Ask an Umpire!

Bill Shortridge has been an umpire ever since he came out of the stands to help with balls and strikes at his six-year-old son’s game. Over a 30-year career, he’s worked college and professional games, filling in with the Sacramento River Cats and Stockton Ports and across the Pioneer League, and manning games here at Raimondi for your Ballers. He takes the time to answer some of your most pressing questions in this interview slightly edited for clarity: how replay works, the best and worst parts of the job, what umpires talk about when they huddle, and what he wishes all fans knew about life behind the plate.

How did you get into umpiring?

When my oldest son was six years old, they didn't have an umpire for his game. 
And so I got back there, and I was absolutely terrible, and there happened to be an umpire in the stands who was working on another field. He just came over and watched, and he says, “you're not very good." 
And I said, “I know, I just…they needed an umpire.”

I mean we have such a shortage of umpires, and it's been like that for 30 years…I just happened to be one of those guys that caught the bug, and I wanted to try and be better and better and better, so I kept going to better and better camps, and that's how I got to where I'm at.

What’s your least-favorite part of the job?

The only thing that I don't love about it is the travel. And I eliminated that… [in the Pioneer League]. Now, I will just do Oakland and Marysville, because I don't want to put that kind of mileage on my body anymore, going out to the north [Montana, Idaho, Colorado]. It's a grind.

And what are your favorite parts? What are the things you really like? 


Mostly being around the teams, the guys, and the crew that I'm working with. The crew that I'm working with, most of them I've known for anywhere from 10 to 30 years. And then the players, because this is professional baseball, they're professional. 
At the college level, you don't see this. These professional guys are out there grinding. 


You mentioned the crews you work with. When the crews come together for a call, can you walk us through that a little bit?

So it's driven because the manager asks a question. So we figure out what the question is, and then we talk about, "Hey, did you see something different?” Like the plate umpire, on a close play at first, where the first baseman may or may not have held the bag—like if he had to stretch—then the home play umpire is responsible for whether he stayed on the bag or not. So there's all kinds nuances and mechanics of what we're responsible for…We just want to know what [the manager is] saying, and then if we have something different, it's up to the person that called the play to decide if that information is valuable enough to either flip the call or stick with it. And most of the time, if somebody sees like an obvious pulled foot or a tag, you know, on the other side of a runner, or the calling umpire couldn't see whether there was a tag or if there was a miss…that's when they get we get all the information together from all three umpires, and then we make a decision as a crew.

What do you wish the average fan knew about umpiring?

There's too many to list. 


Because most [fans], they don't see the strike zone like the umpire behind the plate. And they don't see how close those plays really are and how much practice we've had at those close plays at first or a steal at second. There's things that we're looking for that we're trained to look for. They just, you know, they've.. some of them have had a cocktail or four, and their judgment of the strike zone's a little different than ours.

Some of the calls, we're going to miss. We're going to kick the shit out of a call. 
I mean, it just happens. Yeah. And sometimes you have to live with it. 



On that note, what are your thoughts about replay?

I am for replay. Yeah. I am all for it because honestly, we don't want to get calls wrong. 
We want the call that happened to be the right one. Sometimes it's not. And most of the time, we know when we kick a call. 
So it would be great to have replay out there. You'll get a different answer from, you know, half of the umpires out there. Not half. Most of them want that call to be right. Some of them are good enough to get it right every time. I'm not one of them. I would love to have replay.

And what about the challenge system we see at Ballers games?

The challenge systems are balls and strikes. 
They get six total per team. If they get it right, they retain the challenge. If they get it wrong, they lose the challenge. 
So they get three incorrect ones, they're out of challenges. And for balls and strikes, I think our league average among the 28 or 30 umpires that we have, I think our league average is about 92% correct calls. Which isn't far off from the major league guys…Especially on the strike three calls or ball four calls, we want those ones 100%. That's usually when they challenge. Because it's an important pitch. Whether we get it right, or we don't, the umpires don't care about a challenge. We want the call right.

And what about the actual mechanics of the challenge system? What don’t we see in the stands?

There's actually a Trackman system in place. 
You know, you can't see it because it's not up on the screen where that big, you know, red square is or white square on TV is. But they have a Trackman system installed at every stadium we work in. I think there's three heights of the strike zone now. 
I think there's a 17-inch bottom, an 18 and a 19, and I think the top is 43, 44, and 45…Last year, they only had one height of the strike zone. So if you were 6'5” or 5'6”, the height of the strike zone was the same. That wasn't really fair.
So they changed it this year. So now it's a whole lot more accurate for that 5’6” guy or the 6’5” guy to not have to swing at something at his shins or that's at his chest.

Here's one of the nuances of this. Late in the game, you'll start seeing that batter that's 5'6” or 5’5”, whatever it is, there's a pitch that's up in the zone. Definitely not a strike in the zone that was for him, maybe gets called a ball, because most of us will call what the hitter's height is—where his knees are, where his height, his zone is. And we'll give up on calling that pitch that's up on the letters. 
But questec [commonly used as a generic term for pitch technology] sees it as a strike. 
The catchers and pitchers know that. So that's when you'll see them challenging it later in the games when it matters. They know where the top of the strike zone is per quest. They'll go steal strike…These guys are grinding. 
I get it…The catchers and pitchers have to use the challenge. I mean, that's their side of it. 
And they get to use that, and it's in the rules. So, you know, use the rules to your advantage.

Anything in particular you note about working in the Pioneer League?

They treat us like professionals. These Pioneer teams seem to go above and beyond for the umpires as far as just the little things, you know, the side stuff. We’ve got a shower, we've got a meal, a hot meal afterwards. 
Some of them, you know, they have a clubbie [clubhouse managers or attendants] and they're saying hey, what do you guys need? What can we do to make your job easier? So they're professionals…I know it's a business, but they're still taking care of the umpires. And we're usually the last ones that are thought of.

After all these years, what keeps you going?

There's always the drive because I love baseball…For me, it's just because I want to be around the best baseball that I can.

Anything else you want to add?

If anything comes through with this, it’s that we're still looking for umpires. Umpires that want to learn the trade. Because this is always going to be my pitch: we need people that are in the stands to come out of the stands, and, you know, strap it on for a day. 
I mean, we have camps, we have all kinds of stuff that if they want to really, you know, immerse themselves into, what it's like to be an umpire, I can help accommodate that. I can get them out, and we can show them what the real deal is and how much fun it really is.

Many thanks to Bill Shortridge for his time here and his service on the field. If you would like to learn more about umpiring or trying your hand behind the plate or the bag, get in touch with us here. Bill is indeed willing to put together a clinic with Pioneer umpires for those interested!