District 52 Little League struggles to staff umpires in 2021 All-Star tournaments

An umpire himself during the Little League regular season, Dolan cannot work All-Star tournaments himself because of his role as district administrator. That has left him with 15 umpires available to work this summer, many with limited availability, he said.

“Whereas we used to have about 20 people available, there’s about nine people available now,” Dolan said. “And some of those nine are now umpiring for pay … so having experience on both sides, once you get a paycheck for something you weren’t getting a paycheck for, you tell me — what’s the easy decision?”

District 52 has held steadfast in staffing volunteer umpires for the 11-12s and Juniors tournaments. For the other three tournaments, Dolan had to forgo staffing volunteers and turn the reins over to for-pay organizations.

Many of Dolan’s volunteers — such as Paul Remedios and Ed Walters — are drawn from the Peninsula Baseball Umpires Association. But now, Michael Wraa, president of the Golden State Sports Officials Association — an organization affiliated with Babe Ruth and PONY league baseball — works to staff the other three tournaments with for-pay umpires.

“Up until this year I’ve been able to get 90 to 95% of volunteer umpires to cover all the slots,” Dolan said. “But this year it’s depleted.”

In 2021, all the umpires working 9-10s, 10-11s and Intermediate (13U) games in the District 52 tournaments were for-pay, Dolan said.

“It hadn’t happened before,” Dolan said. “Two years ago, the Juniors Tournament was quite large, but the timing of that tournament, I was able to get volunteers for virtually all of it. But this year, the numbers were working against it.”

Prior to taking over as district administrator, Dolan worked as the umpiring chief for District 52 for approximately 15 years. Going back through the years, staffing games with volunteers — a requirement for the 11-12s tournament — was not always easy.

Dolan resorted to all the tricks of the trade.

“Cajoled, begged, pleaded, called friends and said: ‘I’ll buy you a hot dog next weekend,’” Dolan said. “There were enough bodies that we could do everything gratis. But that just isn’t possible anymore.”

Dolan is afraid he may have to resort to similar tactics simply to find qualified umpires in future seasons.

West Region Little League — overseer of eight regions, including Northern California and District 52 — has traditionally held annual outreach clinics in the Bay Area. It has been three years since the two-day clinics in Santa Clara County run by West Region Chief Umpire Mark Bernstein have been conducted, however, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

One of Dolan’s current umpires, Wayne Yoshitomi, has served as an instructor at the tournament. With the current umpire shortage, however, Yoshitomi and others on Dolan’s crew have resorted to shouldering the All-Star workload. Come opening day of the 2021 District 52 All-Stars tournaments, some of them worked as many as four games per day.

“There’s no way we could get trained or qualified umpires to cover all the tournaments now,” Dolan said. “There’s too many tournaments going on.”

Also in Dolan’s volunteer rotation this year: Craig Gruber, Scott Pritchett, Charlie Adams, Anthony Remedios, Robert Notte, Alex Pereira, Mark Pascale, Steve Washington, Ponch Robles, Mac Parfet and Doug Reibert.

Dolan said he encourages he encourages new and veteran umpires to attend umpiring clinics when they can, but these are not prerequisite to work. Now, the biggest qualifier seems to be a love of the game of baseball and a willingness to work.

“The main qualification is to be referred by a local league,” Dolan said.

And just maybe, going to work for Dolan just might include a free hot dog.