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Valley ump Cooper will work Little League Intermediate World Series
Valley umpire will be
part of Little League
event in California
By charles grove
He learned about it in January, but it’s beginning to feel a little more real as summer continues.
Dr. Chet Cooper, a Little League umpire for 21 years now, will be in Livermore, Calif. for the Little League Intermediate World Series which runs from July 31 to Aug. 7.
It’ll be the second World Series Cooper has worked. He also was selected as an umpire for the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa. in 2012.
So how will this compare to Williamsport?
“I’m curious to find out myself,” Cooper said. “Williamsport was satisfying and gratifying. It’s sort of Disneyland for umpires. But the people I know who have done the Intermediate World Series have spoken very highly of it. I’m looking forward to it.”
The Little League Intermediate World Series began in 2013 and is for kids from ages 11-13 as the next step up from traditional Little League Baseball. The pitching mound is 50 feet from home plate and the bases are 70 feet apart. Traditional Little League dimensions are 46 and 60 feet.
“It’s a bit of an experimental league,” Cooper said. “It’s a way for players to make the transition to a full-sized field. It’s tough to jump right to 90 feet between bases. It’s a great league for kids who still want to play.”
The tournament includes six teams from the United States and five international teams including teams from the Asia-Pacific, Canada, Europe-Africa and Latin America regions. Teams from South Korea, Czech Republic and Curacao have already punched their tickets to California.
Cooper applied to be one of the umpires in California last October and found out the news in January. He’s worked state tournaments and regional tournaments since his 2012 trip to Williamsport, including umpiring the Intermediate Regional Tournament in Kalamazoo, Mich., in 2013. Cooper has received positive recommendations based off of those performances that put him in good enough graces to be selected for his second World Series.
“It’s a personal accomplishment for me,” Cooper said. “I won’t get a big head about it, though. I’ll still get up every day with my cup of coffee and remain humble.”
The umpires in Little League all work on a volunteer basis and Cooper will be paying for his transportation to get out to California to officiate the games.
“The deal is you pay for your transportation and they pay for the hotel, the meals and some entertainment. Baseball and a little entertainment in the evening is about as much fun as you can have.”
Cooper, whose main job is a professor of molecular biology and microbiology at Youngstown State, says umpiring is a way to get away from the other areas of his life, even if it does occasionally include irate parents yelling at him.
“It helps me relax from the other areas of my life. Even if it is a bit ironic since you sometimes get screamed at,” Cooper said. “It’s my escape and it takes my mind away from other things.”