Rest in Peace

Former umpire Eric Gregg died last week. We offer our sincerest condolences and sympathy to his friends and loved ones. But I can't stand silently as some revisionist history infiltrates the media.

Like the notice in Baseball Weekly this week. Paul White notes:

[Gregg] worked an All-Star Game and seven post-season series, including the 1989 World Series, during a National League career from 1975-99, yet he was remembered most for his wide strike zone in Game Five of the 1997 NL Championship Series between the Marlins and the Braves.

Of course he will be remembered for that extra-wide zone -- because it was ridiculously wide! And yet, it was merely one example of a career full of ridiculously bad umpiring.

I have no doubt that Gregg was a great guy who loved umpiring. But let's not posthumously place him on par with Doug Harvey or Harry Wendelstadt.

At best, he was the poster child for all that was wrong with umpiring -- out of shape, tenured umps who had no problem with chasing after players and managers to continue arguments. As such, he was one of the catalysts for umpiring reform in the late 1990's that culminated in disastrous "symbolic" resignations and the end of the umpire's union. If we don't want to remember his horrid 1997 NLCS performance, let's remember him as one of the last of his kind.