I’m not trying to say the guy who got asked to leave Plant City’s district championship loss to Bloomingdale last week was totally out of pocket with his behavior. Though he wouldn’t leave the home plate umpire alone, he didn’t curse or do anything worse than be a constant, nagging thorn in the guy’s side. I’m just trying to figure out why anyone would think stuff like that is necessary or at least worth doing.
Look, we all come to sports games to be entertained. Fan reactions can be funny at times. But constantly trolling the people on the field? I don’t get it.
Is that worth being the center of attention? All it does is throw a wrench in the pace of play at best and force rushed decisions at worst. What do you accomplish besides getting thrown out of the game? It’s different on the field because when a manager or coach is getting thrown out of a game by the referee they dogged, it’s probably to defend the players in protest of a call they had a better look at than you did.
I know for a fact that stereotype about certain parents who always yell at coaches and complain about their kids not getting playing time despite being the “best” is totally grounded in reality and I can assure those people they are not helping anything. If anything, that makes it even worse for the kids: it’s embarrassing for them and it might convince some coaches to keep sitting the players a little longer out of spite. I’ve seen it before and I’ll keep seeing it in the future, because the alternate reality in which the helicopter parent is always right about their kids is too often the only one they can accept.
It’s so weird that sports are meant for fun and entertainment at their basest form, yet some of the jobs in the field can be more stressful than most in the real world. Let’s be real here: refereeing is probably the No. 1 job in the world where you can be at the peak of your profession and literally everyone outside of it will still think they can do it better than you. And they’ll have no problem letting you know the minute you miss a call because you’re only human and couldn’t see a foul everyone missed until the slow-motion replay kicked in. Coaching is somewhere close behind it. While we’re on this subject, so too are teaching, nursing and news reporting (if I can be a little biased for a second). I’m not ranking anything behind umpiring because you could make a case for anything going anywhere, but I’m confident no one on Earth has to deal with that problem on the same level pound-for-pound as the refs.
And yes, I know there are some officials who might really be just guessing out there. Every hardcore Major League Baseball fan can back that up pointing out their least favorite umpires and in some cases I’ll completely agree. But out here? Come on. It’s not the pros.
Let the kids play, let the coaches coach and let the refs at least try to get it right (and if they don’t, let the coaches have the words). Go vent about a game on social media if you must, for at least there you can see who actually likes it and the rest of us can hit “mute.”