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Originally Posted by kylejt
I'd bet you'd like them if they came with an annual check.
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ML umpires are not as fortunate as some of the players as far as getting endorsement deals. They do, however, get a ton of stuff for free.
In addition to the uniform upgrades provided by MLB, they receive shoes, under garments, sunglasses, equipment and other goodies for free from the manufacturers.
Some get more stuff than they can't use and some get stuff they don't like. In both cases, they often give some of it away to MiLB umpires they run into during spring training.
As far as the Reebok shoes...several ML and MiLB umpires will be wearing the base shoes and a couple will be wearing the plate shoes, which as JP has indicated, are basically the base shoes with a metatarsal plate. The other new shoe making the rounds this season is the UnderArmor base shoe. They look good in the ads, but not so much up close.