Civility

BigUmp56 · #1 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 05:39pm

Jeff:

I have to say that I was impressed by your last post. It was probably the most concise and meaningful post I've seen you write. You're absolutely right, in that it's very much about simple respect. I don't care if they like it or not, but there has to be a certain amount of accountibility when information is imparted incorrectly by certain individuals. What sets the more prominent members of this board apart from a very select narrow minded individuals is their ability to accept a measure of accountibilty for the information they impart. I respect, and think most of us resect, a man who is willing to say he make a mistake. We have a few that I believe argue for the sake of arguing. These individuals could care less whether or not we respect them, and in turn afford no one else any respect.

Tim.

JRutledge · #2 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 07:47pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigUmp56

Jeff:

I have to say that I was impressed by your last post. It was probably the most concise and meaningful post I've seen you write. You're absolutely right, in that it's very much about simple respect. I don't care if they like it or not, but there has to be a certain amount of accountibility when information is imparted incorrectly by certain individuals. What sets the more prominent members of this board apart from a very select narrow minded individuals is their ability to accept a measure of accountibilty for the information they impart. I respect, and think most of us resect, a man who is willing to say he make a mistake. We have a few that I believe argue for the sake of arguing. These individuals could care less whether or not we respect them, and in turn afford no one else any respect.

I also hear a lot of this "admit a mistake" stuff from you and others. How are you going to make a mistake on an opinion? I think opinions are the essence of this place. Even when we talk about many rules there are interpretations that are given and vary by whom you work for and where you live. I know just where I live and what part of the state you are in there are many philosophies that vary. Tip O'Neill used to say, "Politics is local." Officiating is the same way. And when we talk about things often it is not going to resonate with everyone when we all have very different experiences. Having met and worked with officials from many surrounding states, it is very common that we all do not share the same attitudes and expectations in our officiating. I remember conversations here about keeping players in the batter's box brought many points of views and experiences and all were not the same.

Peace

SAump · #3 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 08:07pm

Thank YOU BLUEUMP, your post was a breath of fresh air. Nice try.

A finer kettle has never been posted on this website.

I think I just read the Hippocratic Oath.

WhatWuzThatBlue · #4 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 08:26pm

I also hear a lot of this "admit a mistake" stuff from you and others. How are you going to make a mistake on an opinion? I think opinions are the essence of this place.

Opinions are absolutely the essence of this place, well put. We don't require legal names to have one and only ask that the response be well thought and written, thus avoiding confusion.

However, opinions can be erroneous. If I opine that you are a transgender Martian who has never read a rule book, would I be mistaken? If my opinion that a pitcher doesn't have to engage the rubber to deliver a pitch am I correct? Opinions are the lifeblood of discussion boards and many are incorrect. We see time and again newbie umpires think that the hands are part of the bat. That is their opinion and they would be wrong. Some may think that amateur umpires are independent contractors while others will point out that this is a regional definition. What BU56 was getting at was that when you blunder, you have the intestinal fortitude to admit it. Sometimes it is a bitter pill to swallow, but if you want to be strong and act like a man, you may be forced to eat your written words.

I hate to admit it, but there was a point in my early career that seemed like I would never get the hang of our passion. I would assume calls, engage my mouth but contradict it with my physical call and argue with coaches. I realized that growing some thick skin, manipulating the system and slowing down were all part of the success equation. Sure, I blow calls every now and then - I've even been known to admit them to the right skipper. Over a beer or Jack Daniels, I've told stories of making the wrong call at the wrong time. Being able to realize your mistakes and capitalize on that awareness makes good umpires great.

BlueLawyer · #5 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 08:56pm

WWTB: here are my points. Again.

1. I can disagree with you without being disagreeable. I can disagree with your call without thinking you suck as an umpire or as a human being. I can disagree with your internet post, and say so, without engaging in character assassination. I can disagree with you without calling you names, questioning your ancestary or in general telling you that you are the biggest idiot ever to don a mask.

2. We (officials) are all in this together, to some degree, greater or lesser. My fellow blues are my competition, true. But before that they are my colleagues and my teammates. If they succeed, to some extent, I succeed. If this wasn't true, I'd throw my partner under the bus every time he booted a call and say something to the effect of "You're right, coach. He really does suck. I can't believe he's working this level of ball either."

If you don't think this is family, I have genuine sorrow for you.

Criticism is indeed the path to better officiating, and therefore, ultimately, better competition. Criticism should be constructive to acheive its intended goal, however. "Zega, you should have been deeper at C to see the play better. Here's where you need to be," works much better than, "Zega, you suck. That's something I would expect from a University of Arkansas grad. Quit umpiring now and save us all the embarassment of you being on the field. I hope you law better than you ump, or you're going to starve."

"I'm in it for me. Only me. Period." That attitude will lead to an awfully lonely and unfulfilling career. IMHO.

Strikes and outs!

BigUmp56 · #6 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 09:12pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlueLawyer

WWTB: here are my points. Again.

