New Jersey Little League Devises Plan to Stop Parents From Berating Umpires

As youth sports parents continue to be a problem nationally, one New Jersey Little League has developed a plan to get parents and fans to stop berating umpires: If you mistreat an umpire, you need to volunteer to be an umpire for three games before you can come back to the complex as a fan.

Youth sports culture has continued to devolve over the last several years. If you turn on the news, you're bound to see some story about parents fighting parents, parents pressuring kids, or parents and fans berating officials.

One New Jersey Little League has developed a plan to deal with the last issue.

The league in Deptford Township has decided to force parents and fans who argue with umpires to become an umpire for three games before they are welcomed back to the complex.

From an ABC News article on the same story:

"People are very comfortable making officials uncomfortable, so it's about time that we've reversed the trend and started making people uncomfortable who are harassing officials," said Brian Barlow, who founded Offside, a Facebook page that calls out bad behavior among youth sports parents.

Little League officials in one New Jersey town have introduced a new rule to crack down on argumentative parents: If a parent or another spectator fights with an umpire, they have to volunteer to officiate themselves for at least three upcoming games. https://t.co/FnjSO5hCYA

— ABC News (@ABC) April 28, 2023

This seems like a good idea, but it does come with some pitfalls or limitations.

1) It's a good idea to show parents and fans that umpiring isn't as easy as it appears from the stands. The goal is that once they learn it first-hand, they'll be better in the crowd.

2) Little League officials are volunteers, so this works because you aren't taking money from an umpire that is supposed to be getting paid.

The reservations come from the idea that untrained umpires might not make good calls, leading to a worse experience for the players, but the league says that a trained umpire will always be on the field with the parent/fan, but that still doesn't ensure that the trained umpire will be able to see everything.

Also, this works at Little League because the umpires are volunteers, but in other town leagues or other divisions of baseball, the umpires get paid, so it's certainly harder to take them off the field.

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