Edition: U.S. / Global

BASEBALL; Fight Erupts Over Visits With Umpires

Published: July 26, 2002

The dispute between the baseball commissioner's office and the umpires' union flared on yet another front yesterday.

Already mired in a confrontation over the computerized system that monitors umpires' calls of balls and strikes, the two sides engaged each other on the propriety of pre-game visits to the umpires' locker rooms.

The monitoring conflict has produced one lawsuit and two grievances, and in a letter to Rob Manfred, baseball's chief labor lawyer, Larry Gibson, the lawyer for the World Umpires Association, threatened legal action over Manfred's treatment of him.

In the letter, Gibson recalled that in a telephone conversation Wednesday night, Manfred threatened to have Gibson removed from ballparks and to revoke his credential that gives him access to baseball parks. Gibson told Manfred that his threats violated the labor agreement between the umpires and Major League Baseball.

Gibson wrote that unless Manfred withdrew the threats, or directives, as he termed them, the union will ''initiate appropriate legal action to remedy these retaliatory steps, to protect the W.U.A.'s right to act through its chosen representatives and to prevent your threatened physical abuse.''

Manfred, in response to the letter, said in an interview that Gibson violated the rules under which credentials are given two nights in a row. The first night, Manfred said, Gibson had his teenage nephew with him in the umpires' locker room.

Referring to his guest, Gibson, in his letter, did not identify him as his nephew but said he had assisted him ''with an umpire-related matter.''

On the second night, Manfred said, Gibson refused to leave 30 minutes before the start of the game. ''All visitors must vacate the dressing room by 30 minutes before the game,'' Manfred said, reading from the umpires' manual, then added, ''He doesn't know what the rules are and doesn't think they apply to him.''

Gibson said in his letter that the labor contract takes precedence over the manual in dealing with visits by the umpires' counsel. Gibson reminded Manfred that it was the second time Manfred had threatened to have him removed from ballparks. The first time, he said, involved Gibson's desire to see the computer system in operation.

The core of the dispute between the umpires and the commissioner's office is over the QuesTec Umpire Information System. The umpires say they do not trust the system's accuracy and do not want the commissioner's office grading the umpires with data derived from the system.