Take Care of Business:
Problems Arise When You Don't Manage Situations

By Jon Bible

Situations often arise in ballgames when a gentle touch by an umpire can go a long way toward defusing things.

By that I mean doing something in a quiet, unobtrusive manner so as to “nip a problem in the bud,” as Barney Fife used to say on the old Andy Griffith Show, without the average spectator even recognizing it.

Developing that touch and knowing when and how to apply it are not things that umpires learn overnight. That is one of the many reasons that I’ve long preached the necessity of paying your dues and taking things a step at a time in climbing the ladder.

Umpires who advance too quickly may be “book smart” — know the rulebook inside and out and the nuances of the Deep C position — but they will likely lack the “street smarts” that one can only learn by going around the block a few times.

It’s important to be a history student before the game. As much as you can, find out about what kind of relationship the teams have had in the past. If you regularly work in the area you’ll probably know that, but maybe not, and if you are working two teams from out of your area, you may be caught off guard by something that happens.

Has there been bad blood between the teams? Repeatedly? Do the coaches not like each other? Is there some school district/location/ region issue involved? When things happen — fights or near-fights, beanball incidents, excessive chirping — that our fellow umpires need to know about, because they will have those teams the next day or somewhere down the line, it’s incumbent on us to pass that information along to the supervisor/assigner and to the next crew itself, if possible. Otherwise a pitch that seemed to innocently slip out of a pitcher’s hand and go behind a hitter might have really been a “purpose” pitch.

Years ago I had a game involving two teams whose coaches hated each other. I had worked the tournament for several years running and knew the history, so I had done some thinking in advance.

I had the plate for the game and both coaches were engaging in all sorts of one-upsmanship. In the first two innings, each came to me twice to complain about something the other did, and pitchers and batters were repeatedly backing out of the box and off the mound to disrupt the other one. (The game was before the batter’s box rule.)

What finally did it was a complaint that the other coach’s team had different colored shoelaces so they weren’t “in uniform.” I called them both out at the end of the inning and said, “I know you guys hate each other. If you want to kill each other afterward, great. But you’re screwing up my game. The next time a hitter backs out of the box when I don’t think he had a reason, it’s a strike. Next time a pitcher backs off the mound when I don’t think he should have, it’s a ball. And the next time one of you comes to me with a BS complaint, you’re done. If you want to protest, fine — go to the games committee. By the way, I’m the chair.”

Problem solved.

The point is that I didn’t say anything before the game, because that would have made it look like I was fishing for trouble. But when the Mickey Mouse stuff started, as I knew it would, I implemented a plan I had already thought of. In hindsight I probably should have intervened quicker, but at least things went on well from there.

I’m not saying you can always be as inventive as I was then. I was head of the protest committee so I had the luxury of creating some new rules that they couldn’t do anything about. But hopefully you get my point — if you know beforehand what you’re getting into, you can think about what you might do when the inevitable problems arise.

Arrival at the site. Before the game, I think it’s important for the umpires to let the home coach know when they’ve arrived at the site. Nothing more than going to the fence, getting his attention and giving a quick wave of the hand is needed, but it reassures him that the crew is there and that things will get started on time.

Pitchers, especially at higher levels, have a set routine they like to follow in warming up and they want to know the game will start on time so they can begin warming up at the appropriate time.

When a coach assumes the umpires are on hand but they’re running late due to traffic or cutting it close getting off work, the game will start late and the starting pitcher will warm up only to have to stop, cool off and then start again. That can be more than a minor irritant that can carry over to the field.

Keep it businesslike when you walk to the plate. Problems can arise when you stop to chat with players and coaches, especially the home team’s, because the visiting coach, especially if he doesn’t know you, will notice that familiarity. We all know that coaches are paranoid, and they won’t say anything to you about it — how can they, without risking ticking you off? — but they’ll file it away in their memory bank and maybe use it against you if a funky play happens.

I’ve written before that several coaches I know swear they form impressions of umpires with whom they’re not familiar by watching their body language as they walk to the plate. Either they convey the impression that they’re ready for prime time or they don’t, and those first impressions can last forever.

