Quote:
Originally Posted by tballump
Ran into a guy once who said he went to the umpire school the last year they ever taught the outside protector. They had to spend 1/2 the school time teaching the outside and 1/2 the school time teaching the inside. Believe that was 1978 because he mentioned going to the school with Jimmy Joyce.
He said you put the straps on and then grab under the bottom of the protector and pull it up to your chin. You grab the bottom by cupping your fingers (like your going to file them) and grab under the 1/4 of the protector closest to your body as you grab the bottom so you do not get your fingers hit. You do not grab onto the inside hand strap if there is one (you got dinged for this). Most of the old big outside protectors did not come with this inside hand strap anyway. You lined up straight over the catchers head looking right down the middle of the plate and just sat straight down a little bit.
As Tim_C said, when the ball was hit you slide your right arm out of the balloon, reached up with your left hand to take off your mask and the protector is tucked up under your left arm with your hand holding the mask against the protector at hip level. You had to do the same running up the line for the swipe tag. You had to follow the lead-off batter all the way to 3rd, on a triple down the right field line when your partner went out, and you had to make the call at third on a first to third. If you call safe, the strap was left hanging on your arm with the protector dangling, which does not happen if you cheat and us the inside strap if you have one.
I do not write well or communicate well, but this is the best I can do from a story long ago. If you got an outside protector and Tim_C can line you up with Jimmy Joyce since Beaverton is near Portland, that would be the only way I know to actually see how it was taught at the school years ago. Also some of the senior crew chiefs would probably remember if you run into one of them at an off-season clinic.
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thanks for the tip on using the mattress, yeah, of course the inside protector is much easier to use but for a turn back the clock tribute to the game of yesteryear, i think it'd be neat to learn how umpires back in the day used to work...