Phillies' Infield Coach Bobby Dickerson Should Be Able To Sue This Umpire For Pulling His Shirt Over His Belly Like This
A good rule of thumb is that you should probably never really know much about assistant coaches in professional sports. You have your head coach/manager who is front and center on everything the team does. Obviously football is a little different because the offensive and defensive coordinators are more important. But more often than not, the best way to know if your assistant coaches are doing a great job is if you never hear their names at all.
An even better rule of thumb is that you should never see an assistant coach's belly in the middle of a game. Like that's just day 1 stuff right there. You get brought on to the coaching staff and the first thing they should teach you is that your barrel shouldn't be making an appearance at any point during gameplay. Unfortunately for Phillies' infield coach Bobby Dickerson, that rule was broken yesterday as he had to be held back from getting to second base umpire Mike Estabrook.
There's nothing worse than that. Every fella with just a little extra something stuffed in the front drawer knows this feeling. Bobby Dickerson is so enraged at the call on the field, and he wants to tear into Mike Estabrook. But the moment that shirt goes up over his belly, his anger completely neutralized. His biggest battle is no longer with the 2nd base umpire, but it's to pull his shirt back down as quickly as possible. He knows he is caught in a terrible position, and his "fight or flight" kicks in.
This should legitimately teach this method as a way to deescalate any situation where you have an aggressive dude carrying a little extra pouch on him. It won't work against ripped dudes. Jacked guys will happily welcome any opportunity to flash their abs. But the alarm immediately starts going off for a bigger boy like once they feel a breeze on their belly.
Poor Bobby Dickerson, man. I'm sure plenty of people in Philly didn't even know his name before last night's game, and now his belly is seared into their memory. Love to see the passion, but hate to see that happen. They should really make a shirt that has some sort of anchor to avoid any moments like this in the future.