[brandda]

Unlike the other thread, which really was insulting to LL umps, I don't read anything here I disagree with. My experience is very similar to Marty's. When I started umpiring, it was not for the money, but rather, it was something that the community really needed and that I thought I would enjoy doing. It made me feel good to help the kids out and, considering the pointlessness of most of our work lives, that was something that had a lot of value at the time.

Pete - a couple of points to make to what you said:
1) In the local league where I work, while they do not pay umpires directly, they will reimburse $20 a game after the first 8 games that you call for equipment purchases. My first year, I was able to pick up $700 worth of equipment this way which got me off to a good start.

2) My family never had a problem with it because we all love baseball. My wife and kids used to frequently come out to watch the games that I was calling just for the fun of it. We never considered it a sacrifice or anything that took away from the family. My kids now want to get trained up as junior umps which we will be able to do together. Now, golf is a different story.

3) See point 1 on the equipment.

4) No question that this one is an issue. In our league, we have been lucky that we seem to have a pretty good crop of new guys coming in every year and some pretty good training programs. We also maintain good relationships with the more experienced guys who do higher levels who started out with us and they still do a game or two per week. So it works out pretty well.

No matter how high I go, I will always try to do some LL ball. Partially, I feel obligated to them for giving me a place to start from, but mostly, I look at the kids who are just trying to have fun and realize that they are better off with good umps than bad ones. I consider it my contribution to our community.