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How to Become a Youth Baseball Umpire
- Start by registering with a baseball clinic. There are many clinics all over the nation that will help you with your training and facilitate the process to becoming a youth umpire.
- The Little League website, under the umpire tab, provides you with information on different clinics in your region. These clinics offer key fundamentals of the game. Positioning, rules, regulations, interpretations, mechanics of the two-man systems, philosophy, mental approach, attitude toward Little League Baseball, handling situations, control of the game, and three and four-man systems.
- Umpire Clinics emphasize on-field and plate mechanics and ways to better understand the baseball and softball rules of Little League. The cost varies depending on the clinic you choose.
- After working some games, you may feel you have the skills and confidence to work higher level competition. Contact www.referee.com/states.htm for high school registration information.
- Each league should have a League umpire-in-chief (UIC) on its board of directors. Try to get in contact with a local UIC for additional training and league registration. This umpire-in-chief recruits, teaches or trains volunteer umpires and interprets rules. This is a mentor that will help you pursue being a proper official.
Little League Baseball, Inc.
P.O. Box 3485
Williamsport, PA. 17701
717/326-1921
http://www.littleleague.org/
Changing Youth Baseball
Youth baseball is losing participants at a rapid rate. According to the 2006 National Sporting Goods Association (NSGA) participation study for all sports, youth baseball lost over 22% of their participants between the ages of 7 to 11 from 1997 to 2006. There is no wonder kids are less interested in baseball, given the fact that baseball practices are still conducted the same way our grandparents learned and experienced the game. The world’s changed and so has the way kids are attracted to sports.
So let’s take a look at a different way of playing that will increase everyone’s repetitions on the field, at bat,
and running the bases.
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