It's all about the kids. And the the swag. I've included a picture of the gifts D12 and Almaden Little League gave me to give out to the other umpires and officials. Thanks to Don for the Almaden Shirts, Dan for the D12 unders, and Jenice for the wonderful pin sets and D12 branded baseballs.
Got our jerseys and hats. Nice. Sorry about the wrinkles in the photo.
We did out umpire meeting, coach introduction, and equipment inspection. It amazes me how through all the levels of play these kids have done, they still have illegal bats and helmets worn beyond common sense. At least that's all behind us now.
The parade was a hoot. Unfortunately, we didn't get to ride the promised firetruck as it had to do standby duty at a building demolition. But we did get to ride on a trolley.
My randomly selected crew consists of me, of course, Allen, Del, and Will. Good group of guys. We had two games tonight, 5:00 Arizona vs Alaska, and 7:30 Nevada vs Nogales host team. Both games were blowouts, with Arizona winning 14-3, and Nogales winning 19-0. As the host city, Nogales gets to put forward a local team, and the Nogales teams have done very well in the past, and this one looks to be a top competitor as well.
Both games went off without controversy, though we certainly identified several areas of improvement we can address. I had 2nd base in the first game, and 1st base in the second. We'll debrief with Steve our evaluator Christman tomorrow morning. I know he wrote a book taking notes during our game.
Tomorrow I've got the plate for the 5:00 game and 3rd for the 7:30 game. The 7:30 game features Nogales and Hawaii, both big winners tonight, and is expected to be quite a battle.
