During the course of this letter, the two umpires in question will be referred to as Tall Umpire (plate) and Short Umpire (field)

Main occurence

On June 6th, 2005 Hardway Softball was playing the Mooseknuckles.  After the first inning Hardway was down 6-0.  In the top of the second inning Ty Baggott lead off with a single, and advanced to second on a single by Justin Park.  At this point Trent Davis hit an inside the park homerun, scoring Baggott, Park, and himself to make the score 6-3.  After the Mooseknuckles recorded their first out of the inning, Tradd Baggott hit a solo homerun to make the score 6-4.  This was the 2ND INNING.  Over the next couple of innings, the Moosekuckles added to their lead to make the score 11-4 going into the top of the fifth inning.  The 4 had not changed from Hardway's side of the scoreboard for 2 full innings.  So going into the fifth inning Hardway is down by seven, it was at this point Hardway's previous score of 4 became a 3, putting Hardway in an eight run deficit, bringing into play the 8 runs after 5 inning run rule.  Hardway immediatly caught the mistake, and believing it to be a technical miscue and not a diliberate act to take the run away, brought it to the attention of tall umpire (before the inning had started).  When asked why the run was changed, Tall umpire said, "here is where I made the mistake", pointing to his 3" x 4" piece of paper that he writes on.  In script that would best be described as "chicken scratch", a 4 was crossed off and a 3 put in its place.  When he was agained asked how that could be possible, Tall umpire then asked to see the book, which Hardway gladly obliged.  Cody Murray acting as coach, very calmly pointed out all 4 runs that scored, even much as physically pointing to where each hit transpired.  Tall umpire's response to this light being shed on the proceedings, "did you keep the other teams book, well it's not official."  Not 'sorry', not 'oh, I thought I accidently gave you a run', just that our book was not official.  This, of course, begs the question; with hardly any teams keeping book, and no teams that I have come across that keep both sides, what is to stop an official from indescriminatly giving runs and taking runs away, in any matter he sees fit?  The answer of course, is there is nothing stopping them.  Several times in the past two seasons there have been instances of an umpire placing the wrong score on the scoreboard.  When the error is pointed out by our scorekeeper, each umpire immediatly corrected the mistake, with no problems, and no mention of the book having to be official.  Hardway, and all other teams in the league will now have to keep a full, detailed scorebook in order to assure they are credited with the runs they have scored.  It was at this time that Trent Davis, acting out of intensity and passion, rather than common sense, questioned the Tall umpire's mental acumen.  Tall umpire then acted well within his rights and tossed Davis from the game.  When Davis did not immediatly sease and desist, Tall umpire began to 'egg him on', seemingly coaxing Davis into opening his mouth again, so he could unleash some sort of heretofor unseen umpire power.  After Davis was asked to leave, and seeing no logical solution on the horizon, Hardway allowed the game to proceed.  As could be expected due to a supreme lack of focus, Hardway came three up and three down, ensuring the umpire orchestrated run-rule and ending the game.

Other occurences

•	In the 6:30 game of the same day, the same umpiring crew was working the Hardway vs. Nailers game.  After time had expired, a ground ball was hit to Hardway's shortstop Ty Baggott's right, he fielded and threw to second for a force out.  During the throw, Baggott twisted his ankle and fell to the ground. Baggott was in a great deal of pain, clutching his ankle and punching the ground, when Short ump, now behind the plate, yells to Tall ump, "He's not hurt!"  There are several things that are wrong in this situation, (1) time limit was up, so believing Hardway to be stalling for time was wrong, (2) had time limit not been exceeded, Hardway was home team, and the time limit had little bearing on them, (3) even if Hardway was pulling a scam to wring out the last few seconds of time, I do not feel it is prudent for an official of a sporting event to yell such a crass and inhumane statement, especially when a potential serious injury has just occured.

•	A player on Hardway started questioning the missing run in game 2 (as described above).  He is an umpire for several leagues in Edmond, including slow pitch softball.  After explaining that there is no way these ump would be able to get away with taking runs away in his Edmond league, Tall ump then stated, loud enough for Debbie Brandt (mother of a player) to hear, "that's what their problem is, they're from Edmond".  I do not feel this statement was neccesary, and find it rather offensive that I, and the rest of my team have some sort of "problem" because our homes happen to reside in a certain town.  Why would an umpire be seeking out a reason why a team has a problem, and then delighting so much when he "discovered" the answer, if he did not already have predisposed, for lack of better word, hatred of said team?

•	After the game was over, the umpires, not wanting to leave well enough alone, and let us simmer in our displeasure came over to our dugout.  After listening to us talk, and as I mentioned earlier, egg on the argument, they threatened to throw everyone out for the next game.  I, Cody Murray, was the player to calmly explain the situation to the ump back in the fifth inning, Justin Park repeatedly told the rest of the team to relax, Tim Brandt did not say a word, David Porter did not say a word; but for some reason the umpires felt it neccessary to threaten a team-wide suspension, even though the game was over and there has been no evidence to support the ability of an umpire to suspend 11 people at once.

•	During another game a Hardway player was ejected for voicing his displeasure over a call.  This player completly agrees with this ruling, and accepted the ejection with no further confrontation.  He sat the rest of the game in the dugout and cheered for his team.  When Davis was ejected in the game in question, he proceeded to the dugout, still upset at the ruling, but accepting of his fate.  Tall umpire, not wanting to leave well enough alone, follows him up the fence line, telling him he has to completly leave the field.  I am unsure of whether the umpire was acting within his rights, but I there should be at least some sort of unified action taken on ejections, either they can stay or they have to go, because I have no doubt in my mind Tall umpire was trying to kick Davis out completly because of his feelings toward hardway.

•	At the end of the game, a Hardway player explained to the umpires that we planned on lodging a protest.  It was at this time that Short umpire yelled, in a voice that was louder than any used up until that point (either by player or umpire), "WELL, GO FILE THE COMPLAINT, THEN!!!".  Again, these do not seem to be the actions of an umpire who was in control of his emotions, and again points to the fact that this umpiring crew had a problem with Hardway.

If the run had not been taken away, the score would still have remained 11-4, Hardway would still have been behind by a good deal of runs, and probably would have lost the game.  At this point, the team has told me that we do not even want to finish the game, we will forfeit and take the loss, as to not mess with the scheduling of a continuation game.  All we are asking is to be found in the right, to get our $25.00 "protest fee" back, and the assurance that this umpiring crew will not work our games anymore, or at least that their ridiculous and unprofessional behaviour be controlled in some manner.  We love playing in this league, but I speak for the entire Hardway team when I say we are at the end of our rope with some of the things going on.