Does your assignor grade you?

[AtlUmpSteve]

I am an association assignor, as well as an active umpire, and an evaluator. I regularly evaluate the members of my association; most often by working games with them.

That said, I don't think that assignors are necessarily appropriate evaluators. First, there is an inherent conflict in 1) being responsible to fill game positions, 2) sometimes needing to coddle and coerce to get cooperation, and then 3) being the one to tell them when the did poorly. Second, most assignors/coordinators/schedulers/booking agents are selected because they have the time, the mentality, and the willingness to handle the constant juggling act. Not all are even good umpires, attend clinics, stay up with rules and mechanics, or know what a good umpire is, other than ready and willing to accept any assignment needed to be covered. Many assignors are (or should be) retired from calling, and just don't measure up.

In every association I have been involved (including the ones I currently assign for), I have pushed and urged that someone other than the assignor be the primary training officer/evaluator/rater of umpires. Ideally, it should be a training and evaluation committee, chaired by an officer, with participation by non-board members, and the assignor be a non-voting member. In that setting, the assignor advises the committee about feedback from the clients, the committee addresses, evaluates, rates, and ranks the members, with that direction regarding skill level going from committee to assignor, not the other way around.

I think we have all been members of an association where the assignor is a good ol' boy power broker that has lost touch with the job, has his/her group that gets what they want, and puts the other umpires in games without knowing or caring if the right umpires are working the right games. No one is willing to run against them, because 1) it is a burn-out job, 2) you can hardly have a life, and 3) if you run and lose, you can forget ever getting the games you deserve. If you run and win, the usual change is the good ol' boy group is pissed, you get no cooperation, and so you create the good new boy group.