[Patrick Szalapski]

This from AP. P-Sz
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NEW YORK -- Baseball umpires dropped their grievance Wednesday when the commissioner's office said it wouldn't use pitch counts to evaluate an umpire's performance.


"As far as we're concerned the matter is now closed and umpires can get back out of the press, where they prefer to be," umpires' union lawyer Larry Gibson said.


The grievance was filed last Saturday, with the umpires saying the commissioner's office violated their new labor contract by keeping track of the average number of pitches in games worked behind the plate by each umpire and ranking each umpire in that category.


The grievance demanded that baseball "abandon pitch counts as a measure of umpire performance."


A letter from Rob Manfred, baseball's executive vice president for labor relations, to the union said the commissioner's office would do just that. The umpires followed by dropping their grievance.


"It was settled with us getting exactly 100 percent of what we requested," Gibson said.

Umpires were happy with the development.


"I think I can speak for a lot of umpires and say I'm relieved," umpire Tim Tschida said from Los Angeles. "I don't know if pitch count is really a very accurate tool for an umpire to gauge his performance."


Baseball had said high pitch counts can be an indication umpires aren't applying the strike zone as defined in the rule book, but they are not a determining factor.


"I would characterize this as a misinterpretation on their part, which led to the filing of the grievance in absence of private dialogue," said Sandy Alderson, the executive vice president of baseball operations in the commissioner's office.


"I think it is important that it is behind us and we go forward," he said.


Baseball and its umpires have been at odds for more than two decades. This confrontation only increased the animosity between the two sides.


But Alderson said he doesn't expect this dispute to linger.


"This incident is over as far as I'm concerned," Alderson said. "I am not interested in prolonging or furthering it with any analysis."


Since spring training, Alderson and commissioner Bud Selig have pushed for umpires to enforce the strike zone as the rule book defines it, which results in more high strikes.


The rule-book definition of the strike zone hadn't been enforced in years, with umpires pulling the strike zone lower and making it wider through the 1980s and 1990s. Baseball wanted that changed, and emphasized that to umpires during the offseason.


This year, with more high strikes being called, many offensive statistics have decreased 5-10 percent.


"Major league umpires will continue to call balls and strikes with professionalism and absolute neutrality to each pitch," Gibson wrote in a letter to baseball officials notifying them that the grievance was dropped.