is a Diamond.  Always swore I would never go to a HSM however I tried one my first game this year and it never left my side bought it for $20 and still think I stole if from my partner. 

[BigUmpire]

Buy one and make sure you send a picture to mstaylor.

He loves them.

[Hawkman]

I had an All Star MVP that I used for one season. There were a lot of positives about it; I wear glasses and it worked really well with those, ;lus the peripheral vision was superior to a traditional mask. I honestly didn't find it to be any hotter than a standard mask with a hat. The negatives for me were that is was heavy and that it was very difficult to tuck under your arm when making changes to the lineup card. I also felt that direct shots hurt more with it than with my old standard mask. The only other HSM I've ever seen or tried on was the Wilson Shock FX; I know two guys that wear them and like them a lot. My partner actually bought my All Star from me and he loves it.

[BT_Blue]

Easton and Mizuno have one.

[BuckeyeMike]

I cannot ascribe to wearing one of these. 

 

When you take it off between innings, you have no protection on your skull from the sun.  (I'm balding, so i'm sensitive to this fact)

Doesn't it decrease what you can hear?

Isn't it a lot harder to put on/take off ?  (I can whip my whip my mask off quicker than anything)

[coachump4]

I cannot ascribe to wearing one of these. 

 

When you take it off between innings, you have no protection on your skull from the sun.  (I'm balding, so i'm sensitive to this fact)

Doesn't it decrease what you can hear?

Isn't it a lot harder to put on/take off ?  (I can whip my whip my mask off quicker than anything)

I am bald so I do get some sun.  Acutally no it doesn't decrease what I hear and somethings I don't want to hear anyways lol.  I was worried I wouldnt be able to remove it as fast as I can my old mask but have found that I can get it off just as fast if not faster and putting it back on is actually quicker for me.  I was one that said I would never go to the Helmet and found that after 40 games so far this year that is all I have worn and really love it.  After working a sectional game on Friday I found to love it more when I had a foul ball hit the top of the helmet and go about 25 backwards in the air totally out of play and never felt anything.

[Thunderheads]

You can wear a 6 stitch under an All-Star FM2500/4000

[LMSANS]

I cannot ascribe to wearing one of these. 

 

When you take it off between innings, you have no protection on your skull from the sun.  (I'm balding, so i'm sensitive to this fact)

Doesn't it decrease what you can hear?

Isn't it a lot harder to put on/take off ?  (I can whip my whip my mask off quicker than anything)

I wear a cap, just like a regular mask.

What?

It took me half an inning to get used to removing it.  That was 6 years ago.

[Umpire in Chief]

This might help.

 

http://umpire-empire.com/reviews/browse/umpire_equipment_reviews/maskshelmets

 

 

BTW. I'm getting somewhat close to relaunching the reviews with a new and better program which will incorporate into the site better and not be as spam prone.

[benjix4]

Good day all - Has anyone had a bad experience with the Wilson Shock FX HSM.  I took two direct hits this year one in college ball and one in varsity high school.  Both left me on the ground for a few minutes and one of them left me bloodied on the chin.  I did not move my head they were just crappy foul balls.  I wrote Wilson sports and they will not replace with a different mask.  I sent them two videos on MLB umpires who suffered concussions with these masks.  

[kylejt]

The forehead protection is lacking in the HSM. Thin padding, flat surfaces above the cage contribute to this.

 

The newer Wilsons have a cage that actually loops upward, to help out.

 

The new System 7 helmets have improved forehead padding.

 

IMO, none are close to the protection I get with my Team Wendy pads.

 

I've got an All Star MVP, that I wear on rare occasions. It covers my ears, and does effect my hearing. Also, when I do get hit, it's really LOUD inside. My ears ring for quite a while.

[CentralOhioUmp30]

Good day all - Has anyone had a bad experience with the Wilson Shock FX HSM.  I took two direct hits this year one in college ball and one in varsity high school.  Both left me on the ground for a few minutes and one of them left me bloodied on the chin.  I did not move my head they were just crappy foul balls.  I wrote Wilson sports and they will not replace with a different mask.  I sent them two videos on MLB umpires who suffered concussions with these masks.  

I used to use the Diamond Edge, but I switched to the Wilson FX last year.  I've probably been hit less than 10 times, but I haven't had any problems yet (knock on wood).  I am curious how you got blood on your chin though.

[CentralOhioUmp30]

I cannot ascribe to wearing one of these. 

 

When you take it off between innings, you have no protection on your skull from the sun.  (I'm balding, so i'm sensitive to this fact)

Doesn't it decrease what you can hear?

Isn't it a lot harder to put on/take off ?  (I can whip my whip my mask off quicker than anything)

Full head of hair here. 

I haven't noticed much of a difference, if any that would affect my performance (i.e. ability to hear a foul tip).

No problem getting it off at all.  

[MadMax]

Since I wore the originator of the "HSM" as a goalie in hockey, I'll contribute my take on them... 

I will not, nor ever, wear one for umpiring. That is my preference, so I will go on record to say I'll never dissuade a fellow umpire from obtaining and wearing one. However, one should read/hear about their characteristics and integrate them into their decision process.

The advantages they have is that when you're wearing one, it's on (there's no grey area, or improper position on the face, or being knocked off) -- there is a degree of comfort in that. They do offer flank / side / top protection rather well, and a degree of rear protection that a mask-and-hat just cannot. This is especially beneficial on the batter's backswing, or a released bat, or a shattered bat (when in use in appropriate leagues), or a foul ball bouncing off that backstop fence that is way too close for comfort (you know the kind... the fencing that you can scratch your back on between pitches). Or, even more insidious and tragic, when that catcher retrieving a wild pitch just blindly throws it back towards the diamond and beans the umpire.

