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Stopping Game For Sun ?


Doug Ward
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Question

Having been a high school umpire for 28 years in West Virginia and Kentucky I witnessed in a Ky. regional baseball game an occurrence never seen before by me or many in attendance.

 

Scenario:

 

Team P comes to the field in the top of the 6th inning , the pitcher for Team P tells the umpire the sun is in his eyes due to a setting sun. The umpires remove the teams and the delay lasts for 20 minutes to the disbelief of many in attendance. 

 

Could I get some "takes" on this?

 

In my estimation this should not have happened? Anyone ?

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Having been a high school umpire for 28 years in West Virginia and Kentucky I witnessed in a Ky. regional baseball game an occurrence never seen before by me or many in attendance.

 

Scenario:

 

Team P comes to the field in the top of the 6th inning , the pitcher for Team P tells the umpire the sun is in his eyes due to a setting sun. The umpires remove the teams and the delay lasts for 20 minutes to the disbelief of many in attendance. 

 

Could I get some "takes" on this?

 

In my estimation this should not have happened? Anyone ?

I have seen Sun Delays here in AZ before.... Usually it's because F2 can't see the pitch coming in.

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One word - sunglasses  :cool: .

 

I had a game last year on a field where we had to delay for sun.  The setting sun was directly in the eyes of everyone at the plate - batter, catcher and me.  I put on a pair of Oakleys and still couldn't see the ball.  F2 took 2 straight pitches unseen to his CP, the batters also couldn't see it so we waited.

 

But in the OP situation, no reason to delay.  Someone can get F1 a pair of sunglasses.

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Having been a high school umpire for 28 years in West Virginia and Kentucky I witnessed in a Ky. regional baseball game an occurrence never seen before by me or many in attendance.

 

Scenario:

 

Team P comes to the field in the top of the 6th inning , the pitcher for Team P tells the umpire the sun is in his eyes due to a setting sun. The umpires remove the teams and the delay lasts for 20 minutes to the disbelief of many in attendance. 

 

Could I get some "takes" on this?

 

In my estimation this should not have happened? Anyone ?

Why not? Think safety!

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we have a field in town where anyone at the plate is blinded by the sun in the early part of the season. the resolution: THIS is the field that we put lights on.  Some of our delays can last an hour.  therefore, in an effort to get the games in, we turn on the lights and keep playing.

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Having been a high school umpire for 28 years in West Virginia and Kentucky I witnessed in a Ky. regional baseball game an occurrence never seen before by me or many in attendance.

 

Scenario:

 

Team P comes to the field in the top of the 6th inning , the pitcher for Team P tells the umpire the sun is in his eyes due to a setting sun. The umpires remove the teams and the delay lasts for 20 minutes to the disbelief of many in attendance. 

 

Could I get some "takes" on this?

 

In my estimation this should not have happened? Anyone ?

It's a safety concern. If the batter can't see the pitch and catcher can't see the pitch, it can go bad real quick. Think about it, f1 is throwning 90-95, do you want to set up back there without being able to see?

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There are several fields in our area that the sun becomes a risk to players and umpires. I was in the field for a game and when the ball was hit I flinched because I had no clue where it was due to the sun. I think if safety is a concern delaying for the sun is more than reasonable!

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Absolutely a good reason for a delay.  F1 could be killed, blinded, have his teeth knocked out, have his face smashed in...

 

And you can bet the umpire will be blamed for any injuries, if he does not delay the game!!!  Disbelief on the part of spectators is a regular occurrence at a baseball game and not a reason to do, or not do, anything.   :no:

 

I have delayed a game for sun in the pitcher's eyes, and delayed a game for sun in the batters' eyes (and my eyes, and F2's eyes).

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I had the opportunity to work the Cape Cod League from 1998-2000 and the Bourne Braves had a field that had the sun sit behind the pitcher. We had to stop the game every time because there was no way we were able to see the pitch coming at us. Remember, it's a game with human beings. SAFETY!

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I had a game a few years ago where the sun was low and between the third base dugout and homeplate. A rain shower started and while the rain was nowhere near being hard, it was enough to reflect the sunlight off every drop that fell from the sky and make it impossible to see anything coming off the bat.

 

10 minutes later we continued play as clouds then covered the sun.

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Ive got one field in my area that has the setting sun going down right behind the backstop effectively blinding infielders and outfielders....to cut down the delay they neatly covered the reverse side of the backstop with black tarps to lessen the delay....from start to finish the delay lasts only about 15 mins....and that is only on cloudless days.......

 

effective safety procedure.......... as having been the BU on that field many days, with or without sunglasses its blinding.....

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The field we had in Alice Springs was like that.  We generally played in broad daylight, or late enough for obvious light use (sun went down relatively early there).  But when we had a game that was played in the 5-6pm area, the sun would be brutal on F3 (and the ump in A) for a while, before setting behind the ridge line outside of town.  So there'd usually be a 15-20 minute break at some point, to get past that part.

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I think that you have use the mind set of being safe. I wouldn't want to explain in court that I didn't think the sun was that blinding after some player takes a shot to the head because he couldn't see the ball screaming towards him.

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I should have delayed a game this past weekend . Sun was setting behind F6 and a large white building was behind 2B . Had trouble tracking the ball with shades on under my mask and had an uncaught pitch hit me in the shoulder. I sucked it up and finished a 7 inning game in 1:51 , my last of 5 that day . Looking back , I probably should have delayed the game but I wanted it done and the TD would have had a coronary if I had stopped it .

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I should have delayed a game this past weekend . Sun was setting behind F6 and a large white building was behind 2B . Had trouble tracking the ball with shades on under my mask and had an uncaught pitch hit me in the shoulder. I sucked it up and finished a 7 inning game in 1:51 , my last of 5 that day . Looking back , I probably should have delayed the game but I wanted it done and the TD would have had a coronary if I had stopped it .
Not to go off topic but why did a shoulder shot hurt?
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It didn't hurt . I sucked it up because I was so tired . The shoulder shot surprised the hell out of me . Lost it half way to the plate !

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