Ejections

[Warren Willson]

Originally posted by Bfair

Warren, this is from the first of your 16 posts regarding this subject (grin). I am very pleased to see your attitude IS NOT as this first post APPEARED to be. I suspect upon review it sounded pretty hard-nosed.

Obviously you've stated hence that what you were trying to emphasize was that there is no requirement to issue an warning. I think most umps are aware of that point.

It also seems apparent to me that you are a higher level official. THE POINT I WAS TRYING TO MAKE was that I have seen many higher level officials who say one thing----in accordance with THE RULES!!----- and then practice another on the field.

Your original attitude SEEMED to be one that could be supported by the rules, but in reality would not allow you to survive long on the field---not with the many comments made by men. Your follow up posts seem to indicate you're just a wonderful marshmallow at heart and probably get invited to all the pajama parties held by the players. (grinz)

In this imperfect medium it is EASILY possible to impute an "attitude" to a poster where either none existed or the actual "attitude" was quite different. I have been posting on the Internet for a long time. I was posting in the early days of r.s.o and McGriff's and learned very early on that, despite the emoticons and other devices, people's words frequently fail to convey their true meaning.

I am no "marshmallow", but I am also no "harda$$" either. I have been called a "true gentleman" by players from my District League, and I have been called some other less than complimentary names, too. I have survived long enough on the field to call for many years at District League level (A-AA minors equivalent) and State League level (AA minors equivalent, on average), attend 11 Regional championships (including 10 finals appearances and 4 final plates), and 2 Australian Championships (including the championship final plate in the 1998 Commonwealth Cup - the Australian Senior Provincial Championship). I'm not bragging, understand. There are many umpires I know and respect who have done much, MUCH more. I'm simply suggesting that you can't do all the things I've done if you are a black/white, by-the-book, harda$$ official.

The other thing I have NEVER done is to believe that I KNOW all there is to know about the rules or their intent. That is partly what keeps me applying the penalties for rule breaches strictly as written, instead of making my own judgments about player or coach intent, motives, etc. I can legitimately use these cues to decide whether or not a breach has been committed. Once that is decided, however, enforcing the penalty is NOT optional, IMHO. I have ALWAYS practiced what I preach, both on and off the diamond. It's just that sometimes I have trouble helping people from other countries understand exactly what it is that I'm preaching! (grin)

In my recent series of articles for eUmpire.com on "Umpire Ethics", I am at great pains to point out that umpires have two (2) major responsibilities on the diamond:

1. Conduct of the game (in accordance with the rules)
2. Maintaining discipline and order on the playing field

In trying to explain how to maintain an ethical balance between those two often competing responsibilities, I have made it clear that there are times when strictly enforcing the rules is clearly the WRONG thing to do. I think that position betrays that I am not now, nor have I ever been, a harda$$ about going by the book. Certainly where the book has a specific penalty for a clear and undeniable breach of a rule, I believe that penalty ought to be applied as required. That is NOT to say that there aren't times when the maintenance of discipline and order might be better served by doing otherwise. The point is that umpires are powerful enough under the rules, without needing to play God in deciding if a penalty should or should not be applied depending on how they feel about the offense, or the offender, at the time.

Cheers.

[Edited by Warren Willson on Dec 23rd, 2000 at 05:39 PM]