Recruiting New Umpires

Recruiting Umpires

For those who might be in the area, a portion of my crew and myself will be at USC-Upstate officiating a college showcase tournament this Saturday and Sunday, between 8am and 2pm. If you would like to come out and meet us and discuss these issues, I'll be more than happy to sit and talk.

 

LRU regional

only saw one set of NCAA officials this year and that was at the D2 regionals friday at lenoir rhyne. the only one i really remember from her calls was for the LR-GCSU game and sometimes i wondered if she were calling her strike zone instead of the batters.

 

It's ALWAYS the umpires strike zone! And each one is different. The earlier in the game your pitcher and catcher figure that out, the better. Hopefully the zone will stay the same the entire game..........................lol.

 

Why does every thread that says anything about umpires turn into a bashing thread? Yeah, yeah, I know there are some not so good ones. We all complain about strike zones, missed calls, and everything else but it is part of the game. Always has been, always will be. At least they are out there trying. Without them, our girls don't play at all!

How many of us (yes us, I have complained about them too) who complain about the umps have actually put on the gear and got behind the plate for a real game? I did it once because the umps didn't show for a game. The game didn't count since there were no official umps but we wanted the girls to play anyway so I got behind the plate. Lets just say it was an eye opening experience! Even though everyone knew the game didn't count, that didn't stop the coaches, parents, etc. from complaining about the calls myself and another parent from the other team were making.

nc2aump is trying to help all of us and the sport! How about we get back to the real reason for this thread and help nc2aump and the sport!?

 

Umpires

I will respond to the thread about the strike zone, it is true that each official may have a slightly different strike zone; but when determining that, we have to look at all of the extenuating factors. One of the most important factors that determines the zone, is the level of play and the ability of those particular pitchers on any given day. A real good friend of mine and one of the most respected umpires in the fastpitch community is Emily Alexander; and she wrote an article for a magazine a few years ago, that I still use and pass out in my camps. The name of the article was "The Practical Application of the Written Rule". In it she stated that an official muct temper his or her game to the level of competition being played. ie. you cannot enforce the same ruling exactly in an 8U game as you do at the NCAA level. It takes an umpire a few years to adapt to good game managment skills and allowing the players determine the outcome of games. This relates to all sports, basketball, football and so on. CONSISTANCY is the most important tool that any official should bring to the field. Also I believe that a 2/3rds of the people watching the sport, couldn't really tell you what the strike zone rule actually states in the rule book; also most fans are deceived by where the catcher catches the ball and scream accordingly. although I do enjoy the banter as it relates to our profession, i would like tyo get back to the initial purpose of this thread, that being recruiting new officials and helping the ones that really want to do a good job, reach their goals.

 

Excellent points regarding the strike zone and applying it to the appropriate skill level.

Before getting into coaching fastpitch, I umpired baseball for 15 years and worked my way up to calling some small college games. And two of the best compliments an umpire can hear are from a coach are "you were consistent" and "I barley even remembered you were in the game".

 

Recruiting Umpires

I want to take this time to thank everyone for your response to this thread and appreciate all of the comments. I also appreciate those that chose to contact me about learning more about our profession and to attend the camps. If all the people involved in this sport would pull together and realize our objective; that being the improvement of the sport for our daughters, then things will change and we can give our daughters the same opportunities that our sons have had for all these years.