Congrats Tim C!

[Tim C]

"By "top level" do you mean the largest schools? We have five classifications, and working the final in any of them is an equal honor. By the time you get to the finals, all teams are fairly equal in talent, and, as a matter of fact, one of the smallest schools is currently ranked 1st overall in the state."

Oregon has six levels (for baseball the two smallest groups are combined) of baseball at the championship series.

Every now and then we have team from a lower level that may be the best team. This usually happens when that team has a pure D-1 type pitcher and has been able to fill in the gaps around him.

Nothing should be taken from any team that makes the final. They are all deserving. Last year all five championship games were decided by one run.

"Why require college experience in a high school game? I meet that requirement, but I have some high school partners who are very, very good (better than some of my college partners), but do not have the time to devote to college ball."

It is not a requirement to work college baseball to work the tourney. It is most common, however, that the better umpires in Oregon are in a college association. Rei's point is that "normally" when you get this high in the playoffs that the nature of selection falls to better umpires and they are in a college group.

Trust me . . . every one of the college umpires that have been selected in recent years worked a FULL high school schedule.

"Why exclude an umpire from working a classification just because he does not work that classification during the regular season? Are the rules different?"

The Oregon School Activities Association and the Oregon Athletic Officials Association passed very strict rules about the necessary qualifications for state tournament officials.

The thing you might find interesting is the rules were made to assure that officials that worked smaller schools were insured to get fair treatment at tournament time. Some groups were sending "highly rated" officials to work state tourney games that included size and genders they did not work the entire year.

In Oregon an umpire must have worked games in the division he is selected to umpire at the finals. If I came from an area that did not have a 6A (Oregon largest sized schools) then I could not work the 6A Final. (It just happens that this year I worked ONLY games at the 6A level and that would mean I could not work ANY other game at the finals.)

If I am reading your tone correctly you don't necessarily care for our system.

It is better than what was in place before.

BTW, I do not work college baseball.

Regards,

[Blue37]

Originally Posted by Tim C

[B]
If I am reading your tone correctly you don't necessarily care for our system.

It is better than what was in place before.

BTW, I do not work college baseball.

Regards,

I do not care for the system as described by rei. Your clarification removed my concerns.

Congrats on the assignment!!!

P.S. When a school from your area plays a school from outside your area, do the schools from outside your area ever complain about two of the three umpires being from the association which services the other school? If one of your schools is in the final, does the third umpire work the plate?

[Tim C]

P.S. When a school from your area plays a school from outside your area, do the schools from outside your area ever complain about two of the three umpires being from the association which services the other school? If one of your schools is in the final, does the third umpire work the plate?

Very important question.

The Portland Baseball Umpires Association is the only umpire association in the State of Oregon that is deemed "neutral' by the Oregon School Activities Association.

That decision was established simply by the large number of umpires we have and the large number of schools we cover. It is rare that one of the selected umpires would have worked more than one or two games of a team from our area that makes the final.

Even though we were considered "neutral" for many, many years we were not getting to work the plate of the final game IF a school from our area was in the game. The Oregon Athletic Officials Associaiton corrected that issue and last year "Rei" became the first PBUA umpire in many years to work a plate game in the 6A Final (yes what I wrote is accurate - simply because of the number of schools we work a team from our area seems to ALWAYS make the final so were missing a plate final every year).

This year IF the defending State Champion team (from Medford, OR) makes the final then our third member of the crew (he's from the Medford Group) could not work the plate and one of the PBUA guys will get the plate assignment.

Hope this all makes sense.

Regards,

Originally Posted by Blue37

By "top level" do you mean the largest schools? We have five classifications, and working the final in any of them is an equal honor. By the time you get to the finals, all teams are fairly equal in talent, and, as a matter of fact, one of the smallest schools is currently ranked 1st overall in the state.

Why require college experience in a high school game? I meet that requirement, but I have some high school partners who are very, very good (better than some of my college partners), but do not have the time to devote to college ball.

Why exclude an umpire from working a classification just because he does not work that classification during the regular season? Are the rules different?

Classification, level...pick your term. BUT, after our re-classification alignment last year, it was pretty obvious that "playing level" comes into play, because many teams that could not play for a winning record in the old system are now some of the top teams in their new, and LOWER classification. So, indeed, the higher the classification, or "level", generally speaking, the better the baseball. I seriously doubt that the teams of lower classifications can beat the teams at higher classifications when it comes down to the state championship game.

I never said college experienced was required to work the top level state championship game, and Tim C getting the call this year proves that! It is highly unlikely that the 3rd on his crew will have college experience because I am not aware of anybody from the area the 3rd is coming from that has done college. Please read my post. I stated that usually, only college umpires are selected for the top level game. The obvious answer to your question though is that generally speaking, the college umpires are much better umpires. Indeed, we have a "few" guys (really, maybe 3 or 4 out of 154) in our association who are quite good enough for college, but don't have the time and/or commitment to work that level.

