How about an opinion:

[David B]

Originally Posted by jicecone

I am amazed that officials believe that a coaches input is necessary in his deveopment. I have been involved many years in the training of officials for both Ice Hockey and Baseball and find it degrading to think that I, my trainers or association need input from a coach in order to develope an official.

Setting up a training program for your officials in personal appearance, physical conditioning, mechanics, judgement, rule knowledge, interpretation and application, communication with players and coaches, alternate officiating systems, community relations and involvement, needs good experienced officials that are willing to pass along this information. Not Coaches.

Reinforcing this training with constructive evaluations and mid year training, then rewarding with advancement is just about all the ingredients necessary to develope an official.

Most good coaches I have met expect only that we hustle in position, know the rules, be respectful, and give them the best job we can. If they have to tell us how to do our job, then we shouldn't be there and I agree.

I never had the oppurtunity to attend a professional umpires school but, I just can't believe that the staff has many, if any coaches on it. JMO

Precisely what I've been thinking reading this thread. We've never used coaches opinions in our training or evaluations and its worked very well.

Now our state office came along and started this evaluation for each game per the Arbiter system and it was a mess because a coach could easily rate you down and you had no way of responding. And usually you could tell who lost the game based on the evaluations given by the coaches.

But at a local level, training doesn't require coaches input.

I did like Bob's idea that if you include coaches, have a very specific list of questions and very few general ones. The only thing I've been able to glean from coaches input through the years is how an umpire might respond under pressure, when the coach is coming down on them hard during a heated contest. Some very good umpires simply cannot handle the pressure of a "big game'.

Thanks
David

[mbyron]

Who said anything about training? That's a ridiculous red herring. Tee was asking about evaluation.

I and others have already explained the rationale for including coaches' input: they offer a perspective on an umpire's game management that nobody else can. Not a partner, not a paid or volunteer evaluator (who might not hear a conversation).

That's a small but significant component of an evaluation. It's certainly not intended as a substitute for an umpire doing an evaluation, which would cover far more ground and be the primary evaluative tool.

I'm not too surprised that many coaches would ignore opportunities to evaluate umpires. It's not required by their job, nor will it help them keep it. When you ask people to do volunteer work, you have to go out of your way to explain how it will benefit them, their team, and the game. Otherwise all you get are the cranks and hotheads (which could happen anyway).

[David B]

Originally Posted by mbyron

Who said anything about training? That's a ridiculous red herring. Tee was asking about evaluation.

I and others have already explained the rationale for including coaches' input: they offer a perspective on an umpire's game management that nobody else can. Not a partner, not a paid or volunteer evaluator (who might not hear a conversation).

That's a small but significant component of an evaluation. It's certainly not intended as a substitute for an umpire doing an evaluation, which would cover far more ground and be the primary evaluative tool.

I'm not too surprised that many coaches would ignore opportunities to evaluate umpires. It's not required by their job, nor will it help them keep it. When you ask people to do volunteer work, you have to go out of your way to explain how it will benefit them, their team, and the game. Otherwise all you get are the cranks and hotheads (which could happen anyway).

You have one thing correct, the only thing that we've found useful in evaluations from coaches is "game management". As far as positioning, strikes and outs, coaches simply don't have a clue because everything is based on wins and losses.

We've used coaches to evaluate several years ago for a season and it was a complete waste of time, they simply could not get past letting "one call" skew their perspective on the job the umpire or umpires performed during the contest.

The best evaluations I've ever gotten from a coach on an umpire was when i caught him at church, the mall, and the best place .... during summer ball when the regular season was over and the coach had a much more laid back approach to baseball.

Thanks
David

[yawetag]

Originally Posted by David B

You have one thing correct, the only thing that we've found useful in evaluations from coaches is "game management". As far as positioning, strikes and outs, coaches simply don't have a clue because everything is based on wins and losses.

David, this is certainly not true. There are many coaches, at least in my area, that know an umpire's correct positioning. They've been doing the job long enough to know where we're supposed to go and what we're supposed to do.

Some of these coaches even know PU has 3B on a first-to-third by R1. If PU fails to make that rotation and the call goes against the coach, I guarantee he's going to let both umpires know the proper mechanic.

Originally Posted by jicecone

I am amazed that officials believe that a coaches input is necessary in his deveopment. I have been involved many years in the training of officials for both Ice Hockey and Baseball and find it degrading to think that I, my trainers or association need input from a coach in order to develope an official.

The biggest reason I see it helping is simply because there's a coach at every game. If your organization has enough officials to rate every official at every game, then that's great. However, I'm sure you're lucky to get 2 evals on each official in a year.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by yawetag

David, this is certainly not true. There are many coaches, at least in my area, that know an umpire's correct positioning. They've been doing the job long enough to know where we're supposed to go and what we're supposed to do.

Some of these coaches even know PU has 3B on a first-to-third by R1. If PU fails to make that rotation and the call goes against the coach, I guarantee he's going to let both umpires know the proper mechanic.

I would not give that responsibilities to all officials, why would I give this to a group of people that know less by occupation? I guess to each is his own and if you want to put the future or training in the hands of coaches that is your prerogative, but I would find that to be pointless. I guess different places have different "standards."

Originally Posted by yawetag

The biggest reason I see it helping is simply because there's a coach at every game. If your organization has enough officials to rate every official at every game, then that's great. However, I'm sure you're lucky to get 2 evals on each official in a year.

