Scoring Dispute
 

Alot of this story falls outside the jurisdiction of the umpire, but I need to vent anyway.

This Sunday was working the championship game of a 14U travel tournament. In these tournaments the field umpire (for whatever reason) keeps the lineups and the score, and submits the card after the game to the TD after each coach has signed off on his pitching, score, etc.

In the top of the 7th the visitors score 3 runs to make the score 10-2. I mark 3 onto my card and await the next 3 outs. Home team ends up scoring 7 in the bottom on the 7th, visitors record final out, 10-9.

I begin to meet up with my partner and work our way to the gate when we realize home team is taking the field and away team is lining up to shake hands. I say 10-9, visitors say 10-9, home team says 9-9 (they had the team scoring only 2 in the top half of the 7th). I get both books together and find exactly where the home team book is wrong. They had a runner on 2nd with 2 outs, a base hit, and that runner staying on 2nd. I point this out to the home team manager and his response is, "no, he went to 3rd and stayed there." The visiting team manager notes how the ball was overthrown at the plate, his runner got the plate with his hand, and my partner remembers the exact play. The more me and pard' discuss the more obvious it becomes 10-9.

The home team manager then turns his whole argument into "the home book is official". We call over TD who gets on phone and we wait around for an hour to get a ruling. Both me and partner speak with the head hanchos, and each tell them not only are we certain its 10-9, but the home team coach seems to know deep down its 10-9 and is just being shady.

After an hour wait, the word is we have to go play extras, 9-9. TD explains to visiting coach, me and partner are just tight lipped as could be. Coach is relatively calm, understands its not the TD's fault, but says I'm not putting my boys back out on the field, they won the game and to put them back out there is taking that away from them.

The UIC of the state told me I need to verify the books between every half inning from now on, which seems like overkill and interjecting myself into the dugouts every half inning. Furthermore, it doesn't matter even if I do that, because if there is a discrepancy the precedent has now been set that its the home-team book anyway. So whats the point of me even keeping a card on the field? I obviously have no authority on the score, so why even bother with it. Let a 4 year old take a crayon and color all over the home book for all I care, its the Bible.

Any thoughts?

Wow, what a colossal CF.

Another reason why umpires shouldn't ever be required to scorekeep. If it's that important in ball where the players don't shave, then the TD should have an official scorekeeper at each game to take the onus off the teams, and especially the (apparently non-relevant) scorecard you were keeping.

I do like the visual of the official scorekeeper being a 4-year-old with a crayon and scratch pad...:D

Sounds like a large load of nonsense to me. So --- home team can put whatever the heck they want in the book and it becomes gospel? What matters ... at least what SHOULD matter - is what happened. Really. Not who wrote what where.

Don't do that tournament anymore.

+1

Yeahuh. I wouldn't have done extra innings. If the TD can't get his head far enough out of his butt to figure this out, he can work the extra innings himself. He obviously doesn't trust the current crew enough to take their word for the score.

"That's just part of the game" - Derek Jeter

Too soon?

Gotta laugh. Welcome back to travel ball.

If the base umpire is "required" to keep score, he SHOULD verify it regularly. If the home team has the "official book", the base umpire should not have to keep score - the two teams should check with each other every half inning to verify things.
This is a Murphy's Law thing - if a CF like this can happen, it will. You've covered your butts - kept score like you were supposed to - but that's not to say mistakes will NEVER happen even if you are doing what you're required to do. Courts are full of "He said - she said" cases. Fortunately your TD made the final decision. It's unfortunate it may not have been the RIGHT decision, but the monkey's off your back.
Now you get to decide if you need that $40 enough to keep doing those games.

JJ

Verify it with whom? Do what with his score if it differs from someone else (like the home book)? If BU is keeping score, that's the score. I can see ANNOUNCING the score to the bookkeepers on both sides... but not verifying anything.

Well first, I would not work a tournament where BU is required to keep score and lignups, but if I did when the game was over, per my score I am not waiting around an hour for TD to overule the responsibility given.

Sounds like a crock to me.

At the U-trip tournaments I do, we have to keep a card to be the official count for the innings pitched for each pitcher of record. We also put the score on it. I don't count runs as they cross the plate. One or two, I can generally keep track of. We have "official" score keepers running the scoreboard. I'll glance at that to verify what I have. I do, from time to time, verify with one of the dugouts to see if I'm still on track. I'll usually check with the team that is behind at the moment. It just makes sense - however in this case it would have back fired. If we have a discrepency, I'll check with the other book. I've only had one case where the books didn't line up. I had the two get together, and they found the error.

It doesn't seem right at a tournament, where the flip of a coin determines home team to have that as the "official" book. Smells fishy to me. Visitor's book and BOTH umpires have 10-9, that's the score. Our UIC would have backed us up, I think.

So what was the outcome?

Sorry, I guess "verify" is too technical/legal/picky for you. For me, "verify" means, "Hey, Team A, what have YOU got? And Team B, what have YOU got?" If they have differences, we sort them out before we start the next half inning. If THEY can't agree, they're idiots, and I "agree" for them.

JJ
PS I would "verify" every half inning that someone scored. I think I can remember that as the game goes along.