LLWS and replay

[MD Longhorn]

Originally Posted by RichMSN

I guess we magically turn into crappy umpires the second they stop paying us to work games and we put on a LL patch.

That's not what I meant, and I think you know that.

[THoy]

Originally Posted by mbcrowder

Apology accepted. I did not say each individual umpire was bad ... I said the overall quality of the umpiring was bad. And if you feel the umpiring was better than average, I suggest strongly that you get out more. The umpiring on TV was an embarassment to those of us who do the job, and on the whole brought the perception of umpires across the board down. Go work a district tournament in ANY other organization (not to mention a regional or state) and you'll see better umpiring than you saw on TV. Given that you work LL, you are probably completely unaware of the HUGE number of poor positioning, poor (or unnecessary) rotations, etc that we saw. I'm not talking wrong calls... I'm talking wrong calls because the umpire was not where he should have been, or was making a call that belonged to someone else better placed to make the call.

I was at the LLWS. I worked with all the gentlemen, and one lady (who was awesome). It was a good group of veteran LL umpires I would be proud to work with anytime. So, I would have to disagree with you. And honestly, I would love to come and work with you sometime. Further, when we were done I would not rake you over the coals. I would buy you a cold one and a plate wings!

As far as positioning goes you have a point to a certain degree. The small diamond often limits the amount of angle you can get on a given play. I was blocked out on a play at first by the F4 (2ndbaseman), but I made an adjustment and got the play right. However, there we those that were out of position at times. As a whole, the umpiring was no where near the level that has been described in this forum. A few mistakes and some controversy, but nothing that cost any team a chance at the title.

It would certainly be nice if people could understand that umpiring, like anything else, requires constant self analysis and adjustments. You cannot position yourself in the same place for every play. You must react to each individual play. If you can see a play clearly from one position that may not be textbook, then what is the difference? If you are nailing the plays from that position then why change? If you are kicking plays from the proper position, what good is proper position?

I did witness plays that were called incorrectly. One of those plays was mine. I owned during the game, after the game, and right now. There was not as many blown calls as people many want to believe. Maybe people should be offering possible solutions instead of ripping people apart?

[BigUmp56]

Originally Posted by THoy

I was at the LLWS. I worked with all the gentlemen, and one lady (who was awesome). It was a good group of veteran LL umpires I would be proud to work with anytime. So, I would have to disagree with you. And honestly, I would love to come and work with you sometime. Further, when we were done I would not rake you over the coals. I would buy you a cold one and a plate wings!

Maybe people should be offering possible solutions instead of ripping people apart?

I've been milling over whether to say this or not, and I hope it's not taken the wrong way, but I don't think John Hosler was up to the task. He looked out of his element.

Tim.

[THoy]

Originally Posted by BigUmp56

I've been milling over whether to say this or not, and I hope it's not taken the wrong way, but I don't think John Hosler was up to the task. He looked out of his element.

Tim.

Whether that is true or not doesnt take away from who John is as a person or a LL volunteer. Further, be advised that I am not inferring ANYTHING! That aside Jon made some greats calls that others might have missed under the circumstances. You cannot begin to imagine what it is like to know that the calls you make could be reversed. LL did a great job preparing the umpires for replay and frontloaded the recommended approach to it. That being said, I think Mr. Hosler gave his best to the task. I came to know him as a person so I know this to be true. John answered the call and gave his best effort. Until you are standing on the field at Howard J. Lamade Stadium in front of 15,000 fans and on National televison you cannot assess Johns performance...that has been my point all along. Some will never have the opportunity to experience this because of their deploration of the LL program. I, myself, learned more about my own game in Williamsport...

