Kendrick Wooten describes himself as a “laid back person” who is level-headed and slow to anger. A former college baseball player and current high school coach, he said he has seen enough arguments on the field to take them in stride

It’s why, he said, the situation he was involved in at Vicksburg’s Key City Park on Oct. 12 seems so bizarre.

Wooten, who was working as the home plate umpire, was involved in an on-field altercation with coach Roosevelt Brown that went viral on social media and left both men suspended by one of Mississippi’s youth baseball sanctioning organizations.

Wooten reached out to The Vicksburg Post on Saturday to offer his side of the story, a week after the incident and a day after Brown did the same.

“It was very, very weird. I’ve been umpiring for at least five years. I’m a former college baseball player myself. And I’ve never been involved in something like that as a player, as a coach, or as an umpire,” Wooten said. “I never saw anything like it before. It really shocked me. If anybody knows me, I’m a laid back person who doesn’t bother anybody.”

Brown, a former Major League Baseball player who runs The Sandlot training facility in Vicksburg, was coaching his Sandlot Legends 9U team in a game against the Aggies from Choudrant, Louisiana, on Oct. 12.

Wooten, a 28-year-old who played baseball at Mississippi Valley State and is currently an assistant coach at Greenville High School, was the home plate umpire.

The incident started in the bottom of the third inning, when Wooten called a strike on a high pitch and Brown disputed the call while standing next to the first base dugout.

Wooten explained his call, then walked toward the dugout and ejected Brown from the game. Neither Wooten nor Brown said they had had any confrontations with each other before then.

“He kept going on and on about it so I was like, ‘Fine. Coach, we’re not going to do this. I’m going to give you a warning.’ We kept going back and forth, so I called time and gave him a warning. He kept talking, so I threw him out of the game,” Wooten said.

What happened next is the key point of the story. It’s also where Wooten and Brown vehemently disagree on the chain of events.

Wooten said he walked toward Brown to make sure the latter left the field, while Brown said he felt Wooten was being overly aggressive.

“When I threw him out of the game, I walked toward him to make sure he leaves the park. I wasn’t walking toward him as if I’m trying to be aggressive toward him,” Wooten said. “As I was walking toward him, he kept talking. I said something like, ‘Coach, we’re not going to do this. I threw you out of the game. Will you please leave the field?’ As I got closer to him he cussed me out using a profanity word and saying get out of his face.”

A video posted to Facebook shows the altercation, but not the exact moment it got physical. The camera is focused on home plate, and Wooten walked just out of frame as he approached the dugout.

Brown can be heard on the video saying, “You’d better back up,” but most of their verbal altercation is drowned out by crowd noise.

Brown admitted that he pushed Wooten away. Both men agree that someone threw a punch immediately after that, but do not agree who threw it. Brown claims it was Wooten. Wooten claims it was Brown.

“As we were closer to each other, he swung at me and pushed me. When he swung he missed, but he pushed me and that’s how we ended up in an altercation or whatever. I saw in the newspaper where he said I threw a punch, but I never threw a punch. He’s the one who threw a punch and pushed me,” Wooten said. “He threw the punch and he pushed me, so now I’m trying to defend myself.”

Brown, likewise, said he was trying to defend himself.

“Anybody with some sense will regret that happening. But do I regret defending myself? No,” Brown said.

Wooten and Brown were out of the camera’s view when the confrontation got physical. By the time they came back into frame they were at the bottom of a pile of bodies. Brown said he tackled Wooten, and both men were swarmed by other coaches trying to break it up.

Only 10 seconds elapsed from when Wooten ejected Brown to the time they started fighting. It was broken up in about a minute.

“For us to be out there with 9-year-olds, I feel real bad for those kids. Those kids wanted to be out there to play baseball. I was in their same shoes about 15, 17 years ago playing USSSA ball,” Wooten said. “I felt bad because this is not me. I got out of my character in front of a bunch of 9-year-olds. In my head they’re still babies.”

Wooten added that he doesn’t consider himself the type of person to pick a fight.

“I come from a good family from my mother’s side and my father’s side. I’m not the type of person who would get aggressive with another person. In order for me to get aggressive you would have to do something to me,” he said.

Grand Slam, the sanctioning body for the tournament, has a rule that sets a line neither coaches nor umpires are allowed to cross during a dispute. It is designed to prevent incidents like this one. Brown did not leave the dugout area, but Wooten crossed the imaginary boundary when he walked toward it.

Wooten said if he could do it over again, he would not have approached Brown.

“After I threw him out I should have called the (tournament) director and said I’ve got a guy on the field that doesn’t want to leave and is talking crazy or whatever, and I need somebody to come escort him,” Wooten said. “That’s the only thing I really should have done. Other than that, I don’t really regret anything.”

In the aftermath of the incident, Grand Slam suspended both umpires working the game — Wooten and Deatrin Cooper, who is also from Greenville — as well as Brown and his brother Michael from its tournaments. Grand Slam sanctions a number of youth baseball tournaments in Mississippi.

Michael Brown was also coaching the Sandlot Legends and came to his brother’s aid. He can be seen on the video throwing at least one punch in the pile-up. Wooten said he was on the bottom of the pile and was not punched.

“(Michael) actually hit me,” Roosevelt Brown said.

Cooper, who was working as the field umpire, came to Wooten’s aid in the scrum and was among those trying to break it up. He said Grand Slam simply suspended everyone involved and he didn’t have any ill will over it.

“I can deal with the suspension because we came down together. But the altercation didn’t have anything to do with me,” Cooper said. “Kendrick did the right thing. He was protecting himself.”

Mike Narmour, the Mississippi state director for Grand Slam, said all of the suspensions will last until the organization completes its investigation. Because of possible legal action by everyone involved, he said he wasn’t sure when that would be.

Brown and Wooten both indicated they had some intent of filing charges against the other. On Friday afternoon, however, Vicksburg Police Department Deputy Chief Mike Bryant said that no active warrants had been issued in the case.

“I’ve moved on from the situation. I’ve got a real short-term memory. I don’t let anything like this get under my skin,” Wooten said. “I talked to my dad a couple of days ago and he said move on from it, so I’ve moved on from it. I’ve been living the same life since it happened.”

The Sandlot Legends 9U team concluded its season with last weekend’s tournament in Vicksburg. Its 11U team was playing at an event in Ridgeland this weekend, without the Brown brothers coaching them, and then will not play again until the spring season begins in February.

Although they had their obvious differences, Brown and Wooten also agreed they they’d like to resolve the situation with Grand Slam and try to get past it. Wooten said he’ll simply try to maintain his distance from Brown and his teams if they cross paths on the statewide travel ball circuit.

“If his team is in a tournament and I’ve got to call that age, I’m just not going to call his games,” Wooten said. “I’ll avoid me and him. That’s a solution for me.”