PENDLETON – If asked to describe a baseball umpire, most people probably would describe a middle-aged – and probably overweight – man. Very few, if any, would describe a 15-year-old girl.

But Pendleton High School junior Kimberly Engblom may change that fact before long.

She’s sure to become a familiar face to the hundreds in attendance at the youth All-star baseball and softball tournaments taking place this week and next in Pendleton, Pilot Rock, Milton-Freewater and John Day where she will be working on honing her craft, and simply having a good time doing it.

“These next couple weeks will be pretty tough,” she said, “but after that it won’t be too bad.”

Lee Engblom can’t remember exactly how his daughter first got started as an umpire in youth baseball and softball, just that it’s something she’d shown an interest in for a while.

Kimberly, who played outfield for Pendleton’s junior varsity softball squad in an injury-shortened year this past season, remembers it quite clearly, however.

“They kind of forced me into a game,” she said of her first experience as a umpire two years ago. “They were like, ‘You get to do this game.’ I’ve loved it ever since. I love being out on the field, just being involved in the game in a different perspective.”

Since that first experience, Engblom has gone on to show she is more than capable of holding her own in a male-dominated field and has her sights set on bigger things to come.

“My main goal in umpiring right now is to go back and umpire the girls softball world series in Beaverton because I played there when I was 12,” she said.

“We kind of made a pact, so to speak, after she played in the softball world series,” said Lee Engblom, who has been an umpire for about six years. “We said we both wanted to go back and umpire in it.”

She recently returned from the weeklong Little League Western Regional Junior Umpire School in San Bernardino, Calif. The school costs around $500, but Engblom was one of 10 students that earned a scholarship based on her application. The district paid for her airfare.

She didn’t even get back in town until around 2:30 a.m. on Saturday (the first day of tournament action in Pendleton) and went to work the plate in games later that day.

“I was definitely tired,” she said, “and I was sick, I think from the lack of sleep and everything, but it was fun.”

She was one of just four female students out of 67 at the umpire school, but said she had no problem earning the respect of her peers.

“I got a lot of compliments when I was down there and they told me I was doing really well,” she said. “It made me feel good that I was standing out doing well above most of the guys. If they did remark (on her gender), it was just messing around.”

Engblom has never lacked the confidence to take care of herself on the diamond, but she knows that should she ever need it, she has a strong support group of local umpires to fall back on.

“We have a joke that when she eventually gets married, we’ve planned it for her,” said Mike Lieuallen Sr., who has umpired games with her for two years and has been an umpire for 12. “It will be on the baseball field and she’s going to come from center field and we’ll, each one of us (umpires), give her away. She’s just like everybody’s daughter. Everybody takes her under their wing.”

Engblom isn’t certain how far she’ll pursue being an umpire, but already is exploring options that could eventually turn a hobby into a career.

“There’s a five-week certification school in Florida, which if you get certified through there, that’s how you get to be a Minor League umpire and then you just work up from there,” she said. “You can go as a teenager but you have to have a parent there with you and I don’t really want to go yet. I want to get more years in doing this because the way (camp instructors) described it, it would be very tough.”