[THoy]

Originally Posted by THoy

Whether that is true or not doesnt take away from who John is as a person or a LL volunteer. Further, be advised that I am not inferring ANYTHING! That aside Jon made some greats calls that others might have missed under the circumstances. You cannot begin to imagine what it is like to know that the calls you make could be reversed. LL did a great job preparing the umpires for replay and frontloaded the recommended approach to it. That being said, I think Mr. Hosler gave his best to the task. I came to know him as a person so I know this to be true. John answered the call and gave his best effort. Until you are standing on the field at Howard J. Lamade Stadium in front of 15,000 fans and on National televison you cannot assess Johns performance...that has been my point all along. Some will never have the opportunity to experience this because of their deploration of the LL program. I, myself, learned more about my own game in Williamsport...

I would work with John Hosler anytime!

[BigUmp56]

Originally Posted by THoy

Whether that is true or not doesnt take away from who John is as a person or a LL volunteer. Further, be advised that I am not inferring ANYTHING! That aside Jon made some greats calls that others might have missed under the circumstances. You cannot begin to imagine what it is like to know that the calls you make could be reversed. LL did a great job preparing the umpires for replay and frontloaded the recommended approach to it. That being said, I think Mr. Hosler gave his best to the task. I came to know him as a person so I know this to be true. John answered the call and gave his best effort. Until you are standing on the field at Howard J. Lamade Stadium in front of 15,000 fans and on National televison you cannot assess Johns performance...that has been my point all along. Some will never have the opportunity to experience this because of their deploration of the LL program. I, myself, learned more about my own game in Williamsport...

This is why I was hesitant to make the comment about John Hosler. Your defense of the man's umpiring abilities is you speaking with your heart and not your head. The man wasn't good.............period. This isn't a jab at the man's person, or a knock on the effort he put forth. He was there based on his volunteerism alone. Not based on his officiating prowess *combined* with his volunteerism. And as long as LL continues to overlook better, more qualified umpires who have also put in their time to the program, and instead chose to place umpires of John's caliber on national television, they're going to be continually criticized for it.

Tim.

[nopachunts]

Originally Posted by THoy

LL did a great job preparing the umpires for replay and frontloaded the recommended approach to it.

On another umpire board, one of the members gave some insight to the LL Softball WS. Give us some insight as to how LL frontloaded the recommended approach and prepared umpires for replay. That may answer several questions that I and some other have.

[MD Longhorn]

Originally Posted by THoy

I did witness plays that were called incorrectly. One of those plays was mine. I owned during the game, after the game, and right now. There was not as many blown calls as people many want to believe. Maybe people should be offering possible solutions instead of ripping people apart?

I don't recall ripping anyone apart. I do recall offering possible solutions multiple times. WTH are you talking about? I'm not even talking about bad calls - I'm talking about bad umpiring. Seriously - do you REALLY think the games were umpired well? No one else I know does.

As to solutions, I'll recap, but this thread is riddled with solutions.
1) Pay your umpires. Not just sometimes if certain places feel like it... Always. This will ensure you're talent pool is as large as possible and put your association on a level with everyone else.
2) Train your umpires. Not just an optional occasional training session. REQUIRED training that is tailored toward it's audience. I assure you that the first clinic I attend each year is completely different from those before District, State, etc. And it's constant... not just once, far away from anyone, held by some local yokel who has no clue (which was my experience in the 1 and only LL training I've been to).
3) Fix the selection process. This is a problem all over, but it seems worse at LL --- possibly due to 1 and 2 above. The rookie with 15 consecutive rookie seasons under his belt gets the call - but the 3rd year guy who attends everything he can possibly attend, reads posts here, etc - he gets nothing.

I'll apologize again for what appeared to be an erroneous broad brush ... I should not have assumed your statement that the umpiring at the LLWS was not bad was due to a lack of perspective. I don't know what it WAS ... other than that it was wrong.

As an aside ... if the best one can say about an organization's showcase event is that it "wasn't bad" ... don't you consider that a problem in and of itself? At such an event, one would hope that the impartial viewer (or the umpire viewer) would come away saying, "Wow, those guys were great".