Its over!!

Well it a case of been there done that! Yes I have finished the 5 week Jim Evans Academy of Professional Umpiring.

The five weeks of hard work was celebrated by all last night at the graduation dinner. Many students brought along family and friends to celebrate their achievements. Special guest for the evening was Joe West (MLB Umpire) and Jim's daughter Lindsay.

The celebrations may have been last night, but the real tension for many was this morning when evaluation were undertaken, and those told that are being given the opportunity to go to Coco Beach for the PBUC evaluation process and the chance at a professional career.

I am not aware of all the people that have been given this opportunity, but have heard of about 10 so far. A big congratulations to all, especially my Spanish speaking friends - Ramon, Robert and Carlos!

To those that have not made it, many of you are young and believe they have what it takes, ensure that you take the lessons learned during the past 5 weeks, go and get some experience and give it another shot. But also remember that so long as you can look yourself in the mirror and know that you have done your best, this is all that matters.

For me I was please with my evaluation, I did well with theory tests, I built on my field work over the duration of the course - which is what my expectations where before I came here. It was never going to be about getting a job in Professional baseball for me, but to make myself a better umpire and obtain the information I need to be able to assist to promote and train umpires at home.

One comment on my evaluation was that I need to be less tolerant with irate managers and toss people a little quicker. I explained that it is totally different at home, bad behaviour by players and managers is just not tolerated in Oz, but at the same time it is about respect on the field and building repor with our managers.

By the way I am pleased to say that my cage group got the award for Test scores - well done team - Dustin, Matt, David and Norm!

Sorry I forgot to post this one, now in LA on my way home. Will do some summary posts over the next week.

My thoughts are with all my fellow Victorians as they battle with horrific bushfire's across the state, which has claimed the lives of so many Innocent people.

Bottom of the ninth!!!

Well it Friday 6th of February and I cannot believe that this fantastic experience is almost over. The theory is over, the drills are over, and the last camp game has been run. Tomorrow is a late start and an early finish, but we go out with a big bang at the Graduation dinner tomorrow night.

But the tension will still be in the air with most being very disappointed on Sunday morning when they are informed that they did not make the cut for PBUC and the chance to become a Pro Umpire. For some they will go off and work in independent leagues, high school or college ball, then some will return next year to go through it all again to give it another go.

With 100 students you are always going to get a wide variety of people, there is people here from 10+ countries, from people that have done independent and semi pro ball, to those that have never umpired a game and everything in between. There was a very embrassed Fiona in the class this morning when Edwin from Puerto Rico, pleasded with me to go home with him in front of the whole class!! But I can tell you that the apart from the language and cultural differences, the personalities and backgrounds of these people also varied.

Yesterday was 3 camp games...fortunate or not I was not scheduled. But it is still good to be able to sit on the side lines and watch the plays and run through what you think you would have done on each play. Today we listened to each of the foreign students on the umpiring experience, what they do for jobs etc. Yes I was asked to getup and talk about my experiences. we then headed outside for a camp game - which was to be the final. After lunch we did a bit of work on plate meetings, we had previously written up line up card - mine with names like - Crocodile hunter, Shark Bite and Kola Bear. It was then time to work on our non academy out/safe and third strike calls. This was all a bit of fun - you will have to wait til I get back to see if I have come up with something. But we were reminded that when doing the third strike call that we still need to know where the ball is!

Then it was an early call for the day - 3pm & the good news that we did not need to be at the ground til 10am tomorrow. Jim said to us, that maybe some of us needed to spend the afternoon cleaning up our rooms in readiness for departure - believe me some of the guys do need a couple hours for this activity!!

Stay tuned for an entry on the final day, graduation and my summary/s of the past five weeks...

Oh and by the way

More camp games - more ejections

Well in the final week and the camp games have stepped up a peg or two. I am reasonably happy with my progress, they seem to be picking on the little things, like not quite being in the cutout for the play or half a step of my angle.

Yesterdays games - yes two, was an alternative for one, but someone was not well, the earlier one went well, got my time plays Right on, even had a glove and ball thrown at first baseman for an out (which was challenged - and i talked it through with an unhappy manager). Got praise even on my eval for some of my positions and hustle to get to plays.

The second game was a slight challenge - my partner was one of the Japanese guys, who speaks very little English, but they all seem to know the main baseball terms. Well it started out ok, until we had a catchers interference, and i was blocked from his call by other players etc....I then tried to communicate with him about what happened at second base - well we worked it out in the end that is all that matters.

Today's game was as a result of other umpires assisting with some filming, but was working with Matt from my cage group. Plays went well - except for the ejection of JP for arguing pitches - but jumped in quicker today and it was not mentioned in the eval.

But some of the memorial parts of the days where certainly the instructor antics...two have dropped their pants - indicating they were being screwed by the umpire.......we had a sit in today - instructor refused to leave the ground after they teed it up with the ground staff to turn the sprinklers on and see what the umpires did! We have also had an all in, chair thrown on the field and much much more.

One of this afternoons games, we had some high school kids there to do the fielding and make the plays - a few of them could play and throw the ball from centre to home, so made for a little different umpiring that us umpires running and making plays.

Today's challenge was the weather, about 10c if we were lucky! But the wind chill factor was high, yes we froze. Tonight's prediction is minus 3 overnight with a high of about 10 tomorrow with high wind chill factors - this is one aspect I am certainly not going to miss when I get home.

Preparations for the graduation has begun, today we had to organise our tables. Some of the students have family and friends coming along, so let them sort their tables out first and I will just tack onto a seat that is available. Well this sounded like a good idea at the time, now I am sitting on a table with 7 Spanish speaking students and other of the other umpires and his wife. They are very funny guys from Puerto Rico, with one of them telling me all the time he is taking me home, another that impersonates the instructors, so while I may not be able to understand a word they say, could be entertaining.

Well time to hit the sack, ready for another day of adventure...

Ejections

Well day one of the final week, and we were out on the diamonds by 9am due to threatening weather and forecast of rain late morning. Game one I was scheduled to work with Jack in the top of the 5th and top of the 6th.

Since I had not had any ejections to date, i was sort of expecting it. And it started straight away, the sniper fire about balls & strikes from the dugout. Then Quinn questioned a pitch, Craig comes out and is talking to his batter and make a comment about using a nine iron - I ignored, but he then kept going on the balls and strikes, so he was gone.

I run though a few more plays, then a first and third, 1 out, line up the catch in left field, more into position for the time play and there is an out at second, after a quick check of how many where out I call the run not scoring. Sarg then is upon me, right in my face telling me that i was not in position and that i should get help etc. I informed him that i was in position and that my partner would not be able to help with this one. With a little more yelling of disapproval in my face, to finally tell me I was Horseshit - he was done. Just seemed strange, firstly because he has not been acting as the manager of teams and secondly, men of his age don't argue like that!

The evaluation of my game - mostly positive, biggest issue - not throwing them soon enough!! What can one say - I'm a nice person and tolerant, need to be a little tougher, probably not what my son would say.

After lunch I was scheduled for another game, but the rain bet us to it, it was back in the classroom. After a quick review of some common issues (mainly people not doing ejections quick enough), we were spoken to by Kevin Winn from the American Association - Independent Leagues. Kevin spoke of their need also for umpires and the fact that another league was commencing this year and would also be looking for umpires. I am sure a number for guys will be working in these leagues this year.

Then after watching a couple of inspirational videos it was the end of the day. Just 5 days to graduation. As Jim would say, the light is turning on and starting to shine.

Whilst I start to look forward to getting home, to my family and friends, and back to normal life, I will also miss all these wonderful people I have met. Although one of the guys from Puerto Rico has told me he wants to take me home... He still has a week to convince me :-).

Theory over - one week to go!

Well just one week to go...We have finished all theory aspects, which was topped off with the final test - 200 question and just 2 hours to complete. The results..., well I can say that I am happy with my result, just over 90%. Class average was 86%,and of course my cage group (K) topped the class again - well done team. This gave us the highest average score in 7 of the 14 tests undertaken.

So what else happened this week? We had weather from the 80f down to the 30f. It is just weird how the mornings can be so cold and then by mid afternoon it is not so bad. This week we did however have a day of complete rain - which meant no field work. I can tell you it was not fun spending the day in the class room, might have been a little better had this happened early on in the course, but we did manage to get cage work in as this is indoors.

So what did we do....well they conducted interviews with everyone, the purpose to understand the individuals a little more, understand their aspirations, their thoughts on how the school has gone, suggestions on improvements etc...I have to say that mine may have been a little different from the guys going for professional jobs. It was made clear that this was the time to uncover any past run ins with police or the like, as background checks was part of the process to get a pro job. Whilst this was all happening we were also entertained by some MLB footage of umpire bloopers, ejections and close calls etc. But after lunch it we were handed a review sheet - no multi choice this time, 50 questions - was not really sure of the purpose, but I think it would be something that could be referred to as part of the process for selection for PBUC.

But once this review sheet was finished, we were able to leave - early finish - wow it is only 2pm on a Friday. Well considering we were to sit the final test the next day...common sense prevailed and I studied (with a little nanna nap in between).

Saturday after we had all sat our test, it was time for class photo. We all went over to the Gateway high school across the road and in the stands of the schools football/running track. It would have been nice to tell is no undershirts before we got there, so unlike me I was very polite and managed to remove my undershirt in front of 120 guys without removing my t-shirt! I am sure you will not even see my arms in the photo anyway..

Saturday afternoon it was back into camp games, and of course I was in the top of the first and top of the second, working with Pat McCabe Jr and doing the plate first. Despite the initial nerves, it went ok. The last play of my plate was
R1 R2, 2 outs - told me they were setting up a time play - remember to get the tag up at 3rd, as the ball is hit, I hear the instructor say let the ball drop - the right fielder catches it and stuffs up the play...just when I am thinking about the timing of the call for run or no run etc....!!! So in the end today's eval was ok, couple of little things to make me look a little sharper, but was told if I can handle the situations in these games, I will be fine in a real game.

Ted Barrett - current MLB umpire has joined us for a few days, he was even out on the fields as an instructor. He and the instructors setup some plays to really test some of these guys and push their buttons to see how they handle situations. At time i think i get just as much out of sitting on the side watching these plays, as I would if i was on the field, we discuss the play amongst the students and how each of us would handle situations.

We have also been visited by Bruce Webber a New York time journalist, that attended the school, and spent some time with minor and major league umpires to get and insight. He read some extracts out of his new book "As They See 'Em: A Fan's Travels in the Land of Umpires" - from what we heard it sounds like a very interesting read of umpiring life, from an outsides perspective.

Well just 6 days of the academy to go, this time next week I have to be thinking about backing the bags to come home. But that is 6 days away, we have more camp games to umpire and more muscle memory to build and probably a few more things to learn. And then of course there is the graduation next Saturday...

It is now Sunday 9am, and I have hired a car, so it is off to Orlando today to do a little sight seeing and shopping. But it is also Superbowl day, so will be back here to try and understand this game and cheer on Ben Graham.