Two teams trying to stay in the hunt for playoff spots met tonight.
The team trailing and trying to crawl back into the game, has 1 out,
runner on 1B. Ball hit to right center, which the right fielder grabs
and fires back to 1B just beating the retreating runner. I gave a sell
out. On his way back to his third base side dugout, 1B coach says,
"blue, thats the worse call I have ever seen." Me, "The worse call?"
Coach, "Yes, the worse." Me, "Damn". Let it drop and return to my
in between inning position. Two innings later still trying to
get back into the game, runner on 1B [hefty, actually huge] girl on 1B.
Ball is hit to LF down the line. 1B coach, same guy, telling his
runner to go to 3rd. She is thrown out by five steps. As he passes me
while I am cleaning the pitcher plate, I remark, "Coach, that was the
worse call I have ever seen!". He replies, "blue, I believe your
right, I went one up on you."

I had my first hands are part of the bat comedian last night.

A real card that one.

Runner on first, no outs. Batter squares to bunt, trying to move runner over.

Pitch is about 2 feet inside...any further inside, and it would have been behind the batter.

Batter bunts the ball anyway...I hear a tink of the bat being hit by the ball, then I see the ball rolling on the ground.

Coach says to me it hit her first...could you ask for help.

Go to partner, he couldn't tell if it hit her or not...saw ball rolling, thinks he may have viewed a redirection of the ball after hitting the bat, but wasn't sure. We let play stand.

Coach yells to both of us, "how can you not see that? You've got to make that call guys!"

SAY WHAT?

And then what happened?

Only reason I ask is I had the same situation last year. Heard tink of the bat, then batter doubles over and grabs his hand (baseball game...I know, I know). Coach goes ballistic. Neither he nor his assistants will let it go and question every call me and my partner make the next couple of innings. Give them the "no more" hand signal, then an inning later an assistant comes out to argue a call. I run him, he cusses me out (this was a 12 & under game, mind you), and he's in the parking lot.

NFHS rules. Girl squares to bunt and holds bat still as pitch sails over catcher's glove, about two feet outside. Head coach says, "C'mon Blue. She held the bat in the zone. That's a strike in every rule book."

And then what happened?
[/B][/QUOTE]

Coach didn't say another word...maybe it's because other team scored 6 runs in the inning.

I asked offensive coach after the game and also asked player if player was hit with ball at all during the pitch. They said yes, after it hit the bat it glanced off the batter.

I couldn't see it, partner was sure, so what are we to do? Call what we see, right?

I'm sure the coach was refering to just the ones s/he reads.

:)

Some of them seem to read NO RULE BOOKS!!

Had a game last night where pitcher gets ball back from catcher and steps back into the circle and pulls the ball back as though to throw to 2nd where R1 is off the base after the pitch. R1 doesn't move back quickly, so F1 throws and throws it away. R1 starts to 3rd where she gets into a "pickle" until the fielders decide to play on R2 coming from 1st base! After 6-8 throws around, we end up with R1 on 3 and R2 on 2.

Head coach calls time and asks me (BU) why I let them run when her pitcher had the ball in the circle. I explained that F1 was "making a play" and that everything was legal. I DID NOT explain anything about runner not hesitating, and I was afraid I might regret that later.

Sure enough, a couple of innings later, other team has R1 on 3 and BR draws a walk. I see 1st base coach waiving BR on to 2nd and she never slowed down. F1 holds the ball and never even looks like she wants to make a play. Same coach calls time and asks me why I didn't call BR out!!

Later in the game, between innings, the assistant coach of the same team asks me why I'm not calling IP on the other team's pitcher because she isn't starting with BOTH feet on the pitching plate! I explain the difference in NFHS and ASA. (In her defense, she did say that they had been called for IP in a high school tournament earlier in the year for not having both feet on the rubber. This touney was umpired by an association other than the one I work for. Sometimes even umpires don't read the right book!)

So, again I say, some coaches don't seem to read ANY rule book!!
:(

[Edited by NorthAlaUmp on Apr 6th, 2005 at 06:08 PM]