[mcrowder]

You're right Luke - the way it is in your little neck of the woods must necessarily be identical to the way the rest of us have it set up. My bad.

Sarcasm off.

In all locations I umpire, either there is truly a separate individual paid and assigned to keep score (this is usually high school or at lower level tournaments) or we require the home team to provide one.

In EITHER of these cases, the scorekeeper IS required to be impartial, and is required to sit directly behind the plate umpire, away from the rest of the fans (and most definitely not "on a bucket" near a dugout. (And on many fields, is the only one shaded, other than perhaps the board operator (recruited from the visiting fans) --- a nice bonus for their efforts here in Texas).

And without exception, in the cases of someone recruited from the home fans - that person gets a short speech that they are temporarily one of the officiating crew, and they are not to bring any anomalies to the attention of either team. We specifically mention BOO (telling them to ignore and track unless PU asks them something). We also mention the few things that we DO want them to mention (illegal substitute, etc.)

This is the way things are run here from 8U up to varsity H.S., and for baseball, softball, basketball, and football (possibly others --- I've not worked or attended other sports). The occasional college game I work has scorekeepers in a booth, inaccessible (at which point, the emphasis on lineup keeping increases in importance).