[jumpmaster]

There was another umpire assigned to this game. He was on duty as a police officer and had been approached about working another tournament that weekend by another assignor.

Our assocation has multiple assignors that assign the various leagues. When making out the tournament schedules, the assignors meet as a group and identify teams of 8-10 umpires to work the tournaments.

This assignor has had a reputation of not calling until the last minute to fill slots. In addition, by his own admission, on 2 other recent occasions, this assignor failed to ATTEMPT to fill a vacancy.

We did have umpires available. I personally know of 2 that routinely call this level of ball and would have re-arranged schedules for this type of situation.

My beef about the age is not specifically his age but that this kid is a rookie and looks 14. I should have made that clear.