Try www.UmpNews.com - it has a great compilation of umpire related articles and links.

Man if I was a Milb guy i think I would be a little upset, hell almost every college guys makes more than we do. I thought those guys got paid a lot more than that. I see why they want to talk contracts all the time.

It's not like the Milb guys will stand up against the system to get higher pay. They had everyone on their side but MLB during their strike and came back to work for basically nothing.

I don't feel that an amateur that works games for the CPL or similar D ball leagues can be considered scabs since these aren't pro leagues in the first place.IMO

The rates listed are not exactly accurate. MiLB umpires are not paid per game; they are paid per month.

Correct. A fellow umpire in my organization told me how much he's getting paid -- it was "per month."

That said, I still make more at my full-time job than he does umpiring. I don't know if there's any extra benefits (medical, dental, etc.) he gets for free, so that may tip the scales his direction.

The System needs to get fixxed!
 

It is broken in the sense that too many fine young men throw away, by that I mean aren't building retirement, for too much of their earning years.

I know there are many schools of thought, but I am all for local guys working local games, and just AAA or maybe even AA being the professional minor league system. That way the minor leagues get the best umpires avaiable and the guys working to get to MLB don't have to gamble away so much of their life.

How many full time jobs have opened since 2000 that weren't part of guys getting jobs back from '99, and how many guys have gotten jobs out of PBUC? Too many are losing the way it is set up now.

Try multiplying the game fee by 30 and see if that is close to the monthly fee. 2100 to 2300 per month sounds about right to me. That is 70 to 75 per game.

I seriously doubt there is any insurance included as these umps are not in pro ball yet. I can't remember if short season umps actually receive insurance.

There are benefits in working about 3.5 to 4 hrs a day excluding travel and drinking beer/carousing late into the night does not interfere with your work schedule. :D

This is a note from Shawn Francis that was posted on the AMLU website.

"Recently I have been made aware that umpire school graduates who were sent to the PBUC evaluation course in Cocoa, FL, and who did not receive placement in Minor League Baseball for the 2008 season, are being offered placement in the Coastal Plain League for the summer. In exchange for taking the assignment, the umpire school graduates are being offered a return trip to the PBUC evaluation course in 2009 without having to go through the expense and uncertainty of umpire school another time.

The collegiate umpires who normally work this college wood bat league each summer are now expressing their dissapointment with Minor League Umpires, who in their eyes are taking their games away from them.

First, please let me make myself and the AMLU clear, we share the umpires dissapointment that their games were taken away from them by the agreement the Coastal Plains League sought out with PBUC. Most importantly, the umpires in this area were some of the most supportive umpires of the AMLU during our work stoppage two years ago. This has not gone unnoticed by the AMLU and is why we are working on finding a solution to this situation.

Understand that the umpires that are working these games this summer are NOT Minor League Umpires.

They are NOT members of the AMLU.

The AMLU has NO jurisdiction over those umpires.

The AMLU and/or actual Minor League Umpires cannot prevent the Coastal Plains League Presdient from seeking umpires anywhere he sees fit.

If the Coastal Plains League was seeking to use actual Minor League Umpires, the AMLU would certainly not allow that to happen.

The AMLU is continuing to look into any possible scenerio that we can take part in that will help the collegiate umpires in getting their games back.

If anyone has any thoughts on what the AMLU can do to help out in any way please post your thoughts here so they can be considered and discussed.

Thank You.
_________________
Shaun Francis
AMLU President "

Let's see what happens next time, if they have to strike, if nobody crosses the line to work the games. Let's see how long they let coaches and players on both sides umpire the games, before they settle on an agreement, and lets see the raise they get.

Unfortunately, there will always be those who will cross the picket line so they can say they were professional umpires. It's a shame.

Correct, they are paid per month. However, I took several articles that quoted the rate per season for senior umpires at each level, AAA-$15,000, AA-$12,000, A-$10,000 and short A-$5,000 and divided by 140 which is the number of games in a MiLB season. This gave me the fee per game for each level. AAA-$107, AA-$85 and A-$71. Since all the amateurs are paid per game, I wanted to show the per game fee for MiLB. Also, only the full season (A,AA,AAA, not short-A or Rookie) receive the health benefits package.

Yes, now you know. But at the amateur level there is that major discrepancy (for which I get that economics lecture) between the D1 Basketball guys working for $1,000 per game and the D1 Baseball guys working for $200 per game. I think that discrepancy should be what it is at the High School level between basketball and baseball, and I bet the discrepancy isn't that blatant.
Even for the D1 finals, the Basketball refs are paid $1,400 for that game while the D1 Baseball umps are paid $3,900 for the whole tournament, which, if the maximum number of games are played, some umpires work 11-13 games which is only $300-$350 per game.

I believe that in addition to the contracted salary per level of ball, MiLB umpires also get a "bump" based on years of service. A four year pro working his second year in advanced A would make more than a third year pro in his first year in advance A. At least that's what I glean from conversations. Of course those conversations are accompanied by several bottles of amber colored liquid, so I could have misunderstood.

I hate to break it to you, but most of the D1 basketball ref are making more than a 1k... I know a guy who worked a D1 games at Bradley and got 2100 before travel and perdiem..atlot of guys are making about 3k+ doing games like Kansas U...