Oh My, Haven't Seen This in a While!

[officialtony]

I don't see a problem with the hat. It lets people know that you care enough about the rules to be certified by the state. American Legion IS OBR rules, but at least you know the umpire has some decent training at some point. In our area up here, most everybody who wears the NAVY blue OHSAA shirts will wear their OHSAA hats with them. Many of the guys who do summer ball do not own any color shirt BUT NAVY, so they wear them year round. And I have NEVER heard any association up here demand that their umpires NOT wear OHSAA clothing unless they are doing an OHSAA game.
I own several different color shirts and have a Black Hat and Black Ball Bags to go with the Black, White, or Cream shirts I wear. I think it looks more professional to wear that combo together.
I'm not sure what your observation about the photos is concerned with. If it is because it IS OHSAA, I am fine with that. I am disappointed in the shirt however.

Looked at the pictures again. The shirt COULD be Blue.

Red Socks!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

That shirt is not an Ebeco shirt. It looks like a white short sleeve dress shirt. Frankly, I am appalled that an OhioHSAA official would wear his hat while wearing a shirt like that (not to mention the red socks) during summer league play. It just looks so unprofessional. And while we are talking about unprofessional looking umpires, you should see some of the umpires the umpire baseball in the City of Toledo (Ohio) Park and Recreation Youth Leagues. They would make any respectable official upchuck their breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

MTD, Sr.

[BretMan]

A white shirt? I hadn't considered that.

Looks like a light blue shirt to me, with the color washed out in the photo due to the sunny lighting. Compare the shirt to the white uniform worn by the player. The uniform looks bright white and the shirt seems to have a blue tint to it.

But I'll take this guy over the umpire I saw at a tournament last weekend.

Pants- faded to the point of getting that purple look to them, with ragged bottoms at the hem.
Shoes- mud encrusted.
Shirt- obvously unwashed and residing in the trunk of his car.
Ball bag- couldn't have been nastier if you had purposely rolled it in the dirt.
Hat- the topper (literally). Faded, filthy and frayed around the brim (like those "pre-ripped" hats that are sold that way), with chunks of material hanging down.

And the guy had long, greasy hair that looked like he just jumped out of bed and ran his fingers through it. Pretty much the worst looking umpire I have ever seen. I'll take the "Elbeco/red sock guy" any day!