Youth baseball parents put on notice

I feel like I know the rules pretty well -- I think all sportswriters do compared with the other people at the game -- and in my experience, at least 90 percent of the time parents are positive an ump got a rule wrong, the ump is completely correct and the parents are wrong. We had one yesterday -- our hitter swung at a ball that then hit him, and the ump called a third strike. Kid's dad starts yelling "DON'T YOU CARE ABOUT PLAYER SAFETY" and "WHAT, YOU WANT TO GET OUT OF HERE ON A HOT DAY OR SOMETHING?!?!?!" It was enough to get him ejected, frankly, and I am surprised he wasn't. The rule is clear as day that that is a strike. But every one of our parents was convinced that the umpire was wrong, and that he was also out to get us.

I see that situation far more than I see the umpire getting a call wrong. Probably the most common is the "hand is part of the bat" myth. And like Bob, I coach my kids (and especially the parents) to let it go. In my experience, it isn't all that common that the call itself leads to the damage. The damage is caused when one player is complaining to the umpire/ref and doesn't follow the action or gets so upset that he loses concentration and makes another mistake. Basically like the '85 Cardinals in the post-Denkinger portion of the ninth inning of Game 6.

 

"If everyone keeps their cool" is the key part. Usually I see coaches and umps working together to make sure things are right. Especially in younger kids' leagues, there are differing rules that, even if you were briefed on them early in the season, would be easy to forget if they don't come up often. When the coaches and umps work together as you say, that does a lot to stop parents from getting agitated.

Except in travel leagues. A lot of those parents are REALLY crazy. Or as a friend of mine called the difference between coaching travel and coaching house, "In travel, there are a hell of a lot more parents who think their 9-year-old is going to sign a major league contract tomorrow."

 

Going back to the Matheny thing: if his guidelines were STRICTLY followed, going to games would be like a visit to the morgue.

IMO in baseball/softball specifically, but in other sports too, once you get past the tee-ball/romper-room/cookies-for-everybody level of play, a moderate level of "chatter" is normal and the players are used to it.

If the players are such delicate flowers they wilt at the sound of somebody yelling, "OK, come on, give it a ride," they probably ought to stay home and play solitaire tiddlywinks.

This ain't the 1890s when 9-year-old Ty Cobb was spitting tobacco juice on spike wounds, but part of any sport is developing confidence, toughness and even a bit of swagger where you can stand up at the plate with chatter from both sides, and drill out a hit.

 

Heck, some kids would find it disturbing if you said nothing as a parent. I understand not barking instructions -- in fact, on my fourth-grade basketball team last year I had to instruct kids not to listen to what was coming out of the bleachers -- but an "all right you can do it!" hardly seems like child abuse.

Although here's a term I hate hate hate hate in youth baseball and softball -- "Be a hitter!" As opposed to what, "Be a misser"? Gee, thanks, dad/coach, I was going to go up there with the express purpose of whiffing, but not that you've enlightened me, I will put bat on ball.

 

Yeah, in addition to the fact the coach may have put the "take" sign on, and on that particular pitch, he may not be SUPPOSED to "be a hitter."

 

Going up with the intent of hitting the ball would have been an improvement over my approach, which was to focus on nothing but not being hit by the ball.

 

When I was umpiring youth baseball, we reminded coaches before every game which rule book we were using, went over specific variations of the rules that applied to that particular league, and the strike zone ("nipples to knees, one ball width on each side of the plate." We wanted kids swinging.) It was kind of like the flight attendants' safety announcement before a flight, but it laid down the rules of engagement.

We also always specified that we wouldn't argue balls/strikes or judgment calls. We would be happy to discuss an interpretation of a rule, but we reminded the coaches that the games were strictly time-limited and that any minute he spent talking to us was a minute that the kids weren't playing the game.

We really had very few issues, compared to other leagues in the area, and I think it's because our head of officials really took the job seriously.

 

LongTimeListner and Bob Cook, I agree with what you're saying about parents and knowledge of rules.
After seeing parents at all age levels go guano crazy over the years, I pledged I would never do that. And I haven't. Of course, it helps that I know my son is no second coming for his age group and probably won't even be a star on his own high school team, if he even plays on it.
Doesn't mean I don't want to yell my head off when I see a bad call or a plain old botched one, just that I don't yell my head off.

 

I couldn't agree more with Bob Cook.

As someone who umpires close to 200 baseball games a year, and someone who also coached my son's Babe Ruth team last year, the problem, 95 percent of the time, is not with anyone on the actual field of play.

It's with the parents.

I'll give a perfect example. Two days ago, after I was done umping a youth tournament game, I sat in the stands watching two of my co-workers. I was still in all of my plate gear, so there was no mistaking that I was an ump.

There was an appeal play on the field that, frankly, the base ump screwed up. It wasn't his call. The plate umpire got together with him and they changed the call. They explained to the coaches why they did so. The coaches didn't like it, but they understood it.

Meanwhile, the parents of the team that were adversely affected by the call went ballistic. I calmly tried to explain what the umpires had done, admitted the base guy initially made a mistake, but that in the end, they got the call correct.

These parents swore up and down that I was wrong and had no idea what I was talking about.

The problem with parents is three-fold. First, many of them don't know the rules. Second, many of them think they know the rules far better than they do. Third, they see the game with their hearts, not their eyes.

As I told the parents on the team I coached last year, if you don't see me going out to talk with an umpire, then keep quiet. As a fellow ump, I knew when they screwed up a rule and when I could go out and try to get the proper resolution.

Safe/out, fair/foul, ball/strike? I was never going out. That's a judgment call, and no matter how much I disagreed with it, it wasn't going to change.

Fortunately, my parents listened for the most part, and we avoided some of the ugly incidents that plagued other teams.

 

Arrggh. There is nothing worse than umps who call a TIGHT strike zone at lower-levels of baseball and softball.

I've seen games where the two teams combined for 40 runs -- and less than five hits. Total.


Typical inning went: walk-walk-passed ball-called strikeout-walk-walk-wild pitch-walk-walk-called strikeout-walk-walk-hit by pitch-walk-walk-called strikeout. Eight runs, no hits, no errors, three left. Not a single ball put in play.

 

I like what my 7-year-old daughter's softball league does. There are no walks. After four balls, the coach comes in to finish the at-bat, picking up with however many strikes are on the batter. Once there are four "walks" issued (or two hit batters), the coach finishes the inning, which tops out at six runs. I feel like the kids get the best of all worlds. The girls learn to pitch. The hitters, if the girl struggles to pitch, at some point will see strikes and have to swing. The fielders, particularly if the coach comes in, will have to learn how to field a live ball.

By the way, RickStain, your coach was yelling "Be a hitter!" Not, "Be a hittee!"

 

I may or may not have once bailed out on a pitch that hit the dirt outside the opposite side batter's box.