new york times
july 22, 2002
Umpires Under Scrutiny
If Bud Selig is the most disillusioned baseball person of the week, John Hirschbeck might be the second-most disillusioned.
When Hirschbeck, a veteran umpire, led the fight against Richie Phillips's union leadership three years ago, he was embraced by major league officials. Delighted to be rid of Phillips, they welcomed Hirschbeck, the president of the new union, to the negotiating table. With much greater ease than when Phillips was there, they worked out a new labor agreement.
Now Hirschbeck appears to have become a target of these same officials, who view him as trying to undermine their efforts to get the umpires to call the strike zone as they want it called. Hirschbeck was omitted him from the World Series umpiring crew last October.
Then, earlier this season, he received a warning letter from Ralph Nelson, vice president for umpiring, referring to a game Hirschbeck worked, criticizing his strike zone and the way he was conducting his umpiring crew. The letter has become a source of controversy and a lawsuit between the union and the commissioner's office.
"John is the one who said these are good people," one veteran umpire said last week.
If Hirschbeck were to offer his view of them now, he would most likely have a different opinion. But Hirschbeck is not speaking publicly. For now, at least, he is letting the union's lawyers talk about the computerized system baseball is using to monitor the umpires' pitch calls.
The lawyers filed a grievance Friday in an attempt to force officials to answer questions and supply information about the QuesTec Umpire Information System. Last month, one of the lawyers, Larry Gibson, tried to go directly to QuesTec but was rebuffed by the company and cautioned by baseball not to do it again.
In a letter to Sandy Alderson, head of baseball operations in the commissioner's office, Gibson wrote, "By the reaction of the commissioner's office, one would think that I had asked to see the commissioner's personal bank records."
