And wonder if in his mind he didn't kill the ball? If your statement was based upon a discussion you had with him, then by all means your right. I am given him the benifit of the doubt and that is the difference in what we surmise.

The calls make the ball dead, but we don't call "Dead Ball." We don't say "Dead Ball" anymore. It used to be used for a HBP or a ball going into DBT, many, many years ago, but it went out of favor, mostly due to wiseacre clinicians who would perform a funeral for the ball if you said, "Dead ball" instead of "Time." Personally, I don't see what all the fuss was ever about, except clinicians trying to look really smart and be funny in clinics.

In your example of the ball coming up and hitting the batter still in the box, the proper call for the PU has ALWAYS been "Foul." The BU calls "Time" when he sees the ball bounce up and hit the batter, and kills the ball (making it dead :)) and lets the PU decide whether or not the batter was still in the box, making it a foul (or an out if batter was out of the box).

I call "TIME!"

First of all, I don't give a crap about the Padres. If it had been the Dodgers, or any other team I would feel the same way. What is a travestry, BTW? It was a BAD CALL, or do you think it was a GOOD CALL? Sheesh!

Secondly, you have no idea what caliber official I am, but I have watched you work on TV, and you looked fairly run-of-the-mill to me. I don't think I'm good, I have the ratings and evals to back it up, so stop with the personal insults. A whole helluva a lot of people think I am damn fine umpire, and that's good enough for me. I believe them.

Steve,
I have never seen you umpire. (As far as I know.) But I can absolutely tell you are an excellent umpire by what I've read from you on this board. I, for one, truly appreciate what you add to this board and I have learned a lot from reading posts from folks such as yourself. (And I've been doing this for nearly 30 years.) I'm still trying to learn all the time.

It matters not what was in his head. He signaled (and therefore called) "foul." (And then later "fair.") The benefit of doubt is irrelevant. The mechanics were poor and confusing.

Hmmm ... looks like I need to change my mechanic on this one. As SDSteve pointed out, I don't know what the big deal is. All it takes is somebody of authority to have a pet peeve over something as trivial as "dead ball" vs. "time", and the next thing you know a new "proper" mechanic is born.

For the record I say, "Dead" when I use that signal. But I would not use the signal without saying something. Actually if only which way we point mattered, what would you do if someone pointed a ball fair, but for some reason got turned around and pointed in foul territory? Would we consider that a signaling of a foul ball and then kill the play? The reason I ask because years ago I did jut that when a ball almost hit me and I got turned around and very briefly signaled in the wrong direction.

Peace

Not true. Was looking in my BRD and at the NFHS level there is a whole section on reversing a call etc.,

That is also why they added the rule a couple years ago about what happens now when the umpire does verbalize "foul" etc.,

I'm not agreeing he did everything wrong, but I am saying I've had similiar plays happen and sometimes you just have to umpire.

But its obviously NOT cut and dry that just because you throw your arms out that you have a dead ball.

thanks
David

That guy has ENORMOUS hands.

Maybe his hands are "normal" sized; it's just the rest of his body that's small.

Whether it was a good or bad call is your hangup, not mine. Whether he screwed up or not with his hands and arms, well he already agreed with that. So we disagree. Bingo. I still have to work tomorrow.

Now, if your going to try and convince me that you saw me on TV, well I think Dale Scott has a better chance of convincing me that he was praising the catcher's fine play at the plate with his arms up, noticed the ball was fair when touched and pointed it fair. That is much more believable. But good try!

No, what I'm saying is that he first called it Foul, then changed his call to Fair. Nothing more, nothing less. He blew the call. Very simply put.

I saw you work a game on TV. It was some kind of all-start game or something like that. Wasn't that you who said you were working a TV game, and even said what channel it was going to be on and everything? If it wasn't you who said it, I apologize. I really thought you were the umpire working first base in that game, and that I was watching you. Who was it then, anybody remember? It was a couple years ago, IIRC.

No he didn't. This was MLB and according to MLB he may have signaled "time", but he definitely did not signal foul.

Sorry wrong guy and I too, apologize if you thought I was getting personal.

Again I was given him the benefit of the doubt because after all these years I truly respect what the MLB official does and the road he has traveled to get there. And I am sure you do too.