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BASEBALL QUOTES
Quotes by and about baseball umpires
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"An umpire doesn't eject a manager or player, they eject themselves. They know exactly what they can say and who they can say it to. So when somebody is thrown out, he has either completely lost control, or he intended to be run."
- Eric Gregg
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"Ideally, the umpire should combine the integrity of a Supreme Court judge, the physical agility of an acrobat, the endurance of Job and the imperturbability of Buddha."
- Time Magazine
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Former umpire Ron Luciano once said,
"Umpiring is best described as the profession of standing between two seven-year-olds with one ice-cream cone."
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"They expect an umpire to be perfect on Opening Day and to improve as the season goes on."
- American League Umpire Nestor Chylak
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"Why is it they boo me when I call a foul ball correctly and they applaud the starting pitcher when he gets taken out of the ballgame?"
- American League Umpire Jerry Neudecker
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"Umpires have the toughest job in ball. Ever since the birth of the boos, they have suffered more abuse than a washroom wall."
- Ernie Harwell in Tuned to Baseball (1985)
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"The umpire must be quick witted. He may not, like the wise old owl of the bench, look over his gold-rimmed eyeglasses, inform the assembled multitude that he will 'take the matter under advisement,' and then adjourn the court for a week or two to satisfy himself how he ought to decide. No, indeed. He must be johnny-on-the-spot with a decision hot off the griddle and he must stick to it, right or wrong - or be lost."
- A.G. Spalding in America's National Game (1911)
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"Let's face it. Umpiring is not an easy or happy way to make a living. In the abuse they suffer, and the pay they get for it, you see an imbalance that can only be explained by their need to stay close to a game they can't resist."
- Bob Uecker in Catcher in the Wry (1982)
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"Wanting to be an umpire is tantamount to wanting to be President of the United States. I can admire their fierce sense of responsibility, whether they are right or wrong, but sometimes it comes down to being a thankless job; however, the job must be done."
- Art Rust in Recollections of a Baseball Junkie (1985)
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"Umpire's heaven is a place where he works third base every game. Home is where the heartache is."
- American League Umpire Ron Luciano
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"The most cowardly thing in the world is blaming mistakes upon the umpires. Too many managers strut around on the field trying to manage the umpires instead of their teams."
-Bill Klem
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"Your job is to umpire for the ball and not the player."
- Bill Klem
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"An angry player can't argue with the back of an umpire who is walking away."
- Bill Klem
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"It is easy to throw someone out of the game. It's hard to keep someone in the game"
- MLB Umpire Larry Young
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"His eliteness is fixin' to get the $*** kicked out of him!"
- Umpire Charlie Thomas of Dallas, Texas, on a particularly pompous and overbearing umpire
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"I had bad days on the field. But I didn't take them home with me. I left them in a bar along the way home."
- Bob Lemon
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“I made a game effort to argue but two things were against me: the umpires and the rules.”
- Leo Durocher
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"Young man, if that bat comes down.... you're out of the game."
- Bill Klem to Jake Powell, who had just thrown his bat in the air
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"Ed, you're the second-best umpire in the league. The other 23 are tied for first."
- Carl Yastrzemski - To umpire Ed Runge, who credited Yaz with the best barb ever handed to an ump by a player
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"Umpiring ball has taught me that if I'm not willing to give 120 percent, somebody else will."
- Tom Tuttle
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"Somethin' like four thousand bottles have been thrown at me in my day but only about twenty ever hit me. That does not speak very well for the accuracy of the fans' throwing."
- Harry "Steamboat" Johnson
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"When I am right, no one remembers. When I am wrong, no one forgets,"
- Doug Harvey
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"When you go through a game, make it every pitch like it was the last pitch that you'll ever call - you'll have a good game !"
- Edwin D. Merrill
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"People come to see the players. Nobody ever bought a ticket to see a manager."
- Larry Goetz, umpire, on why managers should be thrown out before players
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"His strike zone has the consistency of a pair of dice."
- Michael Murray
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