When nervous jitters turn blue.
I had the privilege of sitting next to the official rules interpreter for the CIF-Southern Section baseball playoffs Saturday at UC Riverside during the Upland Christian-Calabasas Viewpoint game, the Division VII final.
I forget the gentleman's name, but he had clearly found his calling in life. He seemed content to discuss the gray areas between every rule in the entire baseball rulebook for, well, forever. But one point he brought up during a near two-hour long dialogue stood out, something that isn't intuitive to the casual observer: While most high school athletes haven't had to deal with the enormity of a venue like Dodger Stadium or UC Riverside, neither have most high school umpires.
Even though there's a ratings system in place to grade the section's umps, and ensure that only the best are calling games in the playoffs, it does nothing to take into consideration experience. The crowd had no idea how many college or pro games the umpires at Upland Christian's game had called, but it didn't seem to matter. They didn't miss a meaningful call so far as I (or my new friend) could tell.