Ump Beaning Brings Media Frenzy, Sanctions for High School Team

Championship Rout Leads to Ugly Incident

Cartersville Coach Stuart Chester believes Hill could have accidentally missed the pitch.

High-school baseball pitcher and catcher from Georgia intentionally bean home-plate umpire Jeff Scott in the face. The school was fined $1,000 and heavily sanctioned for the incident.

(ABCNEWS.com)
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"I've seen the video. It looked to me like he thought it was in the dirt. We had a guy on second, and it looked like he was concerned about blocking a ball and keeping our guy there," Chester said said.

The pitch in question came after Chester's team recorded its ninth consecutive strikeout and Stephens County players became increasingly frustrated with Scott's calls.

"Their pitcher was hitting his spots so well, and our guys were striking out a lot more than they typically do," Friend said. "They became frustrated and started questioning calls, and I think it was contagious."

Chester said he thought the umpiring was fair.

"We've had that umpiring crew in championships in years past, and in the first two games of this series as well, and I thought they did an excellent job," Chester said. "But I can understand the level of frustration — there was a couple calls that went against us that I wanted to hit the umpire over."

Jesse Smith, a representative of the Multi-County Umpires Association, which worked the game, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the GHSA asked his group not to comment on the incident.

"The decision on what happened is strictly 100 percent in the hands of Dr. Ralph Swearngin and Dennis Payne [GHSA coordinator of officials]," Smith told the AJC. "They have told me they will handle it. It is up to the GHSA."

A Simple Mix-Up

In the video, Hill is seen inexplicably dropping to his knees with his mitt in the dirt as the ball reaches the plate, which could lend some credence to the idea that pitch was supposed to be a curveball.

"They say it was a cross-up in sign — the pitcher was throwing a fastball that the catcher believes he signaled a curveball for," said Friend. "I do know for our pitcher to have intentionally hit the umpire on that pitch, it was the best spot he had hit all day. He sure wasn't hitting his spots against the batters."

Chester said he'd never seen mix-up with such dire consequences for an umpire.

"I've seen catchers get crossed-up and stuff like that before, but never where it was a square lick on the umpire like that," he said.