Quote:
Originally posted by UMP25
You're missing the point. Their salaries weren't adjusted to accommodate this loss of a perk. You also don't understand what it takes to umpire at that level, with all the tips and comps you give to certain individuals who help to make your life on the road that much easier. With more of these disappearing, it makes their road life that much more irritating. The umpire who doesn't see his wife and kids but a couple times a season during his 1-week break is not going to be happy having to pay for tickets for the family when until now they've been provided complimentarily.
No one here is going to have sympathy for MLB umps, who make good money and have good benefits, but we also cannot claim to fully understand just how their jobs are off the field until we've walked in their shoes.
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1. This was a negotiated contract approved by the umpire's union. All provisions of a labor agreement are result of give and take, compromise, if you will. Obviously the union felt the benefits of the new agreement outweighed the loss an old traditional freebie.
2. You are making terrible, nay, fatal, assumptions about Tee's familiarity with MLB umpiring and umpires. Many of us know or are acquainted with one or two MLB umps. Tee is on a personal friendship basis and has worked with several, and I mean SEVERAL, MLB umpires. His contacts right up to and including the MLB office have proven impeccable in the past. If anyone on this board "understands" and communicates with professional umpires about what "it takes to umpire at that level", it is Tee.
[Edited by GarthB on Mar 28th, 2005 at 01:26 PM]