Why I Ump

Now that the clocks have been turned ahead and the sun will be sticking around well past dinner time, I can finally start thinking about baseball again.

Ever since I was old enough to stand up straight, I've been stepping onto muddy fields around this time of year. I played baseball through high school, a good-fielding, seldom-hitting infielder who ran the bases well and could occasionally be called on to throw a variety of junk ball pitches at the opposition.

These days you can still find me on the baseball diamond, but in quite a different capacity. For the past five years I've been an umpire, working mostly little league games, both in my hometown and for West Cambridge Little League.

I remember my first summer as an umpire vividly. I was about to graduate high school, and I decided to make a little extra money for the summer by umpiring at the little league fields where I myself had played as a child. The money was really a bonus though, in retrospect, I would have done it for free, and I still would. Where else can you get a front-row view of an 11-year-old first baseman wearing futuristic sunglasses, blowing a bubble, winking at a girl he wishes was his girlfriend and dropping a hard throw from the shortstop all at the same time?

Sometimes I do five games in a single day, waking up early for the 9:15 game, grabbing breakfast before the noon game, eating a hot dog and slushie before the 2:45 game, dunking my head in ice water before the 5:30 game, and trading stories with the other umpires at dusk before the 8 o'clock game under the floodlights.

What do umpires talk about? Scenarios mostly. If a ball is hit deep to center and the outfielder throws his glove up at the ball, and he hits it and knocks it down in the field of play, what's the call? Or how about this one: a batted ball hits a fielder and then hits a runner, who then walks off the field but is never tagged. Is she out or safe?

Umpires also talk about fashion. Short brimmed caps are in, and everyone has their own opinions about the relative merits of blue, black and gray trousers.

Mostly, umpires stick to their own kinds, finding safety in numbers and teaching their young. At first, I would whisper calls under my breath, not realizing that I really had to yell in order to be heard. Gradually I learned by example that I had to be loud to be effective, not only vocally but also physically, contorting my body violently in order to sell each call. As one of my old coaches and fellow umpires would constantly remind me, the closer the call, the louder I had to yell, and the more authoritatively I had to gesture with my arms and legs.

I also learned not to confuse the drama of a close call with any sense of urgency. Too often, a young umpire will try to make a call before a play has developed, assuming a sequence of action that eventually fails to unfold. The runner may beat the throw, but will he touch the base? The fielder may coax the ball into his mitt, but will it stay there? The ball may beat the runner, but does the tag?

Patience, patience, patience, as an umpire, and then unwavering insistence. If you're afraid of making a mistake, don't open your big mouth until you're good and ready. One of the worst things that can happen to an umpire is to find that you've waved a runner "safe" with your hands but with your mouth you've called her "out." Which to believe? Occasions like this raise an interesting philosophical dilemma, testing the umpire's loyalty to action and language, and forcing him to choose between the two. Although actions may speak louder than words, the action is always more easily transformed than the word. Remember, you can always take your waving hand and make a fist out of it. To say "ou--safe" is far less credible.

Umpiring behind the plate is even harder, because your mind begins to play tricks on you. You begin to root for balls and strikes, your strike zone shifts arbitrarily by batter, or even by pitch, and you start to make make-up calls, and then make-up make-up calls. One time I got caught dozing and a kid walloped a ball 250 feet. I looked up to see it tailing rapidly, about 15 feet above the left field foul pole. I suppose some folks would have called it a three-run homer, but I just called it a foul ball--a really loud foul ball.

At any given point during the summer, you might find me dusty and sunburnt, defending my integrity to a host of complainers over a call such as that one. There's always that scrawny kid in a oversized uniform, asking me if I "need glasses." There's always that balding coach in a tank-top and Bermuda shorts, telling me I "had no angle." And there's always that prim mother in a sun dress, wondering why I won't just "let the kids play ball." Sometimes there's even a little sister with a blue popsicle tongue, declaring that I "suck."

It is for her that I umpire.

Jim Cocola '98 is a history and literature concentrator in Winthrop House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.