Joining Texas Baseball Umpires Association (TBUA)

To join the TBUA, the first step is to sign up for the TBUA Umpire School. There is no fee required to attend this school, however, attendance is mandatory. The TBUA Vice-President should be contacted to sign up for this school.

Having attended the school, each prospective member must decide whether they wish to join the TBUA. If they do, they are given an application form by the Secretary. The applicant pays $15 association dues (this does not include $20 for Pony registration if you want to qualify for Pony tournaments) and a one-time $25 pre-scheduling fee. The $25 pre-scheduling fee is held in escrow by the TBUA and is returned to the member when they leave the TBUA if he is in good standing with the Scheduler.

Meeting Attendance

There are usually five or six general meetings each year. The board may require that each member to remain in good standing attend a certain number of these meetings. Some meetings are mandatory as noted in the meeting calendar located on the TBUA web site (www.tbua.org). Do not miss mandatory meetings.

If a member must miss a meeting, he must notify the Vice President before the meeting to be excused from the meeting.

Rules

High School Rules: The high school baseball rules are published by the National Federation of State High School Associations, and are normally referred to as "Federation" rules. These rules, which differ from the pro rules in several respects, are the only rules used in high school ball games. High school umpires must thoroughly understand the Federation rules prior to officiating high school games. A test can be provided for members that wish to check their knowledge of high school rules.

Typically, one or more rules changes are made to Federation rules each year. There will be a meeting during the early part of the year when these are discussed. These changes will also be published on the TBUA web site.

Professional Rules: All other leagues we officiate will use Pro Rules, also referred to as "MLB Rules" or "OBR" (Official Baseball Rules). These rules are published every year by the Sporting News and will be included with the Pony Rules distributed by Pony Baseball with your information packets. It is imperative that you have a rule book and study it. Ask an officer if they have any old rulebooks. TBUA usually has several from past years.