2024 Contemporary Baseball Era Committee Candidates: Ed Montague and Joe West

This submit is a part of a collection protecting the 2024 Up to date Baseball Period Committee Managers/Executives/Umpires poll, protecting candidates in these classes who made their biggest impression from 1980 to the current. For an introduction to the poll, see here. The eight candidates can be voted upon on the Winter Conferences in Nashville on December 3, and anybody receiving at the very least 75% of the vote from the 16 committee members can be inducted in Cooperstown on July 21, 2024 together with any candidates elected by the BBWAA.

What makes a Corridor of Fame umpire? It’s a very pertinent query on condition that each Joe West and Ed Montague are on this 12 months’s Up to date Baseball Period Committee poll alongside 4 managers and two executives, all of whom have careers which can be extra simply evaluated by wins, losses, pennants, championships, and a extra subjective understanding of the context wherein they occurred. Except for their service time and logs of postseason collection and different notable occasions, umpires don’t go away behind a lot information — or they didn’t, at the very least till the pitch-tracking period arrived. “A great umpire is the umpire you don’t even discover,” stated Ban Johnson, the primary president of the American League. “He’s there all afternoon, and when the sport is over, you don’t even keep in mind his title.”

Between the shortage of knowledge and a committee format that has pitted umpires towards managers, executives, and long-retired gamers, solely 10 males in blue have been elected to the Corridor, together with simply two on this millennium: Doug Harvey and Hank O’Day. Harvey, whose profession spanned from 1962 to ’92, was acknowledged by SABR in 1999 because the second-best umpire in historical past behind solely Invoice Klem; he was elected by way of a 2010 Veterans Committee poll particularly dedicated to executives and umpires. O’Day, a former main league pitcher (1884–90) whose umpiring profession spanned from 1894 to 1927 however was interrupted by temporary stints as a supervisor, was elected by way of the 2013 Pre-Integration Period Committee poll.

No umpire has even been a candidate since regardless of a number of of the longest-lasting males in blue calling it quits, although West, the all-time chief in video games umpired, has landed on the poll at his first alternative since his 2021 retirement. That Gerry Davis, who retired in 2021 as properly and ranks fourth in video games (4,849), isn’t on the poll however West and Montague (who ranks thirteenth) are at the very least signifies longevity isn’t the lone driver of induction. Right here’s a fast have a look at the leaderboard for regular-season video games labored:

Ed Montague

Edward Michael Montague was born November 3, 1948 in San Francisco. His father, Edward Francis Montague (b. 1905), was an infielder who performed professionally from 1923 to ’33, with 220 video games within the majors for Cleveland unfold out from ’28 to ’32. After his taking part in days, the elder Montague spent 40 years (1942–82) as a scout for the Giants and is credited as the person who signed Willie Mays, then of the Birmingham Black Barons, in 1950. Contrary to myth, Montague didn’t uncover Mays; he was the nearer in a course of that started when Corridor of Famer Carl Hubbell, then the Giants’ farm director, noticed Mays play play on the Polo Grounds in 1949.

Because of his father, the youthful Montague bought to go to the Giants’ clubhouses at Seals Stadium and Candlestick Park, the place he’d seize leftover bats and caps from Mays and Felipe Alou to be used in his sandlot video games; when he was 9 years outdated, Mays gave him a glove. Montague attended San Francisco Metropolis School, served within the Navy, labored as a vendor at each Candlestick Park and the Oakland Coliseum, and performed semipro ball. His goals of taking part in professionally have been dashed when his father gave him the onerous fact about his means. “He stated I’d get to A ball and that’s it,” he recalled in 2011. The 22-year-old Montague as a substitute took the recommendation of his mom, who had seen an advert in The Sporting Information for Barney Deary’s Umpire Improvement Program in Florida. “It was like $600 to go for 5 weeks. I figured I’d simply go right down to a pleasant trip,” he told the Corridor of Fame’s Bill Francis in 2021.

That was in 1971; in a category of 120 umpires, simply 5 would make the majors. Montague started his profession within the California League in 1972, and after incomes a suggestion from future Corridor of Famer Jocko Conlan for his work within the Arizona Educational League that fall, he spent the subsequent three seasons within the Pacific Coast League, with two video games within the majors in October 1974. Alongside the best way, working a serious league spring coaching sport with Bruce Froemming made a constructive impression. Froemming really helpful him to Barlick, by then the NL’s supervisor of umpires.

