Girls Little League Softball of Wallingford: What's New: Wallingford softball umpire is one of his sport’s elite

Wallingford softball umpire is one of his sport’s elite
Romano among umpiring elite
Wallingford resident one of 12 chosen for softball World Series
By Tim Kolehmainen Record-Journal staff

From the constant razzing of parents to an overwhelming summer schedule, youth softball umpiring is a thankless job.

When it starts to drag on Wallingford’s Dave Romano, he has an easy cure.

“The first thing I do is look out and see the ponytails and the smiles. That’s why I’m there anyway.”

Romano, the umpire-in-chief for the Girls Little League Softball of Wallingford, received another pick-me-up earlier this month when he was selected as one of 12 umpires for the Little League Softball World Series in Portland, Ore.

Ten teams of 11- and 12-year-old girls competed for the title, including squads from Curacao, British Colum¬bia, Germany and the Philippines. While the players often talked about the tournament as the experience of a lifetime, they weren’t the only ones making memories.

“It’s a pretty big to-do for the umpires,” said Wallingford league president Ken Kish.

Romano has umpired for Kish for the past seven years in the local leagues, since he first donned the “despised blue” in the summer of 2000. He was a volunteer assistant coach that first year, but helped out when he could.

“I umpired because no one else wanted to do it,” joked Romano. But he took to the job, eventually earning the league’s top designation. For each of the past four summers, he’s attended a five-day camp in Bristol, spending dawn to dusk learning more about his trade.

Romano described umpiring as a thankless job, but certainly one with its perks, such as umpiring in the World Series.

“The strange thing is that the higher up you go in tournament (levels), the more composed the parents and players are. At the national level, it’s just a pleasure to be there,” said Romano, who described two traits necessary to be a happy umpire: thick skin and small ears.
 
Romano’s ascent of the national umpiring ladder began when he was selected to umpire the Little League Regional in Albany, N.Y. last summer. He applied for the same post this summer, a necessary step en route to a World Series assignment.

“I had a ball at Regionals and it was just up the road, so I figured I’d go back,” said Romano.

He didn’t get an invitation. Instead, a letter from Little League International Umpire-in-Chief Andy Konyar was waiting in his mailbox. He’d made the big time.

“It was a surprise going out there,” said Romano. “I made two or three weeks of phone calls just to make sure it was real.”

Romano umpired nine games in the seven days of the tournament, including both the semifinals and finals. He was one of 12 umpires, each graded by an umpiring staff. According to Romano, they went through the highs and lows of his performance after each game, including tips for improvements.

At the end of pool play, Romano had to wait out a two hour meeting to discover if he had been selected to be part of the six-man playoff crew. He was.

“It was nerve-wracking because you knew they were looking at you for the championship game,” said Romano, who drew the third-base assignment in the finals.

He claimed not to remember much about the championship game, a 6-2 victory for Mattawan, Mich. over Pequannock, N.J. In fact, he struggled to recall the teams involved. Like any top umpire, his focus was on his job.

“Even when I umpire my daughter’s games, I don’t even realize when she comes to bat,” claimed Romano. “They put a helmet on and it’s all pigtails.”