Many minor baseball players in the province have hung up their gloves or will do so shortly after a season on the diamonds across Quebec.
While each year more pitchers, outfielders and catchers are signing up for the sport, one essential position behind the plate -- calling the strikes and balls -- is one administrators are having a hard time filling.
The Baseball Quebec Federation sent an open letter to parents and coaches recently showing that while the number of players has increased by around 2,000 since 2019, the number of officials has dropped by almost 1,000.
The reason is simple: they don't want to be abused: "Wake up ref!" "What game are you watching?" and the chant that has become a chorus throughout arenas, stadiums and ball diamonds: "Ref, you suck!"
These are the chants refs have always heard, but it is becoming louder and more aggressive, according to the baseball federation's letter.
"It's abysmal, and it's not the umpires' fault," said NDG Baseball director of communications Noah Sidel. "It's abuse, and it's hard for parents to convince their kids to become an umpire if they know they're going to get abused, and the people that are already an umpire don't want to be abused anymore, so they just leave."
With no umps ready to call a game, someone else is often forced to grab a mask and take control or risk having no game at all.
"Some games were cancelled, or parents had to ump games this year," said Kahnawake Warhawks baseball coach Jesse Lahache.
Stephane Boudreau, the executive director of Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec (RSEQ), said the pandemic made the situation worse as it halted recruitment for refs and umpires.
He said many refs retired during the pandemic and the younger generation did not feel it was worth it.
"The thing we're trying to educate student-athletes, the trainers and parents is that first of all, these are people. They're human beings and, second of all, they're someone's parent or someone's kid," he said. "A lot of people tend to forget that."
He said he has to remind parents and fans to support the student-athletes and leave the officials alone.
"If people could just concentrate on supporting their team, supporting the student-athletes from their school or their child or children, it would help a lot," said Boudreau. "Let's not forget, these people aren't paid that well, and a lot of the time, they have a passion for the sport."
If a ref is abused all game, Boudreau said they are discouraged and lose confidence to make proper calls in future games.
"I find it a bit disturbing, what's going on right now with refereeing," he said.
Sidel said NDG Baseball has done a decent job of curbing abuse by ensuring coaches have pre-season meetings with parents instructing them to behave during games and that it remains up to the coach to deal with umpires if there are bad calls.
"What they [umps] need is for someone to deescalate the tension, they need someone to take control of the situation and they need to find someone to try and find a solution," said Sidel.
Sidel said speaking to an umpire in a measured voice usually does the trick, and he will tell parents and fans that he will deal with the situation if he can feel anger rising due to questionable calls.
In the end, he said, bad calls and mistakes happen, and the goal is to set expectations and manage them when tension escalates.
"My wife always says this: 'The stakes could not possibly be lower, so relax,'" said Sidel.
Abuse of refs and umps is widespread across sports, and Sidel said he's seen children as young as seven-years-old get heckled by parents.
"It's bad," he said. "The things I've seen over the years are unacceptable to the point of reprehensible, and that's the core problem. It's the same in all the other sports."
Sidel is also involved in minor hockey and said coaches need to bring skates, a helmet and a whistle along to games as they may be called on to ref because of a lack of officials.
"This is an epidemic that's through all sports -- children's sports, adults' sports -- everything outside of the pros and it's purely because people are tired of being abused," he said, adding abuse can follow the refs well after the final whistle blows as fans and coaches often record the altercations and post them online.
"Unfortunately, I think the core problem is it's too normal, and it's normalized," said Sidel.
Boudreau adds the majority of school teams' staff and teachers are working on etiquette, sportsmanship and respect for officials.
"The main thing is spectators," he said. "It's like they feel like they have a right to yell whatever they think they want to yell, but a lot of the times what I say is, 'would you like me to yell at your kids the way you're yelling at these kids?' A lot of times, they'll reflect on what I said and put it in perspective... It's all about education. You can say it's a bad call... But leave it at that."
