Thanks for the compliment and I am being sincere.

The forecast in San Fran looks great for the weekend and I have my plate coat and new majestic jacket ready if needed.

I'm with you... maybe if I read more, I'll figure out the point of the question....:D

:eek: I hear this comeback all the time and all I find is it is a good way to insure an argument. IMO, the last thing you want to do is to have the coach hear his parents aren't paying enough money...or have the parents hear the same...or put yourself in a position where you get "three blind ones won't be any better".

The last time a partner of mine created his own hell with this statement, I hung him out. After he finally gained distance from the coach, he wondered why I didn't intervene. :eek:

"I figured when you asked for a fight you wanted one." :rolleyes:

I agree that, like so many quips to coaches in all sports, they are better thought than said on the field / court.

Dg
 

If BU comes to me with a Q I would ask him to explain exactly what he saw and why he called him safe. I would then ask him if has any doubt about the call. If noon, then I suggest the call stand, regardless of what I saw, and I'm not likely to tell him. If he says yes, he has doubt and wants to know what I saw, I will tell him. If I saw a safe then case closed. If I saw an out then I suggest to him that he can change it if he wants to but I would suggest he not do that, let it stand, because I could be wrong and his doubt misgiven,after all, he has much better position on the play. Best to let everyone see we discussed and that is all the defensive coach can hope for.

Let me try again
 

The point of question #3 is simply this: On different levels of Baseball there are different ways of handling this situation. NCAA has a list of times when partners should meet, for one example.

I wanted to find out how the many posters and lurkers on this board would handle this situation with their BU partner when confronted with the same situation.

I am still looking for a few more opinions on this situation, so any help you can offer or opinions you can give I would appreciate reading.

I was taught that when conferring, the calling umpire asks, "What did you see on that play?" It is specific and allows a partner to provide information that affirms or changes the call. For HS ball, I wait until asked. The new NCAA guidelines will help me this season. Before I left for Asia, I would have used a very similar mechanic to Fed in NCAA games. Wait and reply.

there is another thread on this running now, i'll save you the review. the mechaninc, the ump's pride, the whatever NEVER exceeds Getting The Call Right.

Gordon/Garth (whichever), which pro school did you attend that taught this?

Unfortunately until you get to work at higher levels consistently with pretty much the same partners, this is going to change, sometimes game to game. I worked two season's with one partner 75% of the time and we read each other like a book. There have been other times you just wonder if it would have been better to do the game yourself. For the most part though, pre-game this and just give your partner info for him to make a decision. It's his call but, make sure to back him up on the field.

I would say that at the Varsity level and below, I have found over the years, that approx. 50% of the time or more, your going to work with someone who really doesn't study mechanics, knows some of the rules and feels as though they have to obligh the coaches, or are just inexperienced and lack confidence. Regardless though, you still have to get through the game.

Good luck.

For high school games, I work with the same partner 80-90% of the time. For college games, I have many different partners. If it were up to me, I would get rid of the partner system. It fosters non-uniform mechanics. This can cause big problems when you work with a new partner which, in high school baseball, is likely to be in the playoffs. Not a good time for partners to be on different pages.

How do you define "the partner system" and what do you propose in its place?

Our state baseball UIC is also pretty tight with the NFHS. Word on the street is that he wants us all to work one set of mechanics for all OHSAA games this year; regular season opener through state tourney final. The mechanics he wants us to use are straight out of the NFHS Umpire Manual. Ugh!

This old dog has some new tricks to learn.

Bad choice of words on my part. I meant working with the same partner all season often leads to the use of non-standard mechanics. Assigning different partners forces everyone to be on the same page rather than a separate page for each team.

Standard mechanics for everyone is the answer, I agree. Getting some of these guys to study mechanics, let alone read the rules, is another issue that should be reinforced at the association level. Having agreed to standard,s from one area to the next is another.

This problem is not unique to Baseball only though. When I officiated ice hockey it was the same thing. You would go from one area to another and "standard mechanics" became a local interpretation sometimes. A perfect example is some areas strictly use NFHS mechanics and some use CCA mechanics. Almost similar but not really, not completely.

IMHO and IME, I disagree.

Since most associations do a terrible job of teaching mechanics, if at all, much less agree on a set of mechanics, or requiring as a function of employment them to be understood and deployed (elaborate pre-season testing, review and supervision), assigning different partners is guaranteeing poor mechanical officiating. :(

If you have an association with a set of quality leaders, they can match up partners according to strengths and weaknesses, temperament, physical capabilities, etc. All derived from the testing, reviews and supervision.

But that isn\'t what happens all too often. The Big Dogs in the association want to work with each other after pancakes \'n beer. This dooms proper matchings; they have no interest in being astute leaders, only their self-interests. Which games with which other Big Dogs and the paychecks that come their way.

And IHOP pancakes and cheap beers of course. :rolleyes: