Back in the day, if you were a softball umpire and Jim Edinger was in charge of assigning umpires to games, nothing was sacred.

Not even food.

"Most of the time I was scheduled by him," recalled John Bell of Post Falls. "And most of the time, I would be sitting down getting something to eat, and I'd get a mouthful, and about that time the phone would ring - 'Somebody didn't make their assignment' - and you know who was running?"

But that was OK.

"He was the best guy you'd ever want to work under," Bell added. "He'd call you and tell you you have games tonight, and how many and on what field, and then he'd call you up after you were done - 'Did you get all your games in? Did you have any problems?'

"He was like a mother."

"JIM WAS ahead of his time," longtime Coeur d'Alene recreation director and state ASA softball commissioner Steve Anthony said of Edinger, longtime softball umpire and umpire in chief in Coeur d'Alene, longtime rec basketball official and assignor of officials in the area, and longtime area baseball umpire, who died July 16 at age 77.

"Now it's a 1-and-1 count to speed up the game. Back then it was three (strikes and) four (balls), but Jim's philosophy was, it was a hitter's game, so if it was close, you swung."

Anthony recalled the glory days of slowpitch softball in the 1970s, when several hundred fans would fill the wooden bleachers at Memorial Field in Coeur d'Alene to watch the championship game of the men's Lake City Invitational - a tournament which attracted many of the top teams in the Northwest.

Jim Edinger often umpired those title games, along with his brothers, Dick and Ron - the "Three Blind Mice," as the fans would playfully chant.

Jim Edinger, a Coeur d'Alene High grad, was inducted into the Idaho ASA hall of fame in 2005, joining Dick and Ron.

"I thought a helluva lot of the guy," longtime softball umpire Tony Luzzo of Coeur d'Alene said. "He gave me so many opportunities."

When Quad Park in Post Falls opened in 1987, Luzzo and Scott Lickfold were in charge of the umpires. Luzzo said Edinger, as umpire in chief in Coeur d'Alene at the time, was extremely helpful to the fledgling umpires.

When softball branched out to fastpitch in the early 1990s, Edinger made Luzzo his assistant in charge of fastpitch, while Edinger handled slowpitch.

When Edinger retired, Luzzo replaced him as umpire in chief, handling both fastpitch and slowpitch.

Jim Edinger didn't pretend to know it all, Luzzo said. He took the time to keep up on the rules, so he could be prepared for every situation, so when he made a call, he could make it with confidence, knowing he'd put in the time and was prepared for that scenario.

"We were working down at McEuen (Field), him and I on some slowpitch tournament," Luzzo recalled. "I'd been trained to be very strict, almost military like, and I turn around and see Jim behind the plate and he's got his hands in his pockets and he's relaxed and he's kicking back.

"That was a great image of him ... that we didn't have to be dictators."

"Jim was a nice normal guy, and that's the way he umpired, and I think that rubbed off on me," Luzzo added. "If I take anything from Jim, it's about being nice to people and getting along with everybody. I don't all the time, but I try to emulate him a little bit."

THESE DAYS, Paul Manzardo is known as one of the top high school basketball and football officials in the area.

But back in the mid-1990s, Manzardo was a young ASA softball umpire, working many games with Edinger, and he also worked some Coeur d'Alene rec department men's basketball games with him.

"He taught me a lot about slowpitch softball, and how to handle confrontations, how to deal with upset players and spectators," Manzardo said. "A lot of stuff he taught me early on, I utilize in my coaching and high school basketball refereeing and high school football officiating."

Later, Manzardo went on to coach baseball at North Idaho College and, in recent years, coaches his own kids in Little League baseball.

One thing Manzardo learned from Edinger - there's a way to handle a potential confrontation without being, well, confrontational.

"Jim would have a guy pretty upset with him, and he came out on the field and argued, and Jim kept backing up, and backing up, and next thing you know, you're out in the outfield and the guy realizes, 'What the heck am I doing?' And he just turned around and went back to the dugout."

Anthony first met Edinger in 1970, when Anthony started playing men's league softball with a team of his fellow graduating seniors from Coeur d'Alene High.

"Jim probably umpired 50 percent of our games," Anthony recalled. "Between Jim, Dick and Ron, you always had an Edinger on the field."

They later worked together when Edinger assigned softball umpires and basketball officials through the Coeur d'Alene rec department.

He was fiercely loyal to the umpires he recruited, trained, coddled and molded. When he was invited to work at national tournaments or attend national clinics, he often sent "his guys" instead, so they could get the experience.

"Jim had many opportunities to go to Oklahoma City, to go back east for nationals, but he always took care of 'his guys,'" Anthony said. "The guys that worked for him, they'd go to the end of the earth for him. And the players liked him."

Heart issues eventually hastened Jim Edinger's retirement from umpiring, which is cruelly ironic in a way.

"What I told people is, he may have had a heart condition," said Anthony, who spoke at his close friend's funeral on Tuesday. "But as far as when it came to relationships, he had a huge heart."

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.