The Umpire Who Called His Son Out
He was a young guy, maybe thirty, with a sunburned neck and the look of somebody who’d had a long morning already.
He called the two coaches together at home plate. I was standing by the backstop with Mom, who had already set up her lawn chair, so I could hear every word.
“My guy had a flat on I-57 and he’s waiting on a tow,” the director said. “I can try to get somebody from another field in about an hour. Or you can use a parent, if you both agree to it. Your call, but you both have to sign.”
Mike Daly turned around and looked at me. He had seen me in the parking lot. He knew I’d been umpiring rec ball, because Jace had told the whole team.
“Brandon’s been doing rec games all spring,” Mike said. “He’s got his gear in his truck right now. I’d take him. But he’s my catcher’s dad, so it’s not my call alone.”
The Bloomington coach turned and looked at me for a long time.
He was older than Mike, gray in his goatee, with the kind of squint that comes from thirty years of summer ball. He walked over to the fence.
“You’re the catcher’s father,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
“Yes, sir.”
“You going to call it straight?”
“I’m going to call what I see,” I said. “Same as I do every Saturday. If your pitcher throws strikes, I’ll call them strikes, and that includes on my own kid.”
He looked at me for another few seconds. Then he looked at my mother in her lawn chair, and for some reason that seemed to settle it. He went back to the director and signed the clipboard.
Mike signed right after him. The director thanked both of them and told me I could have the tournament’s game fee if I wanted it.
I told him to give it to the umpire with the flat tire, since he’d need it for the tow.
I put on the gear behind my truck. The navy shirt was already on.
Shin guards, chest protector, the mask Dale gave me. I brushed off the plate with Dale’s little brush and took my spot.
Mom had her lawn chair set right behind the backstop fence, as close as you can get without being on the field.
She had on an olive jacket and blue jeans, her short gray hair tucked behind her ears. The afternoon sun was coming over my right shoulder.
Courtney was in the bleachers on the first base side, up near the top, with the other Thunder parents.
She had her stadium seat and her water bottle. She looked at me once when I took the field, then looked away.
Jace came out to warm up his pitcher. He walked right past me, all business, in his catcher’s gear with his red jersey under the chest protector.
He didn’t say a word to me. He just gave me a little nod, like he would any umpire.
That nod nearly undid me. I had to look down at the plate and brush it again, even though it was clean, until I trusted myself to straighten up.
“Play ball,” I said, and the first Bloomington batter stepped in.
The first two innings were the strangest baseball I have ever been part of. My son was crouched right in front of me, close enough that I could hear him breathing through his mask.
He caught well, too. He blocked two curveballs in the dirt in the first inning and threw out a runner trying to steal second in the second.