Hawai'i umpire working biggest stage in softball
By Ann Miller
Advertiser Staff Writer
Don't look for Leilani Okuda to umpire any American softball games as Team USA seeks to extend its world dominance to an 18th year at the Olympics.
Gregory Yamamoto • The Honolulu Advertiser
Chances are good, however, you will see the 1983 McKinley graduate at many games not involving the United States.
Leilani Okuda is one of three Americans picked to umpire softball at the Athens Olympics.
Okuda reached the pinnacle of her umpiring career at age 39 when her name was among the dozen announced to work in Athens by International Softball Federation (ISF) Umpire in Chief Merle Butler.
"I feel we have provided to the ISF the very best umpires available," Butler said, "who have extensive experience at the international level."
Half the umpires are women, including three Americans. The trio is not allowed to call a U.S. game, which means Okuda won't be the backboard for one of American Jennie Finch's 70 mph-plus fastballs. Former Rainbow Wahine Brooke Wilkins, nearly as quick in her third Olympics for Australia, is another matter.
But pitchers with lethally lively arms are not among Okuda's primary concerns. Instead, Okuda has spent nearly two-thirds of her life honing a skill where anonymity is cherished, form and reflexes crucial and tranquility imperative.
One other thing. Catchers are your best friends.
"Umpires are not afraid of bad pitching or pitchers that are too fast," Okuda said. "They are really afraid of catchers who are not able to catch the ball. That's when you start to flinch. To have a catcher at this caliber, you can really watch the pitching."
Okuda will see eight of the best in Athens. Softball runs Aug. 14 to 23, with 32 games. The United States has won the first two Olympic golds and is favored for the hat trick.
Hours of practice
To prepare, on an island 2,500 miles from the type of velocity seen in the international game, Okuda has worked hours with former UH catcher Aiko Okamura and a pitching machine pushed to its sub-80 mph limit.
Okuda
Okuda "tracks" endless pitches and coaxes brave friends to stand in the batter's box. She also practices: 1, her form in a full-length mirror; 2, martial arts to quicken her reflexes, and; 3, Zen meditation to keep her cool in the midst of Athens' triple-digit heat and the ump-baiters.
She won't be paid but will be put up in a dorm — away from athletes — and given clothing, equipment and food. After she marches in Opening Ceremonies, her off time will be taken up watching other softball games as the umpires "scout" players for tendencies and support their colleagues.
"I'm there to fulfill a responsibility. People are counting on me to be at my best," Okuda says. "The pressure will be there. I will enjoy myself, but that comes at the end. I want to be able to say I had my best game."
Strange beginning
It would be the best of a career that started inauspiciously at 15.
"At McKinley they thought maybe I was a strange kid," Okuda said, laughing. "(Umpire) Gilbert Fernandez was my idol. He punched runners out with all his might. I used to imitate him, go to a friend's house and run up and down the halls with a mirror at the end. Little did I know I was preparing for this."
"Idoling" away her time turned serious when she first got paid at 18 — "I didn't know people get paid for umpiring," Okuda says.
By 1996, Okuda's playing career was long over but she had WAC games, national tournaments and an ISF certification on her umpiring resume, thanks to a little help from her friends.
The "Hawai'i ohana" of umpires and local Amateur Softball Association officials, particularly Hawai'i ASA Commissioner Donald Meinel and Herbert Paleka Jr. — the first and only other ISF-certified umpire here — gave Okuda their full support.
Worked her way up
They sent her to her first national tournament and Paleka accompanied her to the ASA National Umpire School. Soon after, she received her first major national assignment. The Hawai'i ASA brought the U.S. national team here, in part to help Okuda.
She was eventually picked for an international tournament in Japan because South Africa couldn't come up with an official. "I always say they sent me because I was the cheapest ticket," she recalls, "but that was my break."
Hawai'i's isolation became her salvation. Now umpiring is one of her four careers.
She teaches PE and coaches softball at McKinley, where she was OIA East co-Coach of the Year last season. Her teams are almost always short in numbers and victories, but never out-worked; Okuda has instituted a four-hour study hall. When that's over, she also works as a massage therapist.
She also does interviews for the Baltimore Sun, which ran a feature on her quest for anonymity in umpiring last month. Her dedication is now known coast-to-coast-to-coast. In a few days, it goes global.
Reach Ann Miller at amiller@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8043.
