ok heres the situation: working a 9-10 year old rec game game coach of team A comes out and gets in my face calls me almost every name imanganable minus the F bomb, So I toss em. Would you have done the same thing. What ever happened to sportsmanship?

[Edited by ref5678 on Mar 3rd, 2002 at 01:30 PM]

That is what i would have done. I that is horrible sportsmanship and that coach should have been ejected right when when he got in your face and said the first bad thing that he said.

You did what <u>every</u> umpire should do.
The coach learned this was not acceptable behavior when HE was 9-10 years old (if not before).


Just my opinion,

Freix

There's The Parking Lot
 

One of the guidelines about ejections goes something to the effect that if the coach says that your call was horsebleep he is not automatically gone. When he says "You're horsebleep" it is his time to exit stage left. That means he goes where he can't be heard from, not the stands but quite a distance away such as the parking lot.

You don't mention what gave rise to the coach's angst. Coaches may have legitimate beefs but again that does not give them the right to get in your face and personal. Jim/NYC

Re: There's The Parking Lot
 

Perhaps in a 9-10 game, he should be.

P-Sz

<i> Originally posted by ref5678 </i>

<b> ok heres the situation: working a 9-10 year old rec game game coach of team A comes out and gets in my face calls me almost every name imanganable minus the F bomb, So I toss em. Would you have done the same thing. What ever happened to sportsmanship? </b>

You said 9/10 game - coach gone in a heartbeat, letter written to BOD or President of the League and hopefully at least a one game suspension. No need for that PERIOD, let alone at a 9/10 game.

One thing I like that FED does is <i> restrict the Coach to the Bench area </i> I would like to see that rule in other youth leagues as well.

In your situation you would have no choice, as the coach was going ballistic in a 9/10 game, however, for lessor offenses when the coach wants to come out and question everything IMO, the restrict to dugout rule is a good one. It keeps the coach in the game, but if he / she says anything further - SEE YA.

See if you can get a Local League Rule passed, allowing the umpire to Restrict the Coach to the Dugout.

Pete Booth

he's gone
 

Calls YOU any name at all, he's gone. In my umping career, I've tossed only a few players, and it was always for something personal, never for their opinion of my call. Not even using the bat to draw a line in the dirt, a recent topic here.

From what you described, the farther that "coach" is from a baseball field, the better. And in a 9-10 league, he really shouldn't be questioning calls, except maybe very gently. Anybody knows that with kids that age, a coach is lucky if by the end of the season they know where to throw the ball. Unfortunately, youth ball is full of characters like the coach you describe. The league should get rid of him promptly. We have idiots like that around here, too, even though nobody is allowed on a field without taking a course that covers sportsmanship, safety, age-appropriate drills, etc.

Last summer, a major (350+ teams from several states) annual slow-pitch tournament held in Trenton, New Jersey, took a page from some of the southern tournaments and banned any and all bad language. "Zero tolerance." We were told to eject for anything you couldn't say in school. First inning of first game, the ump tosses a guy for "G** d*** it." (Hey, you wouldn't even have to stay after school for that one these days. But most of the umps went to school before most of the players!) But after the tourney, even the players agreed that the rule was good.

I occasionally call tournament games at a LL park that has a neat house rule. If a coach or player gets ejected from a game, he is automatically ineligible for the next game, and before he may participate, he must apologize for his actions over the PA system microphone. Needless to say, we have very few ejections in these tournaments.

Here in Tennessee, if a FED coach gets ejected, he gets fined $250 by the state. We also have very few ejections in FED ball.

I think the moral of the story is that if coaches and players know that improper behavior can cost them cash and/or emabarrasment, they will usually think twice before getting out of line.

I occasionally call tournament games at a LL park that has a neat house rule. If a coach or player gets ejected from a game, he is automatically ineligible for the next game, and before he may participate in the next game for which he is eligible, he must apologize for his actions over the PA system microphone. Needless to say, we have very few ejections in these tournaments.

Here in Tennessee, if a FED coach gets ejected, he gets fined $250 by the state. We also have very few ejections in FED ball.

I think the moral of the story is that if coaches and players know that improper behavior can cost them cash and/or emabarrasment, they will usually think twice before getting out of line.