Quote:
Originally Posted by Manny A
Guilty as charged. I haven't been to an ASA school or clinic (other than routine pre-season training with my association). The vast majority of what I know is through OJT from previous ASA Nationals, Showcases, and other tournaments. And with the exception of maybe two or three games a year, I work two-man in those games.
And as others have pondered, I did start out as a baseball-only umpire, and worked baseball for about 12 years, before moving over to softball. To this day, I still bring those nasty baseball habits onto the skinned moundless field with me (like tracking pitches only with my eyes, not signalling foul on the ball back to the screen, etc.)
So maybe I wasn't cut out to be "assigned to a tournament of this level for ASA." But I can tell you that there wasn't a single umpire from what I saw or heard during post-game critiques of other crews who didn't screw a couple of these things up. Perhaps it's because they all had extensive NCAA experience, or maybe they, like me, had a baseball background. Or maybe they were just human.
Whatever the case, I was not alone in either forgetting, or just being totally unfamiliar with, the "ASA way" that was expected of us in this National. And I posted my observations to help others here who may be in the same boat.
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Manny, I wasn't suggesting that you shouldn't have been there, though without a national school, IMO, you shouldn't have, but more on a procedural standpoint.
And part of my reason is just what you stated here. These things are common mechanics for ASA. Would you not agree that to reach the top level of ASA FP, the umpire should have the advantage of this knowledge beforehand? If you were a coach, would that not be your expectation of the officiating crew? I can understand umpires just moving into the world of NC play not being 100% up to snuff on some things as different areas and instructors do occasionally insert personal, non-official mechanics, but that should not be an issue at the Gold.