Young umpire calls 'em as he sees 'em, fills need in IHSA

Leo Dlatt is what the Illinois High School Association is looking for. A good, young official.

A freshman at the University of Illinois, the Lake Zurich High School graduate already is in his third season as a high school baseball umpire.

First licensed with the IHSA in April 2021 at 17 years old, official No. 88904 turned 19 on April 3.

Until college lets out, Dlatt will umpire games around Champaign. Then he'll come home, finish the prep season, and head into summer ball. Last year he worked wood bat league games with rosters of college players.

There are 2,876 IHSA-licensed baseball umpires. Dlatt is among the 235 younger than 20, or about 8%, according to Sam Knox, IHSA assistant executive director and baseball administrator.

IHSA officials may be as young as 15 but need to be 17 to work varsity contests. In January, the IHSA board of directors reduced provisional licensing rates for 15- and 16-year-olds. About 75 students have since registered, said IHSA Associate Executive Director Kurt Gibson, who handles officiating.

Also, on April 11, the IHSA board moved to lower costs to register for multiple licenses, and for officials from bordering states.

These ideas are working. Gibson said while numbers remain down in Illinois and nationally, the IHSA issued 1,678 more licenses this school year than the last. The retention rate is up, too.

An article on the National Federation of State High School Associations website said unsportsmanlike behavior, job changes and more family time are the top reasons officials quit.

The closest Dlatt's been to any of that was ejecting someone from a game.

“It didn't feel good and I don't think it should feel good. But it felt needed, which I think is the best way to put it,” he said.

Wunderkind

Dlatt doesn't just fill the dark blue uniform. Last season, at 18, the IHSA assigned him to work the 2022 Class 4A Libertyville regional, always a good one. Those jobs are based on recommendations by regional supervisors who assign umpires during the regular season.

The IHSA does not track this, but considers Dlatt among the youngest to umpire a state series contest. Fox Valley Blues supervisor Jeff Collis, who assigns Dlatt and other umpires to ballgames for about 100 schools throughout the suburbs, believes he may be the youngest.

“What sets Leo apart from other young umpires is the way he handles himself on the field,” Collis said. “He's got pretty good size, he looks you in the eye, he's got a great personality and great charisma and he handles himself pretty well on the baseball field.

“That's something that a lot of guys doing it 20, 30 years will never have. It's something that you'll either have it or you don't. And at 18 years old, he had it.”

Undergoing training and earning IHSA certification his junior year at Lake Zurich, when Assistant Principal Andy Lambert referred him to Collis, Dlatt started umping underclass and junior varsity levels and picked up a handful of varsity games.

Impressing with his maturity and confidence, getting no complaints, Dlatt was the 2021 Fox Valley Blues Rookie of the Year.

In the spring of 2022, Collis assigned the youngster to some early, “low-intensity” nonconference games. High-intensity coaches still manage those.

“That first week I had three very demanding, critical coaches contact me and say, ‘Who is this Leo kid? He's one of the best umpires you've ever put out,'” Collis said.

Collis immediately revamped Dlatt's schedule to cover about 50 varsity games, then recommended him to the IHSA for the playoffs.

Who is this Leo kid?

A former receiver on the Lake Zurich football team — his twin brother, Bobby, now is a running back at Carthage College — Dlatt played baseball from T-ball through his freshman year with the Bears. He'd planned on playing his sophomore season until the COVID-19 pandemic ended that.

He starting umpiring in eighth grade for the Lake Zurich Baseball & Softball Association. The more games he did, the more he liked it.

“My personality suits being an umpire, I love being around baseball, and I got paid. As a 14-year-old, you couldn't really beat that,” he said.

A student of the game within the game, Dlatt takes pride in knowing the rule book's intricacies; he relishes the subtle positioning and teamwork between umpires, their “silent communication.”

“No one sees it happening, but there's a mental component to it I find really fascinating,” Dlatt said.

His father, Phil, called Dlatt “super-intelligent and very thorough.”

When Dlatt played quarterback for the Lake Zurich Flames youth football team, his dad said he was a finalist for a team character award. He also had a penchant for changing the play at the line of scrimmage, leading his coach to call him “Coach Leo.”

“I think that's why he's thrived doing the umping stuff,” Phil Dlatt said. “He's interacting with people that are much older than him and he just knows how to approach it.”

Champaign and beyond

Declared as a political science major at the University of Illinois, Leo Dlatt will attend classes, leave for a weekday game by about 3:30 p.m. and return around 7 p.m. to allow for homework.

In Champaign he reached umpire assigner Donald “D Ray” Tucker, president of the Champaign Officials Association.

“He has poise and mechanics that belie his youth. I would even go so far as to say he has polish in his mechanics,” Tucker said.

On April 14, Tucker and Dlatt worked together in a game between Charleston and Rantoul. Dlatt was behind the plate, his favorite because “it's engaging,” he said.

Afterward, the two just talked. Tucker called Dlatt “a sponge” in learning the trade. Tucker regrets he'll lose him when the semester ends.

“He knows he does not know it all — yet,” Tucker said. “That humble mindset coupled with a desire to be the best is a tried-and-true recipe for success — at life, not just for a baseball umpire.”

Dlatt's goal is to be a Major League Baseball umpire. Last summer he attended a one-day MLB umpire clinic, earning an invitation to a monthlong course in Florida in January. Dlatt declined to focus on school.

One downstate coach told Tucker at first he was skeptical of this new IHSA ump. Dlatt changed his mind.

“You have to prove that you're capable of what you're doing, just like in any job,” Dlatt said. “Pleasing a team is not our goal. Our goal is to be honest and fair and to make the right judgments as much as humanly possible.

“Whether or not coaches agree with our calls doesn't necessarily dictate whether we've earned respect, but it's the consistency of making the best calls possible, and high school coaches will see that and know that you're doing your best.”