[greymule]

Calls YOU any name at all, he's gone. In my umping career, I've tossed only a few players, and it was always for something personal, never for their opinion of my call. Not even using the bat to draw a line in the dirt, a recent topic here.

From what you described, the farther that "coach" is from a baseball field, the better. And in a 9-10 league, he really shouldn't be questioning calls, except maybe very gently. Anybody knows that with kids that age, a coach is lucky if by the end of the season they know where to throw the ball. Unfortunately, youth ball is full of characters like the coach you describe. The league should get rid of him promptly. We have idiots like that around here, too, even though nobody is allowed on a field without taking a course that covers sportsmanship, safety, age-appropriate drills, etc.

Last summer, a major (350+ teams from several states) annual slow-pitch tournament held in Trenton, New Jersey, took a page from some of the southern tournaments and banned any and all bad language. "Zero tolerance." We were told to eject for anything you couldn't say in school. First inning of first game, the ump tosses a guy for "G** d*** it." (Hey, you wouldn't even have to stay after school for that one these days. But most of the umps went to school before most of the players!) But after the tourney, even the players agreed that the rule was good.