[Ump20]

Originally posted by Chris23
Hi, I am writing this article cause i am searching for advice. I am currently turning 18 and this is my 3rd year umpiring. I am not going to say what organization I work for but i will say i am in the NYC area. My first year i did a in-house league, the second year i joined the organization i am currently part of now. In my second year i did mostly 9-12 year old games, in my thrid current year i was told I would do 13-14 and 15-16 age divisions and work a two man crew. I went out and bought equipment to do behind the plate, i bought close to top of the line equipment, I put a huge emphasis on looking proffesional . Pants and shirts is always pressed shoes are always shinned before every game. I made sure myself and my organization was looked at in a positive way every time I did a game. We are roughly about 3 months into the season and i have seen a minute amount of 13-14 and 15-16 year old games. To make it even worse i get a ton of games in the weakest and youngest division we umpire. There are guys who i work with who just started umpiring and are raw and guys who have the same amount of experience i do just maybe a year or two older than me who get better games and in my opinion treated with a ton of more respect. Some of them dont show up to meetings and also cancel games on short notice. I rarely cancel my scheduled games, and i still get nothing in return for being reliable. I show a ton of respect to my boss in more ways than one. I have never complained about the games I get nor do I ever take it out on my organization. The only observation i can think of me not getting better games it that i am just not liked, I know it is not my umpiring skills, I have positive things said about me frequently at league mettings by many coaches. I feel I am at the bottom of the barell, I love umpiring dearly, I have looked foward to almost all of the games i had to do except for the past ten weeks in which i started to hate it and dread going to do games. I was never even confronted by my boss thanking me for doing and covering these games for him. If anyone knows of any organization in the NYC area please let me now and also tell me what you think I should do because i am seriously considering leaving this organization, thanks

Chris,

I am not so sure that you are not liked. It may be that your age is unfairly working against you and leading to you officiating much younger kids than you feel you should be doing. If you would like to move east a bit I can put you in touch with the assignor for my association, Long Island Approved Umpires. We have been in business over 50 years. While we do some leagues that play in Queens we do much more ball in Nassau County. We do mostly baseball from Little League to Connie Mack. Send me an e-mail to [email protected] Jim/NYC