Montague grew to become a full-time main league umpire in 1976; at 27 years outdated, he earned the nickname “Phenom” for his comparatively fast rise to the majors. He was considered as having a hard-line method and being prolific with ejections; in 1977 alone, he tossed 10 gamers and managers, although he had simply 5 over the subsequent three seasons and averaged solely about two per 12 months for his profession. Over time, nonetheless, he gained a reputation for his calm demeanor and his constant strike zone. In 1996, after the sudden, surprising loss of life of John McSherry on Opening Day in Cincinnati, Montague was promoted to crew chief.

Montague umpired in six World Sequence (1986, ’91, ’97, 2000, ’04, and ’07) and was the crew chief within the final 4 of these, tying him for second all-time with Invoice Summers behind solely Klem’s 9. Klem’s 18 World Sequence and 103 World Sequence video games are each information, with Montague tied for ninth within the former class and simply exterior the highest 10 within the latter. He labored seven LCS (NL 1979, ’87, ’92, ’96, ’99, AL 2001, and ’02) and 7 Division Sequence as properly (NL 1981, ’95, 2000, ’05, ’07, AL 2003, and ’04), to not point out the 2007 Sport 163 tiebreaker between the Rockies and Padres to find out the Wild Card qualifier. He additionally labored 4 All-Star Video games (1982, ’90 ’98, and 2004), the final three of them behind the plate.

Alongside the best way, Montague was available for some memorable moments. He was the house plate umpire when Lou Brock collected his 3,000th hit on August 13, 1979, and the primary base umpire when Pete Rose recorded his 4,192nd hit to surpass Ty Cobb for the all-time lead on September 11, 1985. That Montague’s father had performed towards Cobb (and even been spiked by him as soon as to the purpose of needing to go away a sport) made the second significantly poignant for the umpire. Years later, Montague requested Rose to autograph a baseball, then confirmed him that the opposite aspect of the ball had been signed by Cobb, a relic from the senior Montague.

Talking of record-breakers, Montague labored the October 2001 video games wherein Barry Bonds hit homers 71, 72, and 73 to set a brand new single-season commonplace. He was additionally the second base umpire when Bonds hit his 715th residence run on Could 28, 2006 to go Babe Ruth and transfer into second place on the all-time checklist.

Montague was the correct discipline umpire for Sport 6 of the 1986 World Sequence, when Mookie Wilson‘s groundball snuck by Bill Buckner’s legs, permitting Ray Knight to attain the profitable run.

“Sadly, the ball was hit right down to Billy. I feel it might’ve been an in depth play anyway,” said Montague in 2019, on the event of Buckner’s passing. “I feel it might’ve been a race to the bag with Mookie Wilson, so I feel Billy was making an attempt to peek and cheat a bit of bit so he might recover from there.”

Because the Mets celebrated, Montague retrieved the ball and marked it with a tiny X close to the seam. He quickly gave it to Mets touring secretary Arthur Richman, who later sold it at public sale to actor Charlie Sheen.

Montague’s different World Sequence have been hardly much less memorable. He was the house plate umpire in Sport 6 of the 1991 World Sequence, when the Twins’ Kirby Puckett hit a walk-off homer to drive Sport 7 towards the Cardinals. He was at residence for Sport 7 of the 1997 World Sequence, when the Marlins’ Edgar Renteria drove in Craig Counsell with the profitable run within the eleventh inning. “It’s an out-of-body expertise while you’re working these video games,” he told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2003. He umpired the 2000 Subway Sequence between the Yankees and Mets and Boston’s World Sequence wins over the Cardinals in ’04 and the Rockies in ’07.

Accidents restricted Montague to simply 23 video games in 2009. He retired after the season, at which level his 4,369 video games ranked eighth. In 2011, he appeared within the film adaptation of Michael Lewis’ Moneyball. That very same 12 months, he grew to become an umpire supervisor for Main League Baseball. He’s presently an umpire observer for the Bay Space, submitting reviews frequently from Oracle Park.

For the entire massive occasions wherein Montague was concerned, he typically shunned the highlight. “I’d simply as quickly be nameless perpetually,” he stated in 2003, echoing Johnson from roughly a century earlier. “I’m a part of the sport, however I’m not.”