Why require that you work the level that you will work in a championship game? Hey, I don't know how it is in your state, but here, we have little dinky associations that have maybe 15 guys, who service maybe 4 schools, all of them the lowest classification schools. The bottom line is this: The baseball at those schools is nowhere as good as the top classification schools play. The high levels play harder, faster, and with far more skill! I would be VERY nervous with having a partner who does not have regular experience at that level working with me on the biggest game of the year, and frankly, the teams deserve guys that have a COMMAND of doing that level, not a guy who is used to seeing slower, less skilled baseball. Frankly, the JV teams at the top classification schools can usually beat up on the lower classification varsity teams all day long. I certainly do not want a JV umpire working with me on a state championship game.

Sorry you misunderstood what I posted earlier. Nobody else seems to have.

I have to add that in the past, there were problems with umpires coming from smaller associations that don't service the top classification schools working with umpires from the bigger associations.

Umpiring is no different than playing ball in this regard: If you want to be your best, you have to work with the best, and feel some pressure to perform! With 154 guys, there is a pretty good chance that amoungst the younger guys, there will be a few that can move up quickly. EVERY YEARS we have at least a couple of new guys that will move up quickly. If I want to keep my current level of assignments, I have to stay on top of my game, because there are some 5th year guys that would love to be getting my schedule, and are basically skilled enough to do so. I am not going to sit here and tell you how good I am. But, I have a lot of confidence in my abilities, and year after year, evaluation after evaluation, have proven that I should continue to work the level I do.

I do not see the same kind of competition in the smallest associations, and also just don't see those guys having the benefit of having guys with pro experience, nor an influx of talented guys that just missed the PBUC cut. My association has all of that. We draw off of a very talented pool of umpires. Simply, I think percentage wise, the association Tim and I belong too has the highest talent level, and that feeds upon itself. Our association requires more training hours per year out of our members than any other baseball association in the state, and that training is conducted by some of the top umpires in the region!

[Blue37]

Originally Posted by rei

Classification, level...pick your term. BUT, after our re-classification alignment last year, it was pretty obvious that "playing level" comes into play, because many teams that could not play for a winning record in the old system are now some of the top teams in their new, and LOWER classification. So, indeed, the higher the classification, or "level", generally speaking, the better the baseball. I seriously doubt that the teams of lower classifications can beat the teams at higher classifications when it comes down to the state championship game.

I never said college experienced was required to work the top level state championship game, and Tim C getting the call this year proves that! It is highly unlikely that the 3rd on his crew will have college experience because I am not aware of anybody from the area the 3rd is coming from that has done college. Please read my post. I stated that usually, only college umpires are selected for the top level game. The obvious answer to your question though is that generally speaking, the college umpires are much better umpires. Indeed, we have a "few" guys (really, maybe 3 or 4 out of 154) in our association who are quite good enough for college, but don't have the time and/or commitment to work that level.

Why require that you work the level that you will work in a championship game? Hey, I don't know how it is in your state, but here, we have little dinky associations that have maybe 15 guys, who service maybe 4 schools, all of them the lowest classification schools. The bottom line is this: The baseball at those schools is nowhere as good as the top classification schools play. The high levels play harder, faster, and with far more skill! I would be VERY nervous with having a partner who does not have regular experience at that level working with me on the biggest game of the year, and frankly, the teams deserve guys that have a COMMAND of doing that level, not a guy who is used to seeing slower, less skilled baseball. Frankly, the JV teams at the top classification schools can usually beat up on the lower classification varsity teams all day long. I certainly do not want a JV umpire working with me on a state championship game.

Sorry you misunderstood what I posted earlier. Nobody else seems to have.

I sometimes forget that not all states are alike. In my state, good baseball is good baseball and bad baseball is bad baseball, regardless of classification. Your statement about top classification JV teams routinely beating lower classification varsity teams is not true here.

Likewise with umpires. A good umpire is a good umpire and a bad umpire is a bad umpire, regardless of the association to which he belongs or the classifications he works during the regular season. We are association based when assigning regular season and district tournament games, but all regional and state level games are assigned by the state organization. The state has a preseason camp each year and also has close to twenty supervisors who observe officials during the regular season and district tournaments. Even officials from the "dinky associations" have an equal chance to prove themselves.

I apologize for sensing an elitist attitude if none exists.

[David B]

Originally Posted by rei

I have to add that in the past, there were problems with umpires coming from smaller associations that don't service the top classification schools working with umpires from the bigger associations.

\

That's the problem that we've had in our state playoffs in the past. Every year for the last 15 years we have had one of our schools from our area in the state finals and we have not been allowed to call that level.

Several years we had two schools in our area in the finals. So we have had guys calling our area teams that many times they have never called the bigger schools etc., and its not always a good thing.

One thing we have done well is letting our groups work together in the finals, but as you stated, often we get umpires working the highest level they have ever worked a game and it just happens to be the state finals in the larger divisions. Then our groups get left calling the smaller classifications since we have teams from our area in the higher divisions.

Hey its an honor anytime to call a state final, but sometimes I think its not fair to the larger schools to get stuck with the most inexperienced umpires.
Hopefully our state will work on that in the future.

Thanks
David

[tjones1]

Congrats Tee!!