Worked at the PFX tour this weekend - Part II: The Good

[Julio Caliente]

Well, there were many "goods"

- Got to meet Dot Richardson and she is a worker. She never told anybody she didn't have time for them to take a picture or sign an autograph. I remember walking into the complex and she giving an impromptu hitting lesson to about 3 teams on the sidewalk. heck, she even gave my gf help with her Organic Chemistry homework for college WHILE she was announcing the Pro Game.

- Got all of the PFX tour members to sign a ball

- Got to see Lisa Fernandez pitch (talk about mound presence.... geez)

- One of my buddies did the plate on the first PFX Pro game when Fernandez was pitching. He said she was amazing as a pitcher and very tough to call because the ball was coming so fast with so much movement.

- Laughed when he told me that before the game they got the umps together and said "You will not call illegal's, obstruction, interference, or leaving early. You will call fair/foul, safe/out, and ball/strike. Your strike zone will be big because people didn't come to watch them walk".

- Talked to the UIC who is a Division I assignor and asked if he was doing evaluations. He said there were some people he wanted to look at for college assignments, but with 8 fields going that he wasn't going to do everybody. I told him good, because if he were going to do me he would need a fresh pad of paper and multiple pens. He got a kick out of that.

-When I got my check at the end I thanked the UIC for giving me the chance to come work the tournament and that I know he didn't sit down and actually evaluate me but if he did notice anything in his passing for me to work on. He asked me how long I had been doing this for and I said I had done about 25 games before coming here, but had done baseball before. He told me he could tell because there were still some baseball mechanics in my calls (eg when I called a strike I didn't move my fist higher than about my ear, and my slot was about 3" off). Nothing major that can't be corrected with a little help. Told me my judgment was pretty good overall (balls/strikes and safe/outs), but my low pitch call wasn't quite as consistent as he liked (said that would come with more experience), but it wasn't terrible either. Basically, he told me that I have the goods to be a good umpire, I just need to fine tune some thing.

-The facilities at the hosting complex were amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ben Davies High School hosted it and they had a facility that would rival many colleges and make many others jealous.

-Was behind the plate for a 10U game that had a final score of 1-0 and played 6 innings in 75 min. One of the best games I have ever seen at that level.