Some have claimed that there's a better field of view with a HSM over a TM (traditional mask), but I don't "see" it... In order to really benefit on greater peripheral vision when I was playing hockey, I'd have to have my face pressed up as close as possible to the eye cage, but that introduced one of the greatest detriments of the HSM... it's called "standoff distance".

That's the problem with a HSM... it is completely dependent upon its shape when an object hits it. It is prow-shaped for a reason, especially in hockey, so as to deflect that impacting object past the point of impact on a vector. Any energy taken by the mask is supposed to dissipate along the entire structure of the mask, but because the standoff distance between the mask and your head is much shorter than a TM, you do take some of it. Where it really makes a difference is when you take an object straight dead-on. That energy has nowhere to go but to continue on the vector it was travelling... which in the case of the HSM, across that very brief standoff space and right into your skull (or, typically, your jaw).

In hockey, goalies typically have the ability to "see it coming" and prepare for a puck-shot to the head. As goalies, we're taught to "hunker down" and drop our chin, and try to take the puck off the crown... which is where the greatest standoff distance is. I've taken shots off the mask... the "most memorable" ones are those that hit someone out front (stick or body) and change direction, but that does aid our survivability because some energy is lost on that redirection (especially if it hits a body or a limp stick).

This isn't the case with foul balls.

There is absolutely no way that you can "see it coming" and anticipate where that foul-off is going to hit you. Thus, that TM, with its more voluminous padding and greater standoff distance is better protection for a ball (thrown or batted) to the face.

I emphasize "face" because that's going to be your weigh-off decision... Whether you have a greater concern for protection from objects in front of you or for objects to your peripheral (bats on the backswing, et.al.).

From my experience, I couldn't wait to get into an open-ear TM and half-helmet as a catcher. Full-ear helmets were hot, and tore up my ears every time I had to take the mask off (which for a few of my youth pitchers was often). I got really good at being a serviceable catcher even with the mask on (pop-ups, action plays, etc.), much to the chagrin of my coaches ("Take the mask off on a pop-up!" "But coach! I caught it, didn't I?! I saw it the whole time!"). It might be a contributing factor to my success as a wide receiver in football and as a goalie in hockey... I could pick up the ball/puck just fine through the bars. Tuned my eye-hand coordination really well. I can absolutely see why, though, youth and school leagues heavily enforce the HSM for kids. In the brief season we've had so far, I've already had to attend to four catchers hit in the head by bats on the backswing or thrown by an overeager hitter. Each of those shots were the bat hitting the side of the HSM, right where the ear is. When I was a high-school age club catcher, I took a bat to the head that knocked me clean out. I was wearing an open-ear TM and a brimmed helmet turned backwards... and the very inexperienced batter swung at a ball low and away that I (mistakenly, I realize that now) lunged at to scoop, and the bat caught me on the downswing right in the side of the head. Broke the helmet and I woke up in the ambulance. By God's good graces I still have all my marbles, and a HSM wouldn't have mattered.

Youth and school leagues heavily enforce HSM use because what is a concussion? A head injury. What's a bat to the ear? A head injury. And liability insurance is all about reducing (they'd like eliminating, of course) all head injuries. It doesn't matter to them that a TM reduces concussions, it matters to them that a TM doesn't reduce head injuries.

So, after all that said, as some of the other guys mentioned, there are HSM's from Wilson, Easton, All-Star, Schutt, Diamond and Rawlings. The All-Star ones are the most recognizeable, as they seem to be the brand-of-choice for those MLB catchers that wear them (Buster Posey, Martin Moldanado, etc.) Yadier Molina has a signature line of pads with Rawlings, and thus wears a Rawlings HSM. If you look at the All-Star, Rawlings, Schutt and Diamond models, they all look remarkably similar (differences in cage layout), and that's probably for very good reason. Easton's models are similar, but I've always seen them as narrower than everyone else's. Lastly, you have the Wilson, and in classic Wilson form, they look like no-one else's, and have this weird, bushido-warrior fencing mask appearance that I find, frankly, revolting.

[renegadewolf]

I have an Rawlings helmet myself. I switched to the full helmet late last year after taking a pitch that bounced funny off the dirt to directly behind my right ear resulting in a pretty nasty concussion,  I called over 500 games with the traditional mask without incident, but now I just don't feel comfortable (especially at the start of the year) wearing the traditional mask anymore.  While I've had relatively few games with the full helmet, it's very comfortable, view is great and most importantly I feel safer with it on.

[benjix4]

I used to use the Diamond Edge, but I switched to the Wilson FX last year.  I've probably been hit less than 10 times, but I haven't had any problems yet (knock on wood).  I am curious how you got blood on your chin though.

 

The batter swung very late ball barely hits his bat then hit the ctacher an d straight up to me.  Ball caught the lower end of the mask and pushed it up and away from my chin.  I tighten that mask before every game.  I'm convinced ita abad design and a gimmick to have a flaoting cage.

[T-Rav]

How are HSM masks supposed to be worn? Tight or lose? I have a Allstar MVP 2500 and am very curious.

Maybe I should talk to Allstar to see what their advice is.

[scrounge]

How are HSM masks supposed to be worn? Tight or lose? I have a Allstar MVP 2500 and am very curious.

Maybe I should talk to Allstar to see what their advice is.

 

I would definitely talk to All-Star, they've been very responsive to me and others. I guess I've never thought of it too much, mine is snug but not what I'd call tight.

[semper_fi_72]

Mine is just loose enough that my head will turn inside if it if you hold the mask still.

You still want it to move if you take a shot.

Any mask moving after a shot helps disperse the shock instead of transferring it to your head and face.