It's OK to laugh now, but not then

Originally Posted by BretMan

Had a catcher that was a BIG kid and liked to set-up close to the plate. Made it tough for me to get a good look at the ball hitting the mitt.

Pitch comes in, batter swings and misses. DEFENSIVE coach starts yelling, "Come on, Blue, you got to call that!". I'm scratching my head. I did call it- it was a strike.

The coach is getting more and more vocal about how I "missed that call". I figure that maybe I should talk to the coach real quick and see what's up.

Me: Okay, coach, what's the problem.

Coach: How can you miss that? You've got to call that! The batter can't do that! Somebody is going to get hurt!

Me: What exactly is it you think I missed? (I didn't see it or hear anything unusual).

Coach: The batter hit the catcher's mitt! That's interference!

Me: Coach, I was blocked out and didn't see it. I'll watch for it, but in the meantime you might want to tell your catcher to back off the plate a bit.

Coach: (still not satisfied) Come on, Blue. You have to call that!

Me: Are you sure you want me to call that?

Coach: Yes.

Me: Are you really, really sure?

Coach: YES!

Me: Okay. If you insist....(loudly) That's obstruction! You (pointing at batter), first base!

Had a football coach who was about as stupid as this coach you dealt with, though he did seem to have a smart motive for it. He wanted my white hat to change the illegal motion penalty (which is a live ball penalty that can be declined) to a false start penalty (which is dead ball and cannot be declined) because he thought I had it wrong because his receivers were moving at the snap. They weren't stimulating the snap, so that's why I called it illegal motion. Coach kept insisting for the false start, and I pulled out a flag and called unsportsmanlike conduct on him. My white hat had the deer in the headlights look, as did the coach. When I said to my white hat, "coach is trying to pull a fast one on us," white hat said "next one will cost you your a** coach!" Coach wanted to know how he was pulling a fast one. He never figured it out and looked like he was trying to catch his tail between his legs. The rest of that game went so easy.