Umpiring is not that difficult

[BigUmp56]

Originally Posted by GarthB

With apologies to Tee, this ties for the dumbest post ever.

I don't think Pete meant they all had to meet your lofty standards. Rather, I think he's saying that anyone who is inclined to give it their best effort to become an umpire can umpire a baseball game with a fair degree of competency.


Tim.

[GarthB]

There's a couple ways we can look at Pete's statement: "ANYONE can umpire, however, not everyone can play shortstop for the NY Yankees."

First, taken your way, Pete would be comaring anyone off the street who is willing to give his best effort at umpiring with a professional baseball player with inordinate skill and years of training. Ridiculous.

Taken another way, Pete would be suggesting that ANYONE could make it through proschool, PBUC, short season A, long season A, Double A and Triple A and then take the field in the majors. That long road is littered with enough bodies of those who didn't make it to demonstrate that, this too, is ridiculous.

And lastly, (for the purposes of my post) is the possibility that no comparison, though made, was intended, and that, rather, Pete was saying 100% of the population (as in ANYONE) was capaable of becoming a competent "average" amateur umpire. As a trainer of youth and HS umpires, I personally know this to be patently fase. There are some people who just never "get it". There are some people, no matter how many clinics they attend, understand the concept of, or can perform proper mechanics. There are some people who have no concept of calling strikes, and I've seen some trainees who were so afraid of the ball that they backed out from behind the catcher on every pitch, even after four week ends of training and half a dozen game.

Taken at any level, and without consideration to whatever you believe my standards to be, the statment was ridiculous and certainly at least ties for the dumbest ever made on the internet.

[3appleshigh]

Yak yak yak, I'm starting to understand how Tee and garth became so Jaded. Moron's like this spouting retardation. I know a lot more people who have played shortstop than have or could umpire. Yes not for the yankees, but lets compare apples here. Not everyone could umpire the Game 7 Plate of the world series in New York, no matter what some morons on here might think.

Also I think ANYONE could play shortstop for the yankees, just could they do it competently? NO, I think the same goes for umpires. Anyone can buy grey pants and a blue shirt and step on the field to adjudicate the game, but not as many can do it competently. There is a huge difference.

Don't simplify what we do, Don't devalue the service we provide and make us seem unimportant. That is what the fans and coaches do all the time, That is why the number of umpires is DOWN everywhere. And this is what causes the vast number of umpires to be useless, by saying anyone can do it shows that doing it right and getting better at it is a waste of time. That is not the case. Your post was a supreme insult to those here that attempt not only to UMPIRE but to UMPIRE WELL and PROPERLY.