There are ways to sugar coat one’s short comings in life. Platitudes such as “I gave it my all,” or “There’s always next year,” come to mind. In the spirit of brutal honesty, I failed. My goal was to be offered a job in professional baseball and I did not reach this goal at the commencement of my five week training course in Florida. So yes, in that sense I did fail. Needless to say I am very disappointed with myself in that respect. Regardless of the outcome of my training, there are so many things I gained during my time at the academy that I will take with me forever. This is why when people will ask if I feel like I wasted over a month of my life on a fruitless endeavor, I will laugh in their face.
I’ll start off first comparing myself from day one of training to day twenty nine, our final one in Kissimmee. I walked into the Houston Astros Spring Training complex with no confidence in my knowledge of the game, let alone my ability to umpire a game. I had no idea of the umpire’s responsibilities, terminology, mechanics, voice, and even complex baseball rules that must be recognized in seconds. The funny thing is that even if you can master all of these facets, you would simply be an average umpire. The skill that separates the men from the boys is situation management. You can put yourself in the perfect position for a call, use exactly the right terminology in an authoritative voice, with pristine mechanics and still have a team’s manager charging out of the dugout to scream in your face. At this point, it is up to you to do whatever you can to keep the situation from escalating, as well as get the game going in a timely manner. If you say the wrong thing, you will not only have numerous ejections on your plate, but an angry League President who will either fine, suspend, or terminate your contract. This is where inexperience as an umpire prevented me from being offered a pro job. I was told that I was too timid and gave the manager too much rope. See you don’t want to be a “red-ass” who throws anyone who looks at you funny out of the game. You also don’t want to be a pushover who lets the manager walk all over them. It’s a delicate balance, but if you were going to err on either side of the spectrum, it’s definitely better to be an umpire who does not allow a manager or player to talk down to them.
Although I wasn’t an honor graduate from the academy, I did have a few academic achievements I was very proud of during my time there. I got a 100 on my test on Section 5 of the Official Baseball Rules. Overall, I was 14th in test scores out of 115 students. I did not miss one lecture, nor day out on the field. Hell I did not so much as miss a drill on the field. I had excruciating knee pain pretty much the entire camp. I had constant stomach pains from the less than gourmet food being served to us. One day I nearly passed out from a stomach ache, but fought my way through the end of the drills to finish out the day. I’ll tell you one thing, while I was not the number one graduate of that academy, no one worked harder than I did day in and day out.
Aside from my academic achievements which were nice, the fact I am most proud of is the friendships I gained. I am annoyed to say that there were guys at the camp who were far from team players. This was preached to us from the moment we got there, that we are all umpires on the same team and we must not ever do anything that may potentially sabotage another umpire for personal gain. I am saddened to say that numerous times I saw people acting in their own interests to make another umpire look foolish by making personal comments or purposely messing up plays in the field. While this made me angry, I chose not to act on my feelings nor tell any of the superiors. I simply stayed away from these people and became closer with the people I knew were good guys that were there not only for a job, but to better themselves as umpires and as people. This is where I believe I stood out from a lot of people. If you ask most anyone who attended the academy, they will tell you that I would always go out of my way to make sure we had enough players to run a drill, pick up a guy who was injured, or help anyone in any way that I could. Again, this is not to build myself up as some sort of hero, as I am anything but. Umpiring aside, this is the person that I am. I will go out of my way to help any person until they prove to me that they are unworthy of my friendship. At that point, you’re on your own. I made so many friends in Kissimmee from all over the world. Without them, I would not have done as well as I did academically nor in my field work. I hope to umpire with as many of them as possible on an amateur level.
Although I did not achieve my goal of becoming an umpire in professional baseball, I did gain skills that I will utilize for the rest of my life. Life is full of disappointments and moments of elation. This was a mixed bag for me, as although I am not a minor league umpire, I do have many options available to me including the ability to relocate back to America’s Finest City. On a pleasant note, one good friend I was lucky enough to make my acquaintance with while at the academy by the name of Masa Ichiki comes to mind. Masa came all the way from Japan for the pro course, his second stint at the academy. His mechanics are crisp, his rules knowledge is almost flawless, and his personality is perfect for the job. The only thing that prevented him from being sent to the PBUC Academy the first time was his deficiency in English. They told him after his previous stay to learn more English and come back. He did and he was arguably the best umpire. While he had some work to do on his English, I was praying he would be one of the guys selected to move on. He was, and I have never been happier to see another person take a potential job from me. Good luck to you Masa, hope to see you in the majors one day. To all my other academy buddies, remember the lessons taught to us by Jim and every other red shirt there. Hopefully I’ll see you guys on the field as a co-worker. If not, I wish you the best of luck in whatever you do. Much love.

-Cary “from New York”

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