The long-delayed meeting between umpires, Major League Baseball and ... well, a bunch of irrelevant ex-players, finally happened yesterday. ESPN.com’s Amy K. Nelson:
Players Frustrated By Umpires, But What’s To Be Done?
Nine umpires, as well as former players such as Bobby Bonilla, Tony Clark and Rick Helling were at the meeting. Joe Torre, Frank Robinson and Manfred were part of the contingent representing the commissioner's office.
--snip--
Last season, multiple players told ESPN.com's Amy K. Nelson that tensions had increased with umpires. They also are concerned about a lack of transparency when umpires are evaluated.
"We never know why or when they are fined, or reprimanded or held accountable," Oakland Athletics reliever and player union representative Brad Ziegler told ESPN.com last October. "Anytime a player is punished, suspended or sent down to the minors, the public knows about it. It would be a lot easier to communicate with umpires if everyone was held to similar standards. Our statistics as players are a lot more quantifiable than the umpires'."
Actually, the umpires’ statistics are highly quantifiable, and I’m pretty sure that MLB is highly quantifying them. I know for a fact the balls and strikes are closely tracked, and it wouldn’t surprise me if everything else is, too.
But giving the players access to that information is probably a lousy idea. We already know that players get especially frustrated with umpires they think aren’t real good at their job ... What would the players do if they knew which umpires were among the worst? And frankly, they could know quite a lot if someone bothered to compile all the PITCHf/x data and run comprehensive umpire reports.
MLB must forever perform a delicate balancing act between the players and the umpires. This is made more difficult by the umpires’ union, and will be more difficult still when it’s obvious which major-league umpires shouldn’t be. The union’s not going away, but the data’s coming soon to an iPad screen near you. And my guess is that the results won’t be pretty.
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