Okay, so, I was digging into this whole thing about Angel Hernandez, the baseball umpire, and why he never seemed to get the boot, despite, you know, not being the best at his job. It’s a bit of a head-scratcher, right?
So, I started by looking up some basic info on what’s the deal with firing umpires. Turns out, it’s not so simple. The umpires have a union, and from what I gathered, these unions are pretty strong. They’re there to protect their members, which is understandable, but it also means that getting rid of an umpire just because they’re not great at calling balls and strikes is nearly impossible.
Then, I stumbled upon this statement from Hernandez himself. Apparently, he decided to retire to spend more time with his family. He talked about how things have changed in baseball, mentioning the promotion of minorities and all that. That got me thinking, maybe there’s more to this story.
Digging Deeper
- I checked out some rules about how umpires can deal with unruly fans. In Little League, umpires can’t throw out spectators, but they can stop the game until the person leaves. I guess the rules are different in the majors, but it’s interesting to see how things work at different levels.
- Next, I found out about a lawsuit Hernandez filed against MLB back in 2017. He claimed racial discrimination was why he wasn’t picked for big games or promoted to crew chief. There was also some bad blood between him and Joe Torre, a big shot in MLB. This really complicated things. If MLB tried to fire him while he’s suing them, that would have been a whole other can of worms.
I also looked at what people were saying online. A lot of folks were talking about how the union makes it super hard to fire someone like Hernandez, especially since he’s been around for so long. It seems like you’d need some serious misconduct, not just bad calls.
Then, I saw this news about Hernandez retiring, and some media outlets called him the “most disliked” umpire. That’s pretty harsh, but it shows how strong the feelings were about him.
Finally, I tried to find out if MLB had any real grounds to fire or demote Hernandez. I searched for anything on the umpires’ union, the MLB Umpires Association, to see what their deal was. From what I understood, thanks to their labor agreement with MLB, it’s almost impossible to discipline umpires with as much experience as Hernandez had.
So, after all this digging, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a mix of things. The union’s protection, the lawsuit, his long career, and maybe even some behind-the-scenes stuff I don’t know about, all played a part in why Angel Hernandez was, for better or worse, a fixture in baseball for so long.
Honestly, I think it’s good to know more about Angel Hernandez. I think I have a new view on this now.