1. I can disagree with you without being disagreeable. I can disagree with your call without thinking you suck as an umpire or as a human being. I can disagree with your internet post, and say so, without engaging in character assassination. I can disagree with you without calling you names, questioning your ancestary or in general telling you that you are the biggest idiot ever to don a mask.

2. We (officials) are all in this together, to some degree, greater or lesser. My fellow blues are my competition, true. But before that they are my colleagues and my teammates. If they succeed, to some extent, I succeed. If this wasn't true, I'd throw my partner under the bus every time he booted a call and say something to the effect of "You're right, coach. He really does suck. I can't believe he's working this level of ball either."

If you don't think this is family, I have genuine sorrow for you.

Criticism is indeed the path to better officiating, and therefore, ultimately, better competition. Criticism should be constructive to acheive its intended goal, however. "Zega, you should have been deeper at C to see the play better. Here's where you need to be," works much better than, "Zega, you suck. That's something I would expect from a University of Arkansas grad. Quit umpiring now and save us all the embarassment of you being on the field. I hope you law better than you ump, or you're going to starve."

"I'm in it for me. Only me. Period." That attitude will lead to an awfully lonely and unfulfilling career. IMHO.

Strikes and outs!

The problem here is that we have a few individuals that will not accept any form of criticism, however constructive, without responding with personal attacks. We have an individual here who tried to explain to us why he felt it was appropriate to throw his partner under the bus on a non balk call. He rambled on and on about how bad his partner kicked it by not calling an obvious balk. When we pointed out to him that all balk calls are a shared responsibility he responded with all sorts of insults. As the thread went on we all found out that the real fact was he had nary a clue as to how to call a balk himself. Still, he persisted in whining like a school girl that we were picking on him instead of sucking it up and learning from other more experienced officials. I could go into detail about how this child believes in make up calls and had little insight into the nuances of the rules, but by now I hope you get the point. There has not been one single individual who has pointed out his errors that wasn't atacked personally.

Tim.

BigUmp56 · #7 (**permalink**) Sat May 27, 2006, 03:56pm

You've illustrated my point yet again. I've twisted nothing when responding to your posts. You simply don't care to have someone else dare to question you. There have been times to numerous to mention that you've given out erroneous information. It doesn't matter if it's me or someone else, if anyone dares to disagree with you when you do this, your name calling tantrums begin.

Lets's recap shall we. Without going back and actually pulling up all the threads where you've done this, I can recall off-hand quite a few you've done this to.

*Carl Childress

*Tim Christensen

*Steve Meyers

*Rich Fronheiser

*Garth Benham

*Alan Roper

*Myself

All of the aforementioned have had encounters with your nasty little rants. Some have gone so far as to mention to Brad that should you be allowed to continue to post here, they would refrain from participating. Why Brad has allowed you all the warnings he has is beyond me. This forum would be better served if you would either leave, or start to act like an adult.

Tim.

JRutledge · #8 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 09:15pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlueLawyer

WWTB: here are my points. Again.

Blue,

You are dealing with a person that claims to live in my area, talks about people by name while hiding his name, says things to people here he has never said to their face (talking about people in our area) and has flat out lied on people by making claims he cannot back up. Then he claims he knows more than everyone here while dropping his resume but no one here fits that kind of background. At least no one fits that background currently.

I would think someone with so much knowledge and the respect he claims to have in our area would want do lift up umpiring instead of tearing it down. This is why I pretty much ignore him.

Peace

WhatWuzThatBlue · #9 (**permalink**) Sat May 27, 2006, 12:08am

Quote:

Originally Posted by JRutledge

Blue,

You are dealing with a person that claims to live in my area, talks about people by name while hiding his name, says things to people here he has never said to their face (talking about people in our area) and has flat out lied on people by making claims he cannot back up. Then he claims he knows more than everyone here while dropping his resume but no one here fits that kind of background. At least no one fits that background currently.

I would think someone with so much knowledge and the respect he claims to have in our area would want do lift up umpiring instead of tearing it down. This is why I pretty much ignore him.

Peace

The song keeps skipping...we keep hearing the same refrain repeatedly. "I don't know who he is, so he can't be real. Others know his identity and believe his words but I can't because he made me look like a fool too many times. He can't be real. He can't be real. He can't be real. He can't be real..."

I do and have done more for umpiring in Illinois than you'll ever know. Plenty of people know me (in fact, an AMLU supporter was exceptionally talented at detective work) Yes, you keep ignoring me...(snicker, chuckle, guffaw)

The witching hour is nigh...sweet dreams, SBM.

UmpJM · #10 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 09:47pm

BlueLawyer,

Good post to start this thread. I started posting on this forum a little over a year ago, and had "lurked" for about a year prior to that. From my perspective, I can assure you that the AMLU strike is not the source of what you find distasteful in this forum. It was going on, to greater and lesser degress, well before then.

When I do post on this forum, I do my best to be civil. I am not above making the occasional sarcastic remark, but I don't go looking to pick fights with people. Out of respect for the members of this forum, I take some care with what I write so that it is coherent, I do my best not to publish misinformation, and I try to refrain from posting when I have nothing to say that will contribute to the conversation.