The plate conference. In the plate conference, cover what needs to be covered — or let the home coach review the ground rules if he prefers — but keep it short. Not too much jocularity, and especially the off-color kind, because you never know when a coach you think is “one of the guys” is a deacon in his church who’s offended by that sort of thing.

Don’t make it a mini-rules session. A year or two ago, in an early season game, an umpire with whom I work who tends to be a bit loquacious, got both coaches’ eyes rolling because he went through virtually every new rule in great detail.

Depending on the rule I might ask them at the start of the season if they know about it or have any questions about it, but I don’t view the plate conference as a time to have a seminar.

The start of the game. To start the game I always made a big point of carefully dusting off the black edges of the plate, and then some. Especially if they didn’t know me and know that I have a generous strike zone, I wanted to convey that message up front. It’s hard for a hitter approaching the plate to start the game to see you making a big production of that and not understand the message you’re sending: “I like the corners, so swing the bat.” They’ll also go back and let their buds know what they saw.

Develop a good relationship with your catchers. Lots of things have been written about that, because umpires have different viewpoints on the subject. I don’t think any particular theory is right — different things work for different people. I think it’s a good idea to get their first names and give them yours, and I always ask at the start whether his pitcher throws anything unusual that might surprise me. But unlike some umpires, I’m not wild about the idea of shaking hands, nor do I do a lot of talking during the game.

I got burned once in pro ball because I was talking a blue streak and then had a close call in extra innings that won the game for the other team, and I heard the catcher talked on the team bus about how all I did was talk for 10 innings.

Also, some coaches don’t like excessive familiarity between their players and umpires. So I think it’s good to get on a first-name basis but to keep the conversation minimal during the game. We’ve both got jobs to do and too much chatter can be distracting.

That goes for infielders as well. It’s easy to want to chat with a first or third baseman if you’re on the foul line or the middle infielders if you’re there, and a little is OK, but don’t overdo it. I’ve had more than one player let me know directly or by the way he interacted — looking ahead and talking without moving his lips — that his coach didn’t want him talking with umpires. If you insist on doing that you can buy a lot of trouble.

More than once as a college umpire coordinator I’ve had coaches complain about umpires who, they felt, talked too much. Some think it distracts both their players and the umpire. It might not, but perception is more important than reality.

Preventive medicine. If you know your catcher and trust him, you can use him to send messages to the pitcher. The pitcher, for example, may be getting borderline in terms of balking — not really coming to a full stop but not really being deceptive either — so you can send your catcher out to him to tell him to give you a better stop. A base umpire can do the same thing with an infielder. Be careful, of course, in terms of who you’re dealing with, because it can be embarrassing when a player gets halfway to the mound and turns around and asks you, “What did you want me to tell him again?”

In college and pro ball, and in a lot of high school games, the coaches are mature enough, and appreciative enough of the “preventive medicine” approach, that they’re not likely to say anything when you give the opposition a word to the wise in that manner. They know you’ll extend them the same courtesy.

In the lower levels it can be different, for often the coaches haven’t been around that long themselves and see everything in black-and-white, don’t-give-them-any-help terms. If they say something to you, just tell them that you’ll do the same thing for them.

If you miss a balk, go to the defensive coach, or his pitching coach, at the end of the inning and tell him so. There are times when we’ve all slept through someone not stopping, or maybe popping a knee in picking off at first base, but when we call nothing we convey the impression that we don’t think that’s a balk. Then we really have problems when we call it the next time it happens. Just go to the coach and say, “Coach, I missed a balk that inning. Your guy (whatever he did). I just want to put you on notice because the next time it happens, I’m calling it.” They can deal with that.

Sometimes things happen in games that we have to handle openly and aggressively, like calling an interference, balk or obstruction. But at times there are little, maybe unnoticed, seemingly innocent things that we can do that can avert real problems later on. One mark of a top-notch umpire is knowing those techniques and when to apply them.

Jon Bible is a veteran umpire who has worked six NCAA Division I College World Series. He lives in Austin, Texas, and is currently the umpiring supervisor for the Southland Conference.