You need two different people to evaluate two different umpires? Really? If one guy can do that with 5 guys on a field, I think one person can do that in a sport like baseball where no one moves until the ball is contacted or a play is made.

Peace

[UmpTTS43]

Taking judgement away, it is my opinion that coaches can contribute to an umpires evaluation concerning professionalism and game management. There are times when rotations change, crew preferences, and they may think they know what should happen but don't. As long as the play is covered, they have no reason to gripe. Coaches can be, and are, a valuable tool in determing an umpires capabilities, like it or not.

[HokieUmp]

Originally Posted by UmpTTS43

Taking judgement away, it is my opinion that coaches can contribute to an umpires evaluation concerning professionalism and game management. [snip] Coaches can be, and are, tools.

Fixed that for you.

And to actually address the subject, I disagree that coaches are all that valuable to the process. Let me try putting it in mathematical terms, what a coach thinks, generally:

Non-obvious calls went mostly against me == you (the umpire) suck
Non-obvious calls went mostly for me == you suck, but less

Remember, we're pretty much the enemy to these guys, like it or not. Because that call you made in the bottom of the first, calling a kid out on a banger at 1B? That one play was the difference in his team getting beaten 12-1.

I'd like to agree with you that coaches could address professionalism. I'd like to, but can't. Players and coaches can chirp all game long about anything and everything, but the second an umpire says anything, he's the bad guy.

Something apparently happened a couple games ago for the Nats, where an umpire said something to Jim Riggleman after the game, and it became a "thing." I heard Ron Dibble - speaking of tools - on TV last night, and he said something like "Well, Jim Riggleman is a consummate professional, so if he says something about, it's serious." Dibble conveniently doesn't mention anything about how benches gripe all game long.

It's such a one-way street that I really don't want coach input considered. Or, collect all you want, and then take the paper straight to the local recycling company.

[yawetag]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

I would not give that responsibilities to all officials, why would I give this to a group of people that know less by occupation? I guess to each is his own and if you want to put the future or training in the hands of coaches that is your prerogative, but I would find that to be pointless. I guess different places have different "standards."

If you'd read my original post on this matter, you would see how much stock I put into evaluations by coaches. However, the fact of the matter is that there are always two coaches at every game your umpires officiate. If those two evaluations are similar in a category (i.e., both coaches give high marks [or low marks]), it's a fair bet that you've got a good idea how that umpire is for that category. On the other hand, if you've got one giving high marks and the other giving low marks, you can throw the evals out -- they're obviously biased.

Originally Posted by JRutledge

You need two different people to evaluate two different umpires? Really? If one guy can do that with 5 guys on a field, I think one person can do that in a sport like baseball where no one moves until the ball is contacted or a play is made.

Two different people? I'm confused. If you're referring to my "2 evals on each official in a year." comment, you misread it. I was saying that if an organization relied on umpires to go to a game to evaluate the umpires, an umpire would be lucky to have two of their games evaluated in a year.

Peace[/QUOTE]

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by yawetag

If you'd read my original post on this matter, you would see how much stock I put into evaluations by coaches. However, the fact of the matter is that there are always two coaches at every game your umpires officiate. If those two evaluations are similar in a category (i.e., both coaches give high marks [or low marks]), it's a fair bet that you've got a good idea how that umpire is for that category. On the other hand, if you've got one giving high marks and the other giving low marks, you can throw the evals out -- they're obviously biased.

I do not put any stock in coaches because they are not qualified to evaluate officials. If you do that is OK, but I would not want newer officials in my area to have part of their futures or assignments based on an evaluation from some coach that might not know how to coach yet. If there are umpires I cannot put that trust into, I certainly would be weary to do that with a coach.

And that is ultimately the point I am trying to make.

Originally Posted by yawetag

Two different people? I'm confused. If you're referring to my "2 evals on each official in a year." comment, you misread it. I was saying that if an organization relied on umpires to go to a game to evaluate the umpires, an umpire would be lucky to have two of their games evaluated in a year.

Peace

OK, minor issue. You clarified that and it was never that big of a deal in the first place. I am always going to be against giving coaches that kind of power or a structure in which they influence the growth of officials. Again a rating is different than an evaluation. Ratings in my area are only used for varsity contests and are to help rate officials for a small part of playoff consideration. In those ratings we never get information about positioning or mechanics, they simply give an opinion as to what we can do in 5 different categories. The top level being a State Final, the lowest level only able to work a lower-level game. That is only to give some input to our playoff assigning which means theoretically you can get so many of those ratings that one rating means little to nothing. And we never know for sure what they gave us and the coaches must clarify the score of the game.

But we do have an observers program where we try to watch newer officials as to help them get better. In a sport like baseball there is not the man power to evaluate that many in a year. Baseball is one of the least officiated sports in the state and definitely that case in the major sports.

Peace

[MD Longhorn]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

You need two different people to evaluate two different umpires? Really? If one guy can do that with 5 guys on a field, I think one person can do that in a sport like baseball where no one moves until the ball is contacted or a play is made. Peace

He didn't say anything even remotely like that.

[yawetag]

Originally Posted by martinapinto

To be fair, Missouri does require the coach to explain a 5 rating (which equates to "not good enough for sub-Varsity level"). Coaches know this, so the lowest they'll go is a 4 rating. After that, they'll just mark the "needs improvement" for all the sections.

I doubt the irony of the system escapes most officials.