The internet is a wonderful and terrible thing. I know I have learned a lot from both reading and posting on this forum. One of the things that make it both wonderful and terrible is that pretty much anybody can say anything he wants on the internet, without any of the repercussions that might occur in a face-to-face or even "non-anonymous" conversation. On a few occasions over the last year (three, if I remember correctly), I have gotten into "tiffs" with other members of this forum. In each case, I had my say, they had their's, and it was over. I am sure this is true from my perspective, and I believe it is from their's. But some things I can't control. I continue to have conversations with these people, and occasionally "argue" (but I hope in a good way), because I respect their knowledge, experience, and willingness to share both.

There are other people on this board whose existence I do my best to not acknowledge publicly in ANY WAY. I have never addressed a post to any of them, I have never responded to a post they have made, I have never directly referenced or quoted the content of one of their posts (except exactly once), and I have not even mentioned their names, except on the rarest of occasions.

They are TROLLS (one of the "terrible" things about the internet). In my opinion, the current TROLL population of this board is three. In my experience, the only way to deal with trolls is to completely ignore them. This is not always easy to do. But until everyone does, they will continue to pollute this forum with their juvenile drivel.

In my experience, umpires can be a cranky lot - not by nature, but rather because of the nature of what they do. They are charged with the burden of being paragons of calm and rationality, even when lunatic coaches engage in insanely disrespectful behavior towards them because they didn't like the call the umpire just made - which, most likely, was the correct call. Sometimes it is very embarrassing to be a coach.

So, if some of them feel the need to come here occasionally and "blow off a little steam", I really don't begrudge them. I wish they wouldn't, but I have neither the right nor the authority to tell them they shouldn't, and I'm certainly not going to waste my time trying.

Apparently unlike some members of this forum, I have never had any luck with teaching a pig to sing. Maybe it's me, but it could just be the pig.

Again, nice post. Welcome to the forum.

JM

NFump · #11 (**permalink**) Fri May 26, 2006, 11:04pm

Don't listen to SA!

WhatWuzThatBlue · #12 (**permalink**) Sat May 27, 2006, 12:02am

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlueLawyer

WWTB: here are my points. Again.

1. I can disagree with you without being disagreeable. I can disagree with your call without thinking you suck as an umpire or as a human being. I can disagree with your internet post, and say so, without engaging in character assassination. I can disagree with you without calling you names, questioning your ancestary or in general telling you that you are the biggest idiot ever to don a mask.

2. We (officials) are all in this together, to some degree, greater or lesser. My fellow blues are my competition, true. But before that they are my colleagues and my teammates. If they succeed, to some extent, I succeed. If this wasn't true, I'd throw my partner under the bus every time he booted a call and say something to the effect of "You're right, coach. He really does suck. I can't believe he's working this level of ball either."

If you don't think this is family, I have genuine sorrow for you.

Criticism is indeed the path to better officiating, and therefore, ultimately, better competition. Criticism should be constructive to acheive its intended goal, however. "Zega, you should have been deeper at C to see the play better. Here's where you need to be," works much better than, "Zega, you suck. That's something I would expect from a University of Arkansas grad. Quit umpiring now and save us all the embarassment of you being on the field. I hope you law better than you ump, or you're going to starve."

"I'm in it for me. Only me. Period." That attitude will lead to an awfully lonely and unfulfilling career. IMHO.

Strikes and outs!

I'm not certain why you found the urge to reiterate your points, I read and understood them. I used to end some of my posts with a Carl tribute - A2D (agree to disagree). The problem with that is that umpires are an opinionated lot. We don't like to have our judgement questioned - evidenced by countless "Do I go for help on this call?" threads. I addressed the name calling issue - when you get too stressed or run out of communication skills, out pop the dick/mom/heritage jokes. However, sarcasm is a highly sought skill in our world. If you can't handle a wry jab, then you should never don a mask.

Umpires are not a family any more than any other occupation. (Lawyers are the class example - sure we are in this together, but I'll cut your throat and sell my grandmother to make partner/win this case/get elected judge/etc.)We have commonalities and understand the nuances and intricacies of a well called game. However, it is very much an every man for himself world out there. Even amongst NCAA crews, it is fairly cut throat. You want to excel and get noticed while helping your crew mates. Come playoff time across the country, the jealousies emerge. Ego is an intrinsic part of umpiring and the best know they are good. Am I a bad partner for giving a brutally honest post game to a weak crew mate?

I undersatnd that you think we should all live in a pablum internet world. "I disagree with your ruling, but you're a swell guy." That is not the way life is at any endeavor. On a discussion board, you state your opinion and then await the verdict. Just like on the field, confrontation is part of the game. The board owner and mods recognize this and allow a certain amount to pervade the site.

Finally, like those who wanted to ban the Da Vinci Code, why are you afraid of words? The old adage of sticks and stones comes to mind. Maybe we don't see I to eye and can dialogue in a politically correct manner. However, if I am as adamnat in my belief as you are, expect some discourse. If your sarcasm offends me, then maybe I respond in kind. Remember, they are just words.

BlueLawyer · #13 (**permalink**) Sat May 27, 2006, 08:01am

Quote: