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EJ or "that's nothing" ?


wolfe_man
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HS Varsity game.

Bottom of 7th, HT down by one.. one out.  R2 and R1.

Batter bunts to move runners over.  Bunt is on 1B line.  F3 picks up the ball and BR attempts to swat the ball out of the glove.  No contact is made to either player. We have an out on the tag.  VTHC goes ballistic screaming "Get him out of here!  That's bush league!".  

To be honest, he kind of caught me off-guard with being so offended and upset by it.  I am FU and the PU is closest to the call and made the call as an out.  Neither of us reply to the HC but we just move on.  He doesn't seem to want to discuss anything either, by that I mean he never comes out, asks for time, asks us to get together, etc.

The HT ends up scoring the tying and winning runs on the next play and the game ends.  HTHC & VTHC are having a discussion near VT dugout as we are leaving the field.  He is still hot about the play and mad at the other coach about it.  I try to explain why I felt this was not an EJ and why we simply allowed the out and continued play, but he was still adamant that it was bush league and BS (not loudly, just conversational to me and the HTHC).   He then said if this had been earlier in the game, he would have put one in the ear-hole of the next batter and walked away.  The HTHC was only trying to smooth things over and this guy was being a jerk.  Since they do not play anymore games together this year, I let it go since he walked away and the game was over. Now, I'm wondering if I should have EJ him to send a message that he cannot make threats or did I do the right thing by letting him blow off steam?

What are your thoughts on the non-EJ of the glove slap and then the coach's threats as I leave the field?  How would you have handled it differently?

Thanks!

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I don't see anything warranting ejection in itself. I would not have engaged in conversation about the call/non-call after the game--if you're in a situation where part of your duties say to stick around and make sure things don't get out of hand, then limit your conversation to that; in this case, there really was no reason to come into it at all.

Quite frankly, once the game is done, if the two HCs want to get into a fistfight, I'm not doing a thing to stop them--I'll note it and write the report.

 

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29 minutes ago, Matt said:

 

Quite frankly, once the game is done, if the two HCs want to get into a fistfight, I'm not doing a thing to stop them--I'll note it and write the report.

 

Yes to this many times over, I kicked myself for even letting myself be drawn into it.  I should have just kept my head down and kept walking as my responsibility had ended.

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If you ejected him, I wouldn’t have had an issue with it. He (theoretically) threatened injury to a player on the other team, and you were still within the confines of the field. 
 

Without an ejection, you could (should?) probably just submit a special report to your state association. Let that make its way from the state office to the AD/coach. Not only is it terribly unsportsmanlike...it’s about as dangerous as you can get on a field. I’d put people on alert about what was said. Who knows what happens down the line...another opponent, another year, etc. They can not only file it away, but make it abundantly clear that throwing at a HS kid is completely unacceptable, and IMO, should be grounds for losing your coaching job should it happen. 

Because as of this moment, that guy thinks that’s an acceptable retaliation for, at minimum, a missed glove slap in a high school baseball game. Think about that for a minute. I’d move to get that thought out of his head by doing something completely appropriate - the report. 
 

If it’s me, I’m filling out a report.

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1 hour ago, Thatsnotyou said:

If you ejected him, I wouldn’t have had an issue with it. He (theoretically) threatened injury to a player on the other team, and you were still within the confines of the field. 
 

Without an ejection, you could (should?) probably just submit a special report to your state association. Let that make its way from the state office to the AD/coach. Not only is it terribly unsportsmanlike...it’s about as dangerous as you can get on a field. I’d put people on alert about what was said. Who knows what happens down the line...another opponent, another year, etc. They can not only file it away, but make it abundantly clear that throwing at a HS kid is completely unacceptable, and IMO, should be grounds for losing your coaching job should it happen. 

Because as of this moment, that guy thinks that’s an acceptable retaliation for, at minimum, a missed glove slap in a high school baseball game. Think about that for a minute. I’d move to get that thought out of his head by doing something completely appropriate - the report. 
 

If it’s me, I’m filling out a report.

This is well said. If I am an AD, I would want to know I have a Varsity manager who thought it appropriate to say something about deliberately injuring an opposing player. As a parent of a high school player, I would want that manager's AD to be aware of what was said. Words of course are not actions and an AD could still respond in a way that makes it clear that even saying things about injuring players is unacceptable.

As a society, the world is constantly changing and updating itself. Words and conduct that might have been ok in the past, may not be ok now. It all starts with awareness and then working together towards a better tomorrow today. School leadership, athletes, coaches and officials can all play a part in this at a very grass roots level.

I'm sure we'd love to hear further adventures with this manager, if you work his games again, @wolfe_man...

