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Semi-final day for Mid-Atlantic.  I was assigned the plate for the second game, between Maryland and Delaware.  The game was scheduled for 3:00 on ESPN, but there was a big weather front approaching.  Helen drove up in the morning, and we were watching the 11:00 game between Connecticut and Vermont on TV when the announcers […]

Today began the elimination round.  Two of the six teams in each tournament had now been eliminated, leaving the top four to battle it out for the right to go to Williamsport. The New England semi-finals were played today, with NESN broadcasting them.  The Mid-Atlantic semi’s would be tomorrow, with ESPN taking over.  ESPN’s headquarters […]

This day did not start out well for me.  Since my crew had the early two games the previous day, we didn’t hang around the ballfield for the second two.  As we were leaving, we had been told that we would be doing the New England games again, which were scheduled for 5:00 and 8:00.  […]

Tuesday was the beginning of TV coverage.  The New England series, which my crew had been working, was going to be covered by NESN through Friday.  As it turned out, I was assigned the plate for the first game, which was to go off at 10:00. TV games are rather different from normal Little League […]

Because of the rainouts on Sunday, Monday promised to be a long day.  We were fortunate that the schedule worked out that none of the teams who were rained out on Sunday were scheduled to play on Monday.  As a result, we could do the two lost games as well as the rest of the […]

The schedule changed on Sunday to give my crew the earlier games.  The weather did not look promising right from the start – the news was predicting thundershowers in the afternoon.  Al Erdmann had the plate for the 11:00 game, and I was down the left field line.  This turned into our second one-run game, […]

For the second day, the schedule remained the same – our crew had the 2:00 and 8:00 games.  Again, it was bright sun and humid, making for a sweaty afternoon.  I should mention that the staff was taking good care of both the plate umpire and the catchers, bringing them both water and towels between […]

For the first day, my crew was assigned to the later pair of games – 2:00 and 8:00.  (The other games were at 11:00 and 5:00).  I was assigned first base for our first game, for which I was thankful.  Since we were using 6 umpires for all games, there is little in the way […]

Thursday was “arrival day.”  The umpires are being housed in a very nice Hampton Inn located about 10-15 minutes away from the Little League complex.  I drove up in the morning, checked into the hotel and then went over to the complex for our scheduled umpire meeting.  One minor bit of amusement – finding the […]

I was lucky enough to get selected to umpire at the Little League Baseball Eastern Regional this year (2012).  This is the tournament for 12-year-olds – the team that wins goes to Williamsport for the Little League World Series.  (I say “the” because there are actually 8 different Little League World Series – Majors, Juniors, […]