Rainy weather, triple plays, and extra innings.
 

For those of you who do not live in NW Ohio and SE Michigan, the month of April has been one of the wettest in history which means lots of rained out baseball and softball games.

I have lost one single softball game, one single baseball game, and five baseball DH. MTD, Jr., has lost three single baseball games and two baseball DH. His two DH were with me. Lots of money has been lost this month (oh wait, we don't umpire of the money, :D).

Anyway, Mark, Jr., had a FR baseball game (he was BU) and I had an open date, so I decided to go with him and watch the game. The first four innings went quickly with the Home team taking a 1-0 lead into the top of the fifth. But the weather was miserable (cold, very windy, and on and off again drizzles). Being the smart old geezer that I am, I told Junior that I was headed back to the car. :D

While I was taking a 45 minute nap all of the fun took place. The Visitors, scored four runs in the top of the fifth for a 4-1 lead. The Home team quickly had runners on 1B and 2B with no outs, when B/R3 hit a line shot to F3 for the first out, F3 then tagged 1B for the second out, and then fired to F6 at 2B for the third out. A 3-3-6 triple play!! The sixth inning was scoreless. The Vistors scored two runs in the top of seventh for a 6-1 lead and the Home team score five runs in the bottom of the seventh to tie the game at 6-6. That is when I woke up and went back out to the diamond. LOL!

The Home team scored one run in the bottom of the eighth to win 7-6. I did buy Junior a hot chocolate at the concession stand on the way back to the parking lot.

But we did have a nice Varsity DH tgether last night.

MTD, Sr.

Interesting way to turn triple.

I had interesting game last Saturday. I was PU for HS varsity spring break tournament game. Two starting pitchers both went distance and both pitched shutouts, neither got the win. Both were replaced for 8th and in bottom of 8th with 2 outs and bases loaded the starting pitcher for home team was re-entered to bat, and got the winning hit, 1-0.

Interesting story, Mark. However, with all the rain-outs, there wasn't a game available for you? Right now, I could pick up at least a game a day to make up what we've gotten rained out. Today, I had the chance for four games in the day, but could only take one.

This is probably the reason I will not be umpiring very long in the sport of baseball. We have received the very same rain that you get. Almost every day has been a wash. I lost about 4 games this week because it rained almost every day. When we do play it is very cold and not fun sitting outside. And if I am supposed to umpire and the games are cancelled, it ruins the day as I am either waiting on a game to be cancelled or the schools wait until the final moments to work a game. Then we have schools that act like our time is not valuable by changing dates and times to try to fit a game without consideration that the time or site change might affect your availability. I think I am done with that constant game being played. I had friends tell me some time it was not worth it and one of them said they did not miss it when they retired from the sport. The games themselves are fun when it is not freezing, but all the BS leading up to it is making this not fun anymore.

Peace

Come work games in Texas...

In Houston, the last time there was at least 1/2 inch of rain was January 24th...and the forecast isn't changing anytime in the near future. Big time drought condition in Texas.

On this note -- my favorite thing is when schools reschedule games for the next day just assuming there will be umpires lining up waiting to take those games. Then they complain or send out frantic emails in a panic looking for officials.

We always get first crack at the rescheduled games, but I'm usually already working.

Also, if the schools push back start times (you know, the 10AM game that's going to start at 1PM to give the field time to dry) they just assume that's AOK with the umpires. I've turned down such changes in start times, myself. Once the game is rescheduled from my agreed-to contract, I feel no obligation to throw away my entire day while teams keep pushing back the start time (without even asking us if that would be OK with us).

Mark, how awesome the two of you can umpire together. My autistic son and I can do a lot of neat things as father and son; unfortunately, sports officiating is not one of them...

In our association for one year, we had three generations of the same family on a three man crew. They were a good crew; it was obvious that the youngest member had had some excellent mentoring from his father and grandfather. Would that more families could have this great bonding opportunity.

Steve Johnson
Eastern Maine Baseball Umpires Association

We had 21 days with rain out of 30 in April here in Chicago. What a miserable month...

If the "April showers bring May flowers" saying holds true, those flowers have enough rain for two months.

Here we deal with assignors, but I happened to work for one that thinks that these things are an obligation as well. This very thing you just described happened to me a week ago with a school and they not only first changed the time, they cancelled the game, then they decided to move the game to the other school. All of this was assuming that I was going to be around that morning (this was a Saturday DH BTW) and just answer the phone and then work the game as if no one cancelled the game the day before. Noootttt!!!!

I even got an email from the assignor assuming that I should have answered the phone from the school that Saturday morning to address the situation. Aaaahhhhnnnnooo!!! When they cancelled the game, things in my personal life changed and I made other plans. I even went out with some friends to celebrate a birthday Friday night, but these dumb schools think I was to just be around I guess and sit by the phone hoping they will play a game anyway. If this was a football or basketball game, this would have never been the case. I have had games get cancelled in those other sports for many reasons over the years and never once did anyone think the crew was supposed to just cover the game. Of if they did, they certainly learned the hard way. And then you get a phone call (not an email) from the assignor "asking" if you can cover the game and when you say no it is not a big deal or unexpected. I had that happen twice in basketball just this year where I lost games because of a snow storm and the assignors were as nice as they could be to see if I could work the rescheduled game. It was no big deal, not emails telling me I should accusing me this being an excuse or making it sound like I was wrong to turn down the game. The contract only should obligate you to the time and site that you agree to when the game was assigned, not when all the changes are made. And this is the type of BS I really am tired of. It happens too often in baseball and it is likely time to move on for me.

Peace

We have commissioners / assignors, too, but once the game is originally scheduled, they're usually out of the picture and the duty of contacting the crew and negotiating changes in time fall to the athletic directors.

Any change in time or location essentially invalidates the original contract. If I can do the games, I will, but if I can't I don't lose sleep over it.

I feel the exact same way. I just get tired "balls" that those seem to take when you say "NO."

Peace

I like baseball because the participants are smart enough to come in out of the rain, unlike those of that silly game played with nets on sticks who will play in the slop all day long. I hate that game. It has hurt baseball in the northeast.

I still managed to work 21 of the days, 9 rain outs (or "field not playable" or similar). One was a solo when partner didn't show.

Plus one "the field's playable, the weather's pleasant, but the other team can't make it."

JM

Lacrosse is the fastest growing sport in our part of the country. At least they play their sport and not move things around simply because it rained. Just from an officiating standpoint, you at least know they are likely to play.

Peace