Will Umpire for Food

[T Alan]

I have watched the Big League Championship Game, the Pony championship Game, something called the "Senior" Babe Ruth Championship game, all on my Dish.

These games, alng with the current LLWS, have one thing in common.

The umpires in all these games are working for FREE.

Now this is an easy explaination of why I have seen HORRIBLE umpiring in all these games - but my question is -

Why do these "World Series" championships establish the most important administrative job (umpiring) simply to people who will work for free RATHER than spending some money and have upper level qualified umpires do the games.

I have simply given up watching these games. It is not worth my frustration.

T Alan
Member that is Large

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Strikes & Outs

[blanco7]

quote:

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Originally posted by T Alan:
I have watched the Big League Championship Game, the Pony championship Game, something called the "Senior" Babe Ruth Championship game, all on my Dish.

These games, alng with the current LLWS, have one thing in common.

The umpires in all these games are working for FREE.

Now this is an easy explaination of why I have seen HORRIBLE umpiring in all these games - but my question is -

Why do these "World Series" championships establish the most important administrative job (umpiring) simply to people who will work for free RATHER than spending some money and have upper level qualified umpires do the games.

I have simply given up watching these games. It is not worth my frustration.

T Alan
Member that is Large

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Last year I did Regional and Zone games for Pony and they pay $25 per game for those games. I think it lack of willingness to use whatever is avaialable and not necessarily a selection process to evaluate who are the better umps

[Stan W]

I did a PONY regional tourney last year and as I was told...when a community applies to PONY to be a regional or satelite tourney stop, they are responsible for providing umpires (who are supposed to be PONY certified) and they set the fees if any that are paid to the crews...we got $26 per man (2man crew).......local community gets all concession stand revenue, parking and half the take raffle revenue...PONY supplies a rep and charges a fee to hold the tourney....this is why you see a lot of local guys at PONY tourneys......as far as the world series goes....no clue as how they are picked.....

[T Alan]

I am going to go out on a limb here:

The PONY championship game was in Tucson.

I am willing to bet that there are considerably better umpires in Tucson (alone) than what I saw on the game.

I have worked in both Connie Mack and American Legion tournaments and have found noithing but top notch umpires.

Why oh why, does the touch of volunteerism over ride competence.

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Strikes & Outs

[Mark Land]

There are lots of excellent LL umpires, most of whom never get paid a dime.

I am sure those guys are as nervious as the kids. I am not sure I would want my biggest game ever on world-wide TV either.

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Take care,
Mark

[This message has been edited by Mark Land (edited August 22, 2000).]

[Alligator Bag]

I take offense to your comment. I worked the Junior League World Series with 13 other very competent and damn good umpires. We all work various levels of ball from Little League to D1 college and take great pride in the fact that many games we are paid for and others we work for free. It is a great honor to be selected to work those and it sounds to me that you are more jealous of the fact that they are there and you are not. Remember one thing as you turn on your dish, it is easier to make the calls in a chair than it is with all the anxiety and pressure of a world championship in your lap. Hopefully someday you will be there and I hope nobody gets on a bulletin board to bust your chops!

[Dave Davies]

TA. This is a subject htat has been debated endlessly and will continue ad nauseum.

I guess the first question to be answered is; who are the volunteers that work the various Series and how were they chosen.

In LL, volunteerism is the driving force for favorable assignments. Seniority is also huge. Seniority is where the major problem lies. Some of these WS umpires are, and have always been horseshit. Why? inadequate training. There were no adequate training programs when they started umpiring.

This has all changed, however. In the past dozen years, the training programs have improved dramatically. There are thousands of properly trained volunteer umpires that are at least as qualified to work with the paid veterans.

Do I see horseshit paid umpires? Absolutely!! Why? because they are inadequately trained, although they, along with volunteers, think that they ARE well trained. These guys should be classified as "Buggy Whip" umpires. They were necessary when horses were our primary source of transportation.
When the automobile came into vogue, the buggy whip was history.

Our "Senior" umpires have simply failed to
modernize their techniques with our modern times. TA, I am betting that you are an excellent umpire. Are you? Are the mechanics you use from the '50s or the '90s? I'll bet, from your posts I have read the past couple of years, you are a '90s type of umpire; you try to learn something every game. I would venture to say that most "newer" umpires strive to learn and learn and learn. I'll bet that our "Senior" umpires mindset is that "I have been doing it this way for 25 years" They would be wrong and it is impossible to convince them otherwise.

This is where the "good ole boy" network rears it's ugly head. Favors are owed and paid off. My good buddy, but shitty umpire, has earned a shot at the glory. And, he gets it.

Hence, the fallacy that ALL volunteer umpires eat shit and bark at the Moon.

Because I AM a volunteer umpire, I am embarrassed by some of the shoddy performances I have witnessed the past few days. When it comes to National exposure, LL should put its best foot forward and show off some of the real talent that has been buried by our "Senior" lords.

When I worked the WRLL Tourn. in '98, I was surrounded by "good ole boy" incompetence. Out of the 14 umpires assigned, only six were competent to be there. Frustration? In Spades.

When all these favors have been paid off (probably another five years or so), the real talent will manifest itself.

I'm 57. I am, or was on the list to work the LL WS. In the West, that equates to an 8 to 12 year wait. In the South, I understand there is an umpire with 6 years total experience working the LLWS.

You think you get frustrated just watching these abominable umpires. Think how frustrated umpires like me are watching guys that couldn't get a local assignment during regular season.

Thanks for listening, TA. I get pissed like this once a year along about this time.

Dave Davies
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quote:

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Originally posted by T Alan:
I have watched the Big League Championship Game, the Pony championship Game, something called the "Senior" Babe Ruth Championship game, all on my Dish.

These games, alng with the current LLWS, have one thing in common.

The umpires in all these games are working for FREE.

Now this is an easy explaination of why I have seen HORRIBLE umpiring in all these games - but my question is -

Why do these "World Series" championships establish the most important administrative job (umpiring) simply to people who will work for free RATHER than spending some money and have upper level qualified umpires do the games.

I have simply given up watching these games. It is not worth my frustration.

T Alan
Member that is Large

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[T Alan]

I take offense to your comment.

Take All the offense you want.

The work shown in many of the Summer World Series is proof enough that volunteerism, while, nobale simple continues the 'Good Old Guy' network of supplying BAD umpires.

As for expereince:

Been There Done That!

No envy invloved, I have all ready worked games at the highest Amateur levels.

T Alan
Member of Jenny Craig for Life

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Strikes & Outs

[GarthB]

Tee:

If the umpires at the PONY Championship were unpaid, that was a local decision. PONY, unlike LL has no such requirement. The host PONY organization is responsible for securing umpires, all of which must be registered PONY umpires.

I was the UIC at the Northwest Regionals. All umpires received $30/game for the mustang level and $40/game for the palamino level. I know that in previous years the championship umpire were paid.



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Co-Moderator, UT

[Rich Ives]

Hmmmm . cronyism . favoriteism . golly!

Maybe LL should select its WS umpires in merit, just like MLB. Oh, wait! MLB "chooses" its umpires based on whose turn it is. (maybe it'll change with the new union contract)

[Randy McMurchy]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by T Alan:
[B]I have watched the Big League Championship Game, the Pony championship Game, something called the "Senior" Babe Ruth Championship game, all on my Dish.

These games, alng with the current LLWS, have one thing in common.

The umpires in all these games are working for FREE.

T,

What makes you think PONY games use volunteer umpires? I managed a PONY tournamant team this summer and we played in District, Section, State and US Zone competition.

All umpires in every game were paid association umpires.

I'm just curious how you found out umpires for the PONY championship game were volunteers.

--
Randy

[T Alan]

Randy:

They interviewed the Plate Umpire (from Tucson) and he said all the umpires for the Pony Championships (i.e. that week) were unpaid volunteers.

Tee
Member - Fat Boys Club of America

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Strikes & Outs

[PeteBooth]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by T Alan:
[B]I have watched the Big League Championship Game, the Pony championship Game, something called the "Senior" Babe Ruth Championship game, all on my Dish.

These games, alng with the current LLWS, have one thing in common.

The umpires in all these games are working for FREE.

T - another problem I see is that those who do get paid and are good umpires do not want to give back where they started.

I started out at LL and then progressed to higher levels. I have not umpired college yet but that is in my future plans.

Since I started out in LL where they allowed me time to develop, I feel I should give something back to them. I also volunteer my services in assisting with the training program.


Umpiring in LL All Stars and for that matter any LL game IMO is like a "catch 22". All involved want quality umpiring but do not want to pay for it.

I'm sure you have spent some money on attending clinics / mileage to and from games along with the latest equipment. Money doesn't grow on trees.

Also, as others have stated Politics are involved.

Pete Booth

[T Alan]

T - another problem I see is that those who do get paid and are good umpires do not want to give back where they started.

Pete you can ONLY speak for yourself. Very, very few umpires in my local group 'got their start' at the LL level. Actually we have nothing to do with LL and it appears in MY AREA that those umpire sets are mutally exclusive.

As I have posted before I have never worked a LL game . . . I am not sure that I have worked with anyone in the last two years that got thier start in LL.

Working for free is noble but often misguided.

I started out at LL and then progressed to higher levels. I have not umpired college yet but that is in my future plans.

Peter, I started as a Plate Umpire in a VARSITY High School game. Our local training now considers that ALL umpires are 'first timers' and we teach umpiring from the start . . . the beginning.


Peter, it will always be my view that LL 'uses' people to umpire. The rewards are self motivated and those that are successful should be comended . . . however, I cannot support a corupt system that gives us people with the skills that worked this year's LL World Series.

T Alan
Member of the National Fat Boys Club

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Strikes & Outs