[Ump20]

Originally posted by Warren Willson

Just for FURTHER clarification -

Saying "Joe, you are an idiot" is obviously a flame.

Saying "Joe, all your ideas are idiotic" is equally a flame.

Saying "Joe, that's an idiotic idea" is, IMHO, not a flame.

What is absent in the third example is any sort of personal pronoun. As soon as someone says "you" or "your", whatever follows MUST be personal. That is why I immediately eject participants from the diamond who start their objections with that personal pronoun; because anything that follows must be "personal". "That call sucked" is only an opinion, but "Your call sucked" is a personal criticism.

Cheers,

I am very much a proponent of free speech and I empathize with those umpires who feel their posts were unjustly exorcized from this site. I think to even begin to reach the potential of the Internet some decorum and civility has to be injected into the process even if that unfortunately means a post is deleted because it demeans another umpire. If that was your partner who was being blasted by a coach the way some of us label each other I think you'ld run his ass in a heartbeat. I know I would, and I average about an ejection a year. If we don't tolerate it from a coach why in heaven's name do we do it to each other?

I began my Internet journey toward better umpiring in early 1997. At the time I discovered McGriff's to be a challenging place to visit. As people became more comfortable there was playful needling that went on and even a thread or two that was involved in movie reviews, politics etc. At the time I posted that we should be more focused and one or two people said I should get a life.

I was quite shocked to visit after a quiet winter to find how bad the attacks had become in early 2000. Maybe we got too comfortable with the new medium. In many forums Carl and Warren are subjects of frequent criticism. Personally, I find most of what they initially write to be thought provoking. I am amazed how easily someone can get their goat ( or is it goats?) by calling them Emperor of in some other way challenging their "credentials". Someone posted recently that we don't really know how good an umpire is by the way he or she posts. I agree with that. Some may have thought long and hard about what they are going to write. We don't have the benefit of hindsight when it comes to mechanics and timing.

I know Carl no longer officiates on the field and the quality of ball in Australia has been questioned by some. I don't care whether Carl is retired in Edinburg or if Warren umpired something akin to Division I college. I can't judge them by watching them so all I have is their posts. They can be pretty brutal at times in some of their "rebuttal" posts but their advice and rules knowledge are outstanding. So how come more people are just members in name only? Maybe Carl and Warren (and others) should look how they "react" to challenges and work on being kinder and gentler i.e. not treat us as coaches.

Might I suggest an e-mail survey to all "members" to find out how often they visit with an effort to encourage them to participate. I am afraid that if we eliminate negative attacks we might be down to 2-3 posts per day. I would also ask if it is possible that a poster who has his post deleted have that returned to them via e-mail. Afterall they are the authors of posts which sometimes do have baseball content mixed into the "attacks".

I would also ask RightSports to communicate with us about the overall content and stagnancy of some of the content. I took the chance of becoming a member figuring I spend a couple hundred dollars every year on equipment, videos, and books. I realize some attention has been turned toward legal challenges but I would like to see more substantive interviews and more submissions from the various staff. Jim Simms/NY