[PeteBooth]

Originally posted by Carl Childress

We're not talking war or peace, life or death here. We're talking about how to cover a baseball diamond and work as a team.

Papa C IMO the aforementioned says it all. Baseball is a GAME and as we have found out there is NO ONE accepted way of umpiring.

We have had huge debates over such things as:

Uncaught 3rd strike less than 2 outs and B1 starts to run.
Do we say Nothing or do we
Signal the out sign and say batter is out.

Then there was the infamous balk call that ended the game.

We could go on and on meaning there is NO accepted way of doing things.

As with most publications, it boils down to which writing style or author one likes best.

There are those that read anything Hemmingway has ever written and there are those that wouldn't read the cliff note version.

As for me Not to suck up but I enjoy your articles as well as those of Jon Bible.

Why!

I think both you and Jon give ALL views (including your own) on a certian subject matter and allow the reader to decide for him/herself.

In addition I also learn from some of the articles especially Jon's article on calling balls/strikes in which he stated that he treated the strike zone as a "window" which made his job as PU easier.

Perhaps you can alure Jon from referee where IMO would make a great addition to the staff.

In addition, it's much easier to take advice from an author who has umpired at every level from HS all the way to the BIGS.

In Summary as with any publication there are those articles which one will have no use for but there are many which one will. Also, the writing style and author also alure subscribers as well.

Pete Booth