Quote:
Originally Posted by Rich
I love these stories.
I have one of my own.
I'm coaching my daughter's softball team this summer. 8U. I'd give anything for girls that could catch, pitch, hit, etc. but we're having fun and we're doing OK. We're playing a lot of 10U teams and actually won a 10U tournament a few weeks ago.
We're at a tournament this past weekend and end up the 3 seed out of 12 teams. We had a game against the 6 seed on Sunday to advance to the semifinal.
One umpire with a HS player on the bases. Hey, he was actually dressed in a uniform, which isn't a usual thing for us. At this age level, there are so many modified rules I have a hard time keeping them straight, so it's no big surprise that they are different from game to game and umpire to umpire.
First inning of the game, there was a throw that got through at second base. My runner came to third and I sent her home. The plate umpire yelled at me and the runner, "ONE BASE ON AN OVERTHROW!" I was a bit stunned, but figured that was one of the day's modifications, so I said, "No problem. If I run a girl too far, just let me know and we'll put her back."
"IF YOU KNOW THE RULE, WHY WOULD YOU RUN HER?" Top of his lungs.
Wow.
Next inning, I had a legitimate question about a rule modification. I asked for time, was granted it, and walked calmly to the plate umpire to ask the question. Before I could get a sentence out, he yelled at me, "SHUT UP AND GET BACK IN THE DUGOUT."
Stunned, I went back towards the dugout and the umpire followed me. I turned towards him and he then said, "ONE MORE WORD OUT OF YOU AND YOU'RE GONE."
I was so stunned that I think I said, "But..." and just like that, he ejected me.
I walked out without saying a word and ended up on a picnic bench in left field. After I left, one of my parents said something and he turned and yelled through the fence, "SHUT UP OR YOU'RE GONNA LEAVE."
The tournament director was sympathetic and came and talked to me and said I could return to the tourney if my team won. We didn't. My kid was an absolute basket case, but she pitched the next inning really well.
So there it is. My first career ejection on the other side. I still don't know what hit me, other than the worst umpire I've ever seen.
|
Wow, just wow. I've seen some uptight umpires in my day, but this takes the cake. You never yell at a coach when you are an umpire. If there is an issue, you talk to them in a calm and professional tone of voice. You can be authoritative if needed, but that is different from yelling. You also never ever follow a coach that is walking away from you.
The worst one though was the "if you say anything else, your out of here" type comment. The good news, he followed through with his threat. The bad news is you have now forced yourself into a corner as an umpire, because even if the coach says "ok" you need to toss them.
I have never seen an umpire get removed from an event in softball, but I've seen a couple instances in volleyball where officials have nearly been sent home (and in my opinion should have been). One was a varsity event where the officials was making all the calls, even though most of them were not his call to make. He was also very rude to the coaches when they attempted to question calls. Finally he was very rude to the event manager when his officiating was brought up. Thankfully they changed the schedule so he was not working the gold bracket matches in the afternoon. (Funny about that he said he wanted to start doing college matches, one of the parents of a team he screwed over on a call is a national level official (worked NCAA post-season play) and is the volleyball trainer for USAV. That ended any plans he had of advancing to college ball anytime soon. The second issue was an official who was yelling at a coach to the point of making her cry at a tourney. It was a season opening event and was freshman volleyball. She was a new coach (college graduate last year) and made a couple coaching mistakes. Instead of talking to her about the issues in a professional manner, and calling the issues by the book, he started berating her in front of the teams, fans and other coaches. Several of us who witnessed this wanted him removed, but the school AD refused. This is the only time I have ever been in favor of removing an official in an event.
The first official I mentioned from volleyball was removed from my assigning list for a sport I assign, swimming. I observed him at a meet that he showed up late to, and had no clue what he was doing. It was so bad I thought he was going to toss the visiting coach from the meet for questioning his starting procedures. (You can't start backstroke from the pool deck). This visiting coach is one of the most mild mannered coaches I have worked with, and never has he said anything to anyone that would warrant an ejection, but he was close at this SWIM MEET (I've heard of three ejections from swim meets in my life, and one was for a swimmer violating a rule repeatedly-jewelry).