League is right to suspend the umpire. Cannot compromise the integrity of the game.

no matter how badly the lesson may be needed.

The umpire was completely out of bounds. If you want to talk about emboldening people, anything less than a suspension arguably would embolden other umpires to administer "tough lessons" any time their delicate egos got bruised.

Whatever may or may not be an appropriate response to the kid has absolutely nothing to do with determining the proper response to the umpire.

then his job is to call strikes strikes and balls balls.

The umpire could have immediately warned or ejected the player. What he did instead was undeniably wrong.

And be very clear, there is an umpire shortage at crisis levels now as it's a thankless job. There are many high level youth and HS age games going on with only a home plate ump. At 14, 15, 16U that's a bad situation. Lived with it all last year.

I hope what this guy did is shown to every aspiring youth player with the very clear message to shut your mouth, and play.

And I don't really care about this ump. D1 college umps are pretty protected and isolated, but guys out doing HS and youth games are saints in my book. They put up with more a-hole parents than I could ever imagine, and have to deal with them even after the game as there's no tunnel to disappear into.

So, messages like this get twisted in kids minds and then eventually you see this crap show up in youth leagues. Sue me. I'm all for the tough love.

We're not short of umps in D1 college ball. But, the game is struggling mightily with this at youth levels and it only seems to get worse every year.

and the problem that they cause/threaten to the sport.

For starters, I don't really disagree with your take about the player. His response was out of bounds. As another posted has already noted, he was subject to warning or even ejection. I'd have no quarrel with either.

But as best I can tell, while not defending the player, I don't see anything that poses a threat to the umpire's immediate safety. I haven't read a report that the kid used threatening language or profanity.

On the other hand, the umpire chose to interject himself in the game because he was pissed. He directly affected the outcome of the game by awarding the defensive team an out they hadn't earned.

I'm on these pages often enough to have read dozens of stories about out of control players and parents throughout youth sports. Like you, I find that deplorable. I certainly understand why so many officials give it up -- or never start.

That needs to get addressed.

But there is absolutely no question as to which of these two actors, in this particular incident, posed a greater threat to the game. And it ain't the kid.

paid to be professional and should be above that and the other is an immature college player who may or may not have been coached or fathered well (does he even have a father?). Who says he won't be reprimanded by his current coach. It seems like the ump had other courses of action than deliberately blowing a call to end a game. That seems to big a choice for an ump to make and I liked the standard the conference using that Section 3 of Character and Conduct.

Thx for your perspective.

....should we never expect him to be called on his bad behavior? When does he become an adult who is expected to act like it? And why shouldn't the ump be the one to deliver that message?

I guarantee there are many reasonable people around the country using this as a teaching moment with their kids. Unfortunately, this kid needed one himself.

It's not a gateway drug. You may be overreacting a bit.

Also, for some random reason, I thought of this moment:

You may be overreacting a bit.

That’s against the rules. It really isn’t against the rules to express disagreement with a balls and strikes call.

I just wrapped up 14 straight days of averaging 13 working hours per day.

The kid showed bad character. The umpire cheated. He knowingly and willingly cheated by calling a ball a strike in retaliation for the kid showing bad character. The suspension isn’t long enough. It should have been season ending at minimum. No umpire can ever - for any reason - knowingly make a wrong call. Ever. Period. Zero debate. Zero room for any umpire like that to exist in the sport.

In addition, the umpire should be fined and forced to return the money paid for that game. He was not paid to intentionally call balls a strike.

There is a gigantic difference between making a mistake, calling what you think happened - but actually were wrong, and intentionally making the wrong call.