~Dawg

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Nope. I've taught my (Umpire) kids: "If after the game, the coaches come out of the dugout saying to their team, "Hey, great game guys...hey, .anyone know where the Umpires went?" then you've done your job. Nothing good comes of staying around...

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On 4/30/2021 at 7:38 PM, Thatsnotyou said:

If you ejected him, I wouldn’t have had an issue with it. He (theoretically) threatened injury to a player on the other team, and you were still within the confines of the field. 
 

Without an ejection, you could (should?) probably just submit a special report to your state association. Let that make its way from the state office to the AD/coach. Not only is it terribly unsportsmanlike...it’s about as dangerous as you can get on a field. I’d put people on alert about what was said. Who knows what happens down the line...another opponent, another year, etc. They can not only file it away, but make it abundantly clear that throwing at a HS kid is completely unacceptable, and IMO, should be grounds for losing your coaching job should it happen. 

Because as of this moment, that guy thinks that’s an acceptable retaliation for, at minimum, a missed glove slap in a high school baseball game. Think about that for a minute. I’d move to get that thought out of his head by doing something completely appropriate - the report. 
 

If it’s me, I’m filling out a report.

Attempting to swat a ball out of a glove and missing doesn't seem like grounds for an ejection to me nor a report to a state association.  Perhaps if it was really a malicious looking swat but I'm not envisioning that based on the OP.  I'd probably report the talk about ear-holing a kid though.

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On 5/2/2021 at 10:06 AM, zoops said:

Attempting to swat a ball out of a glove and missing doesn't seem like grounds for an ejection to me nor a report to a state association

Do you mean if he had succeeded it would be grounds for an ejection?

Attempted interference is nothing...so, you can't call him out for trying to interfere.  If he succeeded, he would be out.   That part's easy.

But unsportsmanlike conduct doesn't require success...the attempt itself is either unsportsmanlike, or it's not...success/failure is irrelevant.  You're ejecting for the act, not the result.

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6 hours ago, beerguy55 said:

Do you mean if he had succeeded it would be grounds for an ejection?

Attempted interference is nothing...so, you can't call him out for trying to interfere.  If he succeeded, he would be out.   That part's easy.

But unsportsmanlike conduct doesn't require success...the attempt itself is either unsportsmanlike, or it's not...success/failure is irrelevant.  You're ejecting for the act, not the result.

No, I don't think it would be if he had made contact, I just used the description given in the OP.  I'm envisioning a play less egregious than ARod knocking the ball out of Arroyo's glove in 2004 (video below).  Call the interference (if it occurred) and move on - this doesn't register as an ejection to me, unless you somehow judge malicious intent.  Seems sometimes we think every time contact is made in a baseball game it needs to be an ejection.

I see your argument about penalizing the act and not the result, but certainly results play into it.  Would you eject an F3 for swiping an unnecessarily hard tag and missing the runner?  What if the same tag whacks the runner in the head as he's lying on first base?  Would you eject a runner sliding into second base with his cleats up but missing the fielder by 2 feet?  

 

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23 minutes ago, zoops said:

I see your argument about penalizing the act and not the result, but certainly results play into it.  Would you eject an F3 for swiping an unnecessarily hard tag and missing the runner?  What if the same tag whacks the runner in the head as he's lying on first base?  Would you eject a runner sliding into second base with his cleats up but missing the fielder by 2 feet?  

I don't think your examples work that well, because without results from them, it would be hard to determine intent. A better example would be a missed kick or something like that. 

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12 hours ago, zoops said:

Call the interference (if it occurred) and move on - this doesn't register as an ejection to me, unless you somehow judge malicious intent.  Seems sometimes we think every time contact is made in a baseball game it needs to be an ejection.

I see your argument about penalizing the act and not the result, but certainly results play into it.  Would you eject an F3 for swiping an unnecessarily hard tag and missing the runner?  What if the same tag whacks the runner in the head as he's lying on first base?  Would you eject a runner sliding into second base with his cleats up but missing the fielder by 2 feet? 

To be clear, I'm talking about rule sets/organizations where there's a lower bar/intolerance for unsportsmanlike behavior.   At the pro level, this is nothing.  At other levels, maybe it's something.

The results aren't a requirement for an unsportsmanlike act, but, in some cases, are necessary to gauge/prove the intent...a hard tag that misses isn't always evident to be a hard tag, or an attempt to slap the runner in the face - it might just look like a plain old missed tag...doesn't mean the intent or act wasn't there...it's just harder to detect, or be sure about it.

If you can gauge the intent without contact, then yes, eject.

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