COVID ruined my whole year of umpiring

[Cyrus Cassidy #45437]

My goal in umpiring baseball is to work at the collegiate level.  I have a mentor who has worked at that level, and he provides me valuable feedback.  Getting there as an umpire is statistically harder than a high school player getting a scholarship, which is 1 in 250,000.  So it's a tall order to begin with,

 

For D2 RMAC, they have a four-day clinic down in Phoenix every year called the Desert Challenge.  You pay to attend the clinic; they train you and then evaluate you during live games.  The best get hired by RMAC to become umpires the next season.  Everyone else goes home to their high school associations, hopefully a little better than they were before.  It just so happens that my mentor is one of the founders of the Desert Challenge, and I was all signed up and paid.  Most likely, I would not have been selected this year, but I would have gotten feedback directly from the assignor on what he wants me to improve on.  It generally takes multiple times at this clinic before you get hired by these guys.  This would have been my first one.

 

Then I got COVID a few days before the clinic, and had to back out.  I stayed in bed for 3 days.  By the time the clinic was over, I was out of bed, but still very ill.  I also lost hundreds of dollars on this -- clinic fee, nonrefundable plane tickets, etc.  Most importantly, my goal of working collegiate ball is delayed by another year.  ARGH!!!!

 

Whelp, I still want to improve as an umpire, so I signed up for another clinic in Phoenix this November.  It's not a collegiate level developmental one like the Desert Challenge; this one is just designed to make me a better high school umpire.  Oh well, at the end of the day, it's still baseball.

[Pat Riot]

Sorry to hear this Cyrus. Maybe this November clinic will give you the edge to succeed on the next Desert Challenge. 

[J-BAR #18287]

They will be impressed with your persistence.  I am.  The good news is you are highly unlikely to ever be susceptible to Covid again.  So take some comfort in being a survivor.

 

Keep a diary.  A memoir of your journey will be an inspiration to future umpires.

 

Good luck in your umpiring clinic.  We look forward to an update after class!!

[Warden Callaway]

1 hour ago, J-BAR #18287 said:

The good news is you are highly unlikely to ever be susceptible to Covid again

 

You sure? There are now new variants out and more expected after that.   I see they are dosing out booster shots.

[J-BAR #18287]

3 hours ago, Warden Callaway said:

 

You sure? There are now new variants out and more expected after that.   I see they are dosing out buster shots.

Yeah I’m sure.  Damn few get infected twice.

 

https://www.physiciansweekly.com/less-than-1-percent-of-covid-19-patients-experience-reinfection

 

And damn few who are vaccinated get sick at all.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/p0514-covid-19-vaccine-effectiveness.html

 

 

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

Both my wife and I were vaccinated with Moderna in February. Wife got a booster in August. We both tested positive the other day. My symptoms were that of a standard cold and some mild fatigue. No fever, loss of smell/taste etc. commonly reported with COVID. After 5 days from symptom onset, I’m almost back to normal, just like a cold if not sooner. Wife has no symptoms thus far.
 

The reason for test was doc wouldn’t prescribe an Rx for my nasal congestion without it. Without the test, we would not have suspected COVID.
 

Glad we got the shots as we think it could/would have been worse. YMMV. 

[Nostrum Damus SASS #110702]

2 hours ago, J-BAR #18287 said:

Yeah I’m sure.  Damn few get infected twice.  And damn few who are vaccinated get sick at all.

My fully vaccinated firefighter son is sick with "the rona" as he calls it, and for a big strong tough guy, he's laid pretty low today.  Said he was looking for the train tracks of the locomotive than ran him over while trying to sleep last night -- "the worst head cold you've ever had, some fever, and a migraine just for added fun" is how he describes it.  No loss of taste or smell, though, and no fatigue, he says.  Still, I spent 4 days with him and his girlfriend last week and neither she nor I (we're all fully vaxxed, she's months away from her USAF honorable discharge after 10 years as a satellite imagery analyst) have even tested positive.  We're testing every other day until Saturday, then declaring ourselves totally clear.

[Subdeacon Joe]

Well, that sucks.  Hang in there, it will happen in the proper time.
Endeavor to persevere.

[J-BAR #18287]

There has never been any vaccine for ANY disease that is 100% guaranteed effective.  None.

 

Most veterinarians are vaccinated for rabies while they are veterinary students.  We are at high risk since we come into contact with animals every day of our careers.  Each of us veterinary students were tested after vaccination to make sure we were protected.  The antibody level (titer) is a measure of vaccine effectiveness.  One of my professors at the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Missouri, Dr. Emmet McCune could not react to the rabies vaccine.  His immune system simply would not produce a protective titer (antibody level) to prevent him from possibly being infected with rabies.  So Dr. McCune chose to become an avian pathologist (a darn good one), because birds do not carry rabies.

 

Folks who expect any vaccine to be 100% effective simply do not comprehend biological variation.

 

Today's Covid vaccines protect over 90% of those who are inoculated.  I'm sorry some of your friends and/or relatives who have been vaccinated did not develop a protective titer.  Crap happens in a pandemic.

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

Ok, here’s a question for you.

 

MLB ump Joe West is retiring this year. I assume that means that one of the umps who has been doing the minors will get a chance to move up. Does that mean that a college ump will be invited to do the minors?

[Cyrus Cassidy #45437]

9 hours ago, Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984 said:

Ok, here’s a question for you.

 

MLB ump Joe West is retiring this year. I assume that means that one of the umps who has been doing the minors will get a chance to move up. Does that mean that a college ump will be invited to do the minors?

No, college umpiring is an entirely separate organization and chain.  To become a professional MLB umpire, one has to pay out of pocket to attend one of two different month-long umpire schools.  Each class has about 100 people in it, and only 10-15 will get a job offer.  Those 10-15 start in the minor leagues and work their way up the same as players do.  Those guys starting in the minors are usually in their 20s, because it is an average 10-15 year trek through the minors to get to MLB, and they want to have a career in front of them.  A lot of folks who know they aren't going to professional baseball (too old, have an established career, don't want life on the road, have a family, etc.) will attend pro school to get a leg up on the collegiate competition or semi-pro independent baseball leagues.

 

College umpires are hired by each individual umpire association.  Each college league (Big 10, Pac 10, Mountain West, SEC, etc.) has a contract with an umpire association.  Each association sets its own standards as to who they hire, but typically they are hired out of clinics such as I mentioned.  However, for Division I umpiring, the vast majority have also been to one of those two pro schools but either weren't one of those top 10-15, or were too late in the game to make the journey through the minor leagues.

 

Not only did Joe West retire the other day, but so did Jerry Davis.  That means two AAA minor league umpires are making it to the show next year.  Statistically, it's a lot tougher than making it as a player!