My First

[gregm]

Today in my third game, second game behind the plate, I had by myself, with no partner. Dizzy Dean 13-14. The crowd on visitors had been very unruly, and as I went to the manager to tell him to control his fans, he started arguing balls and strikes. I told him we were not going to argue balls and strikes, he kept on. I told him that is enough. He kept on. Then he was gone. His wife kept it up in the stands, so I stopped the game and couldn't find a board member no where to take care of it so I told her she was gone too. I told them that city ordinance required them to leave the park. He said that his son was on the team and he wasn't going to aboandon his son. I told him, you have 2 coaches to take care of him, so they left.
I do have a question, what do you do in an ejection when you don't have a partner. I turned and walked away, and luckily, he left still complaining, but did leave without incident.

[mfs914]

My best advice is to never get involved with fans. I wasnt there so i dont know how bad they really were, but for the most part you need to just be able to ignore them.

I think you handled the coach ok, you asked him to stop arguing balls and strikes and when he didnt you ejected him.

To answer your question as to how i handle ejections when I work alone, i handle it by not working alone :wink: . I am lucky enough that most of our games now are 2 man games, we do very few leagues that are single man, in fact i just looked back at my notes and I have not worked a single game in over 2 years.

Bottom line, dont get involved with fans, its just not worth it. Let the Administrators take care of those clowns.

[umpduck11]

Today in my third game, second game behind the plate, I had by myself, with no partner. Dizzy Dean 13-14. The crowd on visitors had been very unruly, and as I went to the manager to tell him to control his fans, he started arguing balls and strikes. I told him we were not going to argue balls and strikes, he kept on. I told him that is enough. He kept on. Then he was gone. His wife kept it up in the stands, so I stopped the game and couldn't find a board member no where to take care of it so I told her she was gone too. I told them that city ordinance required them to leave the park. He said that his son was on the team and he wasn't going to aboandon his son. I told him, you have 2 coaches to take care of him, so they left.
I do have a question, what do you do in an ejection when you don't have a partner. I turned and walked away, and luckily, he left still complaining, but did leave without incident.

Another example of why NOT to work games solo.

[Ozzy]

Today in my third game, second game behind the plate, I had by myself, with no partner. Dizzy Dean 13-14. The crowd on visitors had been very unruly, and as I went to the manager to tell him to control his fans, he started arguing balls and strikes. I told him we were not going to argue balls and strikes, he kept on. I told him that is enough. He kept on. Then he was gone. His wife kept it up in the stands, so I stopped the game and couldn't find a board member no where to take care of it so I told her she was gone too. I told them that city ordinance required them to leave the park. He said that his son was on the team and he wasn't going to aboandon his son. I told him, you have 2 coaches to take care of him, so they left.
I do have a question, what do you do in an ejection when you don't have a partner. I turned and walked away, and luckily, he left still complaining, but did leave without incident.
Umpduck11 is 100% correct - this is a good reason why you should not work solo. That said, your authority ends at the fence! Stay out of the crowd! All you have to do is put both teams in the dugouts and have both managers meet at home plate. Inform them that if they cannot get the crowd under control, the game is over - and stick to it!

[Richard_Siegel]

....He said that his son was on the team and he wasn't going to aboandon his son. I told him, you have 2 coaches to take care of him, so they left.....

When I have ejected a coach who claims he can't leave because his son is a player, he is really trying to throw up an obstacle at you to try and get you to retract the ejection. I don't want to give him any way to do this.

I have a better way to deal with this response. If he says, "I can't leave, my son is here." I just say, "Take him with you!"

It is not my job to suggest who can take care of his son. I let the guy figure that out for himself, or he can take the kid and go home.

[Matt13]

When I have ejected a coach who claims he can't leave because his son is a player, he is really trying to throw up an obstacle at you to try and get you to retract the ejection. I don't want to give him any way to do this.

I have a better way to deal with this response. If he says, "I can't leave, my son is here." I just say, "Take him with you!"

I wouldn't even say that. I'd just tell him that's not my problem.

[gregm]

As a rule, I do ignore the fans. One thing I did not write about in my OP. I tried to keep it as short and sweet as posible, was that during the game I heard a comment from behind me saying,"you can call the corners too, they do not have to come over the center of the plate." I jut ignored it, didn't even turn around. But I was tempted to turn around and tell him that if the pitcher would actually hit the corner, I would call it. A couple of pitches later, the catcher requested time to talk to the pitcher, so I turned and cleaned the plate. At this time I took a glance to see who made this comment and saw the manager, that got ejected later, walking away. At this time I told him that he had to stay in his dugout, that he could not mingle with the spectators. Had I turned around when the comment was made and saw him standing there, I probably would have run him then and there. But at this time I could only assume that he made it.
As for his wife in the stands, she had been running her mouth, but when I ran her husband, she gave me what piece of her mind she had. First I had some people looking for a board member, but none was to be found. Luckily, a local guy who I do not know stepped up and took care of it.

Thanks for all of the input on how to handle this type of situations. I hate working alone, but all but myself and 2 other umpires are young newbies who have never even done a clinic, just played a lot of baseball. The 2 experienced umpire's last game ended earlier and they had left, and the young ones had their Saturday plans. We had out of town teams playing our local teams, and I didn't want to send them awy empty handed or prolong their game. I did about 3 1/2 innings of the fourth game by myself as well before one of the experience umpires came back after finally being reached by phone. But the second game went off without a hitch.

[Jerry]

A number of years ago when I worked in a 11-13 age group, I believe at one point if a coach got thrown out, they were supposed to take their son with them.

[hey_blue]

Funny, thing. I had a game this year where an unruly fan was barking at me and screaming about balls and strikes..when I looked back, it was the COACH! he was behind the backstop over to the left! I had a talk with him quick and he went to the dugout and never made another sound. He knew he was doing something wrong and even apologized later.

I seriously think that some of the younger league coaches do that on purpose thinking they can get on the umpire, hoping he will think the coach is a fan and never turn around..it's pathetic.


Honestly, just my advice...but two things from this post I do ALWAYS...

never work solo and never call games for kids under 15U...just aint worth to me anymore...

[SJC_Blue]

Unfortunatly, in my neck of the woods, there are a lot of solo games. Frosh and JV for example, as well as travel ball. I agree with all here to avoid solo work. That said, when working solo you really have to keep your cool. Especially when ejecting a manager or coach. You have no support on your side during this and it's best to make sure the manager or coach is ejecting himself. Once you give the heave ho, immediatly walk away. If you are ejecting the manager the assistant coach is now in charge. Pretend the manager no longer exists.

"You're going to have to get him out of here before this game continues. He's going to have to take his son with him if that's a problem, etc etc."
Once you eject him, do not argue or even aknowledge his presence.

Now if you are ejecting a coach, just tell the manager to get him out of there immediatly or he's going with him.

I cannot stress enough how important it is not to loose your temper in the slightest bit during all this, especially when you are by yourself.

As far as fans go, just ignore em. They are never going to be happy.

[bigblue2u]

gregm:
Good advice from other posters on handling fans. But, as has already been said, it can be a problem if you try to eject fans. The best way to handle unruly fans, is to get both teams off the field and tell both managers/coaches that the game will not resume until the troublemakers are removed.

If you want to see peer pressure in action, try this!!!!

[SocalBlue1]

Funny, thing. I had a game this year where an unruly fan was barking at me and screaming about balls and strikes..when I looked back, it was the COACH! he was behind the backstop over to the left! I had a talk with him quick and he went to the dugout and never made another sound. He knew he was doing something wrong and even apologized later.

I seriously think that some of the younger league coaches do that on purpose thinking they can get on the umpire, hoping he will think the coach is a fan and never turn around..it's pathetic.


Honestly, just my advice...but two things from this post I do ALWAYS...

never work solo and never call games for kids under 15U...just aint worth to me anymore...

Coach behind backstop arguing balls & strikes?! INSTANT ejection - I'm not even going to give him a chance.

Working solo - never except in an emergency (IE: partner goes down w/injury during game).

[BT_Blue]

I have to agree... they will learn really quick that way.

[gregm]

The way I have been taught to handle fans who get out of control is first, ignore them. If they get to bad, call time and tell the manager to get control of his fans. If it continues, call time, put teams in the dugout, get a board member and let them handle the fan ejection. However, in the OP, there were no board members to be found.

[SocalBlue1]

The way I have been taught to handle fans who get out of control is first, ignore them. If they get to bad, call time and tell the manager to get control of his fans. If it continues, call time, put teams in the dugout, get a board member and let them handle the fan ejection. However, in the OP, there were no board members to be found.

If no board member / administrator can be found just leave the teams in the dugouts. It won;t take long for peer pressure to fix the problem. otherwise wait a reasonable time, suspend the game and leave.