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The “Out” Incident
as told by Bennet-sensei, teacher at PS. 39 in Brooklyn, NY.
“One day when I came in, the class was debating a play in a baseball game between the Brooklyn Cyclones and the New York Yankees. The auto-ump had called the Brooklyn runner out on second, when replays clearly showed that the player, I forget his name, was safe. Much of the class—Yankees fans, I suppose—were complaining that the auto-ump called the play and that was that, end of argument. A fair few of the rest were saying that if the auto-ump couldn't call a play correctly we should all just go right back to human umpires, as some leagues still used. I let them argue because I didn't have enough coffee to really face them all that morning. The argument devolved into whether one should rely on machines to make “important” decisions, or whether a human (I corrected them here, whether a living) being should oversee these decisions, something most pro leagues had phased out long ago.
“When someone threw a spitball at someone else I decided this had gone on long enough and I called the class to as much order as could be expected. I said, 'I have a way we can test this and see which side is right,' and some of them were skeptical and some were eager to try it, so I explained, making up a lot of it as I did so.
“I said to them, 'We will have a class baseball game. There will be two teams. The Green Team will be those of you who think an auto-ump is enough. The Purple Team can be people who think there should be living umpires. Okay?'
“They all murmurred and after a while assented.
“I went on, 'And there will be four umpires; two from the the Greens and two from the Purples—' I was interrupted there by this kid Tumbarello, frantically waving her left hand in the air and yelling, 'Me! Me! Me!'”
“I said, 'Oh, Tumbarello-chan, why you?'”
“Now this kid was one of these, 'I'm the Big Sister! Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead' kind of kids who was never afraid to be the first kid to hand in a finished test even if she knew she'd flunked it. So I was expecting one of her carefully crafted excuses that Big Sisters are known for. But what she said was, 'My Uncle Angelo was an umpire in the Empire League. He taught me how to make calls, so I know how to do it RIGHT!'”
”'Oh yeah you do!' said this other kid, Mayell-chan, who was an only child and acted the part. 'Show us if you're so smart!'”
“Tumbarello-chan walked to the front of the class and said, 'Here's what you do. On a base, you watch the base, to see who's touching it, but you listen for the sound of the ball hitting the glove.' She demonstrated by punching her fist into her open hand. 'So! If nobody is touching the base when you hear that sound, OR, only the runner is touching the base, the runner is safe, right? And if only the baseman is touching the base when you hear that sound—'
”'What about if the baseman tags the runner and nobody is on the base?' Mayell-chan challenged.
“Tumbarello-chan was not fazed. 'Well, you have to be paying attention to the players, too, and in that case—'
“I stopped the argument there. These two could get into brawls. I went on. 'Now, what we're going to do, is we're going to go to the park and we will play a five-inning game. When the Green Team is at bat, we will use umpires. And when the purple team is at bat, we will use auto-umps.'
“A bunch of the kids yelled, 'No fair!!'