[MD Longhorn]

In judgement calls, don't offer help...

But in a situation like this, the umpires have the responsibility to make sure the rules of the game are administered correctly. You are not "overruling" or "showing up" your partner if a rule is being administered unfairly or incorrectly. You are protecting the integrity of the game. If the umpire chooses to take offense when he/she is corrected on a rule interpretation, so be it - they shouldn't. But it's most important to get the rule enforced correctly.

Had one last year. PU had been umpiring for 30 years, and runs a clinic. Runner on 3rd, 1 out. The pitch comes in, bounces and is swung at for strike 3, and the catcher fields it cleanly. Batter takes off and makes it to 1B, as the catcher didn't want to allow the fast runner on third to try to score. PU rules that the pitch was not dropped, batter out.

Offense is in an uproar as I'm approaching her. I ask her if she ruled that the catcher caught the ball before it hit the ground - she says, "No, but she fielded it cleanly and didn't drop it." I try to remind her that she's got it wrong, but she won't budge. Offense protests (nearly drawing an ejection - yet another problem), and loses the game by 1. Needless to say, we had to replay from there later, and of course, PU was out of town that day.

We discussed the play between games (before the protest was even heard), and she insisted that since it wasn't dropped, it was not a "dropped 3rd strike". I kept reminding her that the rule does not say that if the catcher drops the ball, the batter can run... it's worded the other way around - (book not in front of me, so I'm hopefully not too far off here) - The batter is out if the catcher catches the 3rd strike before it hits the ground. She still doesn't back down and insists, "That's the way we teach it in my clinic." Scary.

Anyway - it's the responsibility of the umpires to correct a ruling error when they can.