MY FIRST UMPIRING CLINIC

by Paul Husselbee

I last umpired a baseball game 20 years ago, and it wasn't a pleasant experience. Called out of the stands and pressed into service at the last minute, I was raw and untrained. I told myself to establish a strike zone early and be consistent, but I didn't even know where to stand behind the catcher. I kept moving to getting a better view. As I moved, so did my strike zone.

The coaches were patient, but their comments about my inconsistency played jailhouse games on my conscience. I tried to make up for missed pitches, keeping the mental "fairness" tally as even as possible. That made me more inconsistent.

The fans were not patient. Twenty minutes earlier, I had been one of them, but once I strapped on the gear, they became merciless. Seizing on my glasses and the spare tire around my waist, they got personal in a hurry.

"Get some new glasses, Blue!"

"What's the matter with you? Can't you see, Four Eyes?"

"You'd see better if you'd just bend over, Fatty!"

After the game, I fretted and fumed and resolved never to umpire again.

In November, a fellow high school football official told me of the growing shortage of umpires in our region and asked me to consider doing baseball this year. The memory of my last umpiring experience two decades earlier came to mind, and I almost declined. Almost.

Once I decided to umpire, I told myself, "If we're going to do this, we're going to do it right." I resolved to spend the money for the best equipment and the best training.

After I bought my gear, I went online to scout training options. The pickings were slim, and nothing fit my needs. I could not take six weeks off to go to umpire school and be trained from the ground up, but the weekend clinics were geared to veteran umpires.

Then I found a link on Dick Honig's Web site (honigs.com) to the Arizona Umpiring Academy. Its brochure for a three-day clinic outlined a training curriculum right up my alley: proper use of equipment and uniform; umpiring signals; rules and terminology; balks, obstruction and interference; two-man mechanics; detailed training behind the plate, including video evaluation; and dealing with arguments.

Excitedly, I called a veteran umpire and tried to get him to sign up with me. I told him all about it, concluding with, "This sounds too good to be true!"

"It probably is," he responded. "You don't have any experience; you'll just be in the way. They'll take your money, but you won't learn anything."

My friend was wrong.

I attended the Academy clinic Jan. 23-25 at the Texas Rangers Spring Training site in Surprise, Arizona. In three days of classroom instruction, cage training and on-field drills, I learned more than I could have imagined. When I think about all I learned that weekend, the $330 tuition fee was a bargain.

The entire teaching staff was excellent and well-qualified. Steve Mattingly is serious when it's time to be serious, but he is also entertaining. His use of humor kept the atmosphere light. As a college professor, I find that students learn more when the learning environment is relaxed. Other teaching staff - such as MLB/PCL umpire Rob Drake, former PCL umpire Donnie Rea, and minor-league umpire Jeff Macias - followed Steve's lead and kept things loose, even as they taught us things we could not learn anywhere else.

The training in the cage was invaluable. From proper stance to torso lean, from head height to tracking, the instruction on "working the slot" was perhaps the best thing about the clinic. In some cages, two instructors worked together to teach proper plate mechanics. Video evaluation allowed each student to watch himself and learn from his mistakes.

When we went to the field for work on two-man mechanics, the depth of the instruction was outstanding. The Academy not only teaches mechanics, it teaches the "why" behind each mechanic. Repetition in drills allowed students to master their footwork and gave meaning to things we heard again and again: "pivot to open the gate," "chest to ball," "angle before distance."

Later, instructors played the roles of players and coaches as we learned to deal with arguments. The scenarios were realistic, and the instructors played their parts well. My personal favorite was seeing Donnie Rea - easily the nicest, most mild-mannered of all the instructors - go ballistic in the role of the third-base coach over the plate umpire's improper ruling on a defensive conference. In each such situation, we learned what to say and, perhaps more important, what not to say.

The other night, I received a phone call from our region's arbiter. He told me I'll be assigned to umpire in a high school tournament during the first week in March. I'm excited, yet confident. Thanks to my training at the Arizona Umpiring Academy, I know how and where to stand behind the catcher. I have a much stronger grasp on the strike zone and the mechanics of calling pitches. I know what to say and what not to say to coaches who argue balls and strikes - or just about anything else. I know how to tune out fans.