umpire

An umpire is a kind of referee who enforces the rules during certain sports, such as baseball, softball, and cricket.

In higher levels of baseball and softball, there are often multiple umpires on the field. They are primarily responsible for determining whether base runners are “safe” or “out.” The most important one is the home plate umpire, who determines whether each pitch is a “ball” or a “strike.”

Umpire is also sometimes used to refer to someone who acts as an impartial judge during some kind of conflict, such as two friends having an argument, as in Jane and Mike were losing their tempers with each other at the meeting so I had to step in and act as an umpire until they calmed down. 

Less commonly, umpire can be used as a verb meaning to perform the duties of an umpire, as in I signed up to umpire my daughter’s softball games. 

An informal short form of umpire is ump, which can also be used as both a noun and a verb. It’s especially used as an informal way to address an umpire, as in Hey, ump, that was way out of the strike zone!

Example: The umpire called him out, but I’m pretty sure he was safe.

The first records of the word umpire come from the 1300s. It comes from the Old French nomper, meaning “arbiter” or “one who is not equal,” from non-, “not,” and per, “peer” or “equal.” Nomper was adopted into Middle English as noumpere but eventually became umpere—the first two letters were struck out because people heard “a noumpere” as “an umpere.” This is called metanalysis, and the same thing happened in words like apron (originally napron) and nickname (originally ekename).

Umpires are most commonly associated with baseball, but other sports have umpires. In professional American football, the umpire is one of several officials who each have different titles and responsibilities. Tennis has chair umpires and line umpires. In other sports, the person in this position is called a referee or judge. In all such cases, the role of the umpire or referee is to be an enforcer of the rules who does not favor either player or team. Being an umpire is often seen as a thankless job since players and fans are known for arguing with their calls (which, yes, are sometimes terrible).

What are some synonyms for umpire?

• ump
• referee
• judge
• arbitrator
• arbiter

What are some words that share a root or word element with umpire? 

• peer

What are some words that often get used in discussing umpire?

• baseball
• softball
• tennis
• rules
• call
• strike
• ball
• safe
• out

The word umpire is most commonly associated with baseball, but the title is used in other sports.

Umpire just told Beltre to get in the on-deck circle. Beltre responded by dragging the on-deck circle to where he was standing. Ejected.

— Levi Weaver (@ThreeTwoEephus) July 27, 2017

Serena Williams was cheated because an umpire you've never heard of, Carlos Ramos, had his feelings hurt, and needed to exert his authority. Serena is right that it was unfair and wrong. Ramos should have been overruled, and his penalty should he never to umpire a match again.

— Tony Schwartz (@tonyschwartz) September 8, 2018

Put another way, Facebook is happy to let factcheckers act as umpire and call balls and strikes. But if the game plays out in a way the company doesn't like, Facebook has no problem going back to fix the score.

— Ryan Mac 🙃 (@RMac18) August 7, 2020

Is umpire used correctly in the following sentence?

I ended up having to umpire their argument by acting as the voice of reason.