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Old Fri Jan 06, 2006, 01:39am
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Rich Rich is offline
Get away from me, Steve.
 
Join Date: Aug 2000
Posts: 15,785
Quote:
Originally posted by Sal Giaco
Quote:
Originally posted by JRutledge
Are you telling me Randy Crystal (sp?) who has worked multiple College World Series and has worked in some of the biggest college football games in the Big 12 and worked a National Championship game in 2002 could not make the transition to the Minor Leagues? Many Minor League Umpires never umpired a single HS game before they got a shot to work pro ball.
Rut,
Do yourself a favor and go back to the basketball/football section of this forum because when it comes to baseball, you're about as clueless as most of the coaches out there.

Randy Christal would do a fine job working MiLB but there are very few umpires at the DI level that can work like him. As for your other ignorant comment about MiLB umpires skipping HS ball and going straight to the PRO game. You forgot to mention one thing, they are PROFESSIONALLY TRAINED and developed umpires - something that many college umpires don't have.

Face it, many NCAA umpires are either self taught or are "grey hairs" still hanging around the system because of "who they know" (mainly coaches). The fact is that college umpiring is getting younger and improving because of the training that is now available. Umpires' credentials are no longer based on how many years they've been umpiring but rather what experience and training they have had.

If you look at the NCAA umpires who work the big games (CWS and Super Regionals), many of them have previous PRO experience, usally at the AA & AAA levels. I'm done talking about this because I don't want to appear that I am bashing NCAA umpires, because I am one. I have a lot of respect of college umpires (for any umpires at any level for that fact), and we'll just leave it at that.
I work three sports (baseball, basketball, and football) at about the same level (HS varsity, although I work in 2 D-III baseball confereces) and the toughest thing in any of the sports is being a solid, consistent plate umpire. Nothing else comes close.