British Baseball Federation Umpire Handbook

Umpire Assignments

The BBF assigns official umpires to as many season games as possible. Since the number of umpires in the UK is not yet sufficient to cover every game in every league, umpires are assigned to leagues in order of level from the top down: NBL, AAA, AA, etc. If an officially assigned BBF umpire is not available for a game, it is the responsibility of the home team to provide competent umpires.

As a rule of thumb, two umpires per game will be assigned for each regular season NBL game with one umpire per game assigned for the lower leagues. All playoff games should be covered with at least two qualified BBF umpires.

The BBF appointed Assistant Umpire Directors manage and publish the umpire assignments for the different leagues:

NBL Mike Shepard nbl.umpiring@britishbaseball.org.uk

AAA Bill Varon triplea.umpiring@britishbaseball.org.uk

AA Chris Goldsmith doublea.umpiring@britishbaseball.org.uk

A Gabor Erdos singlea.umpiring@britishbaseball.org.uk

WBL John Baxendale TBC

We make all efforts to reach out to umpires who may be qualified to officiate the different leagues, but sometimes we miss some. Any umpire who is available to work a game, can always get in touch with the Assistant Umpire Directors above for assignment. Assignments can be managed retrospectively as well. If an umpire umpired a game at short notice, they can get in touch with the league’s Assistant Umpire Director to keep record of the assignments in MyWBSC. Again, we can never have too many umpires!