The DP/FLEX took me a lot of work to get the hang of it- multiple readings of the rule, making sure I understood each point before moving on to the next one, reading the supplemental rules, interpretations and case plays and poring over some of the many handouts available on-line that explain it. Finally, I am comfortable in saying that I have a pretty good grasp on it!
As an umpire, the Unreported Substitution rules are hard for me to keep straight. In some respect, this is similar to the Batting Out of Order rules in that there are many "in's", "out's", "twist's" and "turns" it can take depending on when it is caught. The Unreported Sub rule gets even trickier because you can have an entirely different outcome if the sub is a batter, a runner or a defensive player and each of those can spin off in a different direction depending on if the sub is caught either before or after the next pitch or play. Both the Unreported Sub rule and the Batting Out of Order rule (and the DP/FLEX rule, for that matter) take up an entire page of the rule book! So there's a lot there to digest and memorize.
Another thing that makes those rules hard to get a grasp on is that they come up so infrequently in actual game play, you don't really have a lot of opportunities to apply them. The things you deal with every single game, like tag plays, catches, fair/foul calls tend to get fairly well ingrained. I work a lot of games, usually more than 100 every season, and could probably count on one hand the number of U/S and BOO calls I've had to deal with this year.
The other big thing that can trip up an umpire is the many rule differences between different sanctioning bodies. We might tend to think "softball is softball", and many of the basic rules are the same. But if you are involved with multiple sanctioning bodies, there are many, many rules that are written or interpreted differently. Keeping them all straight is a big challenge!
So far this year, I have umpired high school baseball, recreational league baseball, high school softball, ASA softball, NSA softball, six different age groups that each had their own special rules and two separate leagues that use their own modified rules, not to mention at least a dozen tournaments that had their own rules too. In two weeks I start in a fall league and they have their own rules to deal with. At one point this year, I figured that I had dealt with no fewer than 10 different game ending run rules alone!
Anytime I'm going to be working a league or santioning body I'm not familiar with, I make it a point to get ahold of their rule book and study it before hand. I've even gone so far as to jot down some of the differences on a "cheat sheet" and stick that in my line-up holder before the game.
As an umpire, the Unreported Substitution rules are hard for me to keep straight. In some respect, this is similar to the Batting Out of Order rules in that there are many "in's", "out's", "twist's" and "turns" it can take depending on when it is caught. The Unreported Sub rule gets even trickier because you can have an entirely different outcome if the sub is a batter, a runner or a defensive player and each of those can spin off in a different direction depending on if the sub is caught either before or after the next pitch or play. Both the Unreported Sub rule and the Batting Out of Order rule (and the DP/FLEX rule, for that matter) take up an entire page of the rule book! So there's a lot there to digest and memorize.
Another thing that makes those rules hard to get a grasp on is that they come up so infrequently in actual game play, you don't really have a lot of opportunities to apply them. The things you deal with every single game, like tag plays, catches, fair/foul calls tend to get fairly well ingrained. I work a lot of games, usually more than 100 every season, and could probably count on one hand the number of U/S and BOO calls I've had to deal with this year.
The other big thing that can trip up an umpire is the many rule differences between different sanctioning bodies. We might tend to think "softball is softball", and many of the basic rules are the same. But if you are involved with multiple sanctioning bodies, there are many, many rules that are written or interpreted differently. Keeping them all straight is a big challenge!
So far this year, I have umpired high school baseball, recreational league baseball, high school softball, ASA softball, NSA softball, six different age groups that each had their own special rules and two separate leagues that use their own modified rules, not to mention at least a dozen tournaments that had their own rules too. In two weeks I start in a fall league and they have their own rules to deal with. At one point this year, I figured that I had dealt with no fewer than 10 different game ending run rules alone!
Anytime I'm going to be working a league or santioning body I'm not familiar with, I make it a point to get ahold of their rule book and study it before hand. I've even gone so far as to jot down some of the differences on a "cheat sheet" and stick that in my line-up holder before the game.
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