Coach will not face assault charge Portland’s Rutherford bumped baseball umpire during June 8 game

PORTLAND – Prosecutors won’t pursue criminal charges against Portland High School’s baseball coach over an incident in which he was accused of assaulting an umpire in York County.

The umpire said Portland Coach Mike Rutherford made contact with him three times during a confrontation that followed a call at the plate and the ejection of a Portland player for using bad language.

Rutherford was kicked out the Western Class A semifinal playoff game on June 8 in North Berwick and was barred from the next game that Portland lost 6-0 to Sanford, the eventual state champion.

York County District Attorney Michael Cantara said the incident should be addressed by Portland school administrators or the Maine Principals’ Association, the governing body for Maine high school sporting events.

“We have found that Mr. Rutherford’s behavior was clearly inappropriate and decidedly unsportsmanlike and not an example we would want our children to see,” he said. “But it does not rise to the level of a criminal offense.”

Rutherford, who has coached at Portland since 1995, said he was relieved the assault charge was dropped on Friday.

“I thought it should have stayed on the baseball field and had no business going to the court system,” said Rutherford, 37.

Rutherford has been disciplined by the Portland School Department, which would give no further details.

John Cote, the plate umpire, said Rutherford made contact with a body bump, a hand gesture that scratched Cote’s face, and finally with Rutherford’s sunglasses.

Previously, he said he owed it to the kids to pursue the case.

“The whole idea of sportsmanship is being a good example. And he wasn’t,” Cote said. “To have this go away reinforces the idea that that type of behavior is OK in that type of arena. It’s not.”

Art Tardif, a member of the executive board of the Western Maine Baseball Umpires, hoped the case would go to court.

“I was glad John Cote pushed it like he did. I didn’t want to see Mike Rutherford lose his job over it, but I just thought on that particular day Mike went a little too far,” he said.

Taken to an extreme, youth sports can bring out the worst in adults. In a well-publicized case two years ago, a volunteer youth hockey coach in Massachusetts was beaten to death by an enraged parent.

Nothing like that has happened in Maine, but there have been other examples of unsportsmanlike conduct by parents, coaches and players.

Last February, a youth hockey tournament was marred by a bench-clearing brawl in which a coach shoved a player at the Central Maine Civic Center. Referees levied “gross misconduct” charges against five coaches.