Joe West

The place Montague was content material to mix into the surroundings, West so usually wound up because the focus, although not all the time in the most effective of how. From his bit half in The Bare Gun in 1988 (skip to 2:08 within the scene under for those who’re in a rush) to his secondary profession as a rustic music singer-songwriter — one which gave him the nickname “Cowboy Joe” and resulted in two albums, enabling him to rub shoulders with the likes of Merle Haggard and Mickey Gilley and seem on the Grand Ole Opry — he attained a degree of superstar not like any of his cohorts. Mix all that along with his record-setting longevity and he’s simply probably the most well-known umpire of his time… and probably the most notorious as properly, because of the quite a few controversies wherein he grew to become embroiled.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn4LQyKUQMk

West considered himself as a guardian of the sport. A July 24, 2017 profile by Sports activities Illustrated’s Michael Rosenberg bore the title, “The Final Cowboy: Joe West Is On A Quest To Protect The Sanctity Of Umpiring.” A 2020 feature by ESPN’s Tim Kurkjian was titled, “MLB umpire Joe West has by no means missed a name. Simply ask him.” From the latter:

“I say this to each younger umpire: As an umpire, you will have three duties. First is to the sport of baseball. Second is to your career. Third, make a name that’s morally trustworthy. If you happen to do every part in that order, nothing you do can be improper.”

…”I can’t put you in jail. However I can kick you out of the sport. And that’s a part of the material of baseball. You could have sure guidelines and laws that it’s a must to go by. However to be vindictive, since you didn’t like what any individual did, that’s being dishonest to the sport.”

West was well-known for mandating that gamers greet him earlier than their first plate look, a pleasing little bit of decorum amid the warmth of competitors, and was extensively considered as among the best umpires when it got here to information of the principles. However whereas he claimed to have a thick pores and skin, he sued Paul LoDuca for defamation in 2019 over the variety of occasions the umpire ejected the previous catcher (for which he was awarded $500,000 in damages in 2021), and earlier this 12 months was banned from enhancing his personal Wikipedia web page, the place he took issue with the best way sure occasions in his profession have been characterised (he even appeared on an Successfully Wild podcast).

Joseph Henry West was born on born October 31, 1952 in Asheville, North Carolina however grew up 65 miles south in Greenville. At J.H. Rose Excessive College, he performed baseball, soccer and basketball; he was a catcher on the diamond however pursued soccer by way of a scholarship after he graduated. After spending a 12 months taking part in security at East Carolina College, he transferred to Elon School, the place he quarterbacked the varsity to 3 straight Carolinas Convention championships from 1971 to ’73, setting quite a few college passing information alongside the best way and main his staff all the best way to the NAIA Division I title sport in his senior 12 months.

West’s duties with spring soccer ended his baseball taking part in profession, however whereas umpiring native video games as a school scholar, he met Carolina League umpire supervisor Malcolm Sykes, who really helpful that he attend an umpire coaching college. He did so in 1974, then started his skilled profession that 12 months within the Western Carolinas League. He climbed shortly, passing by the Carolina League, the Southern League, and the American Affiliation. He debuted within the majors on September 14, 1976, a couple of month and a half shy of his twenty fourth birthday; he labored eight video games that month, then 45 video games as a fill-in umpire the next season. In 1978, the 25-year-old West grew to become a full-time Nationwide League umpire.

He shortly bought his style of historical past. On June 30 of that season, he was the house plate umpire when Willie McCovey hit his five hundredth residence run. He was additionally working the plate on July 25, when Rose collected successful in his thirty eighth consecutive sport, breaking the fashionable NL document set by Tommy Holmes (he would in the end tie Willie Keeler‘s all-time NL document of 44 video games, set in 1897). West was the primary base umpire for Nolan Ryan’s record-breaking fifth no-hitter, for the Astros towards the Dodgers on September 26, 1981. He was additionally the primary base umpire when Orel Hershiser set the document for consecutive scoreless innings on September 28, 1988 (some sources say he was behind the plate, however not Retrosheet or Baseball Reference).

In response to Retrosheet, West was behind the plate for just one no-hitter, that of Clay Buchholz for the Pink Sox on September 1, 2007, within the 23-year-old righty’s second main league sport. He was a part of the crew for others, together with these of Kent Mercker (April 8, 1994, at second base) and Félix Hernández (an ideal sport on August 15, 2012, at first base).

A pair weeks after Ryan’s no-hitter, West grew to become the youngest NL umpire to work a Nationwide League Championship Sequence at age 28, the primary of 10 LCS that he labored (NL 1986, ’88, ’93, ’96, AL 2003, ’04, ’13, ’14, and ’18). In Sport 3 of that collection, he was the house plate umpire whom Mets supervisor Davey Johnson alerted to verify the glove of Dodgers reliever Jay Howell for a international substance. The umpires discovered pine tar, although it was crew chief Harry Wendelstedt who ejected Howell, who was suspended for 2 video games.

West was the left discipline umpire when Aaron Boone hit his pennant-winning homer off Tim Wakefield for the Yankees in Sport 7 of the 2003 ALCS and behind residence plate for Sport 6 of the next 12 months’s ALCS, which featured Curt Schilling‘s bloody