[UmpJM]

Rich,

The "five words or less" theory makes an awful lot of sense to me, and I am working on becoming an effective practitioner.

So far this season (3 games) I've had exactly one "conversation" with a coach about a call I made during the game. I was working solo, and the F1 successfully picked off the R2 at 2B.

After I called him out, the offensive head coach (who had been coaching 1B) came trotting down to talk to me. I called "TIME!" (though he never requested it), removed my helmet, stepped out from behind the plate and waited for him.

Though he never said so, I believe he was displeased with my call. Our conversation went something like this.

Coach: (In an incredulous tone of voice) Where did he tag him?!?!?!

Me: On the arm.

Coach: (Less incredulous tone) How can you call that from back there?!?

Me: I had him out, Coach.

A brief moment of silence ensued and the coach returned to the box and we went back to baseball. No further incidents.

What I saw on the play was the runner was fooled by the pick-off, slipped on his initial attempt to return, the throw beat him back to the bag, and the F4 got a tag down on the ground as the R2 did a "reach slide" back into 2B. Whether the F4 actually physically tagged the runner or not, I have no idea. The coach may have had an angle where he clearly saw his runner evade the tag. From my vantage point he was out.

Now, a lot of things were going through my head that I might have liked to have said ("That's a $50 call Coach, you want that one, pay for two umpires." or "I know, why don't YOU take the plays on the bases & I'll just do strikes/balls and fair/foul?" or,,,,)

Anyway, I'm glad I resisted the urge.

The author of the book is a former English professor and a former Policeman. He developed his theories from his experiences as a cop and seeing how some cops seemed to naturally defuse tense situations while others turned innocuous situations into extremely tense, and sometimes violent, situations.

It's not especially well-written, but there are a lot of interesting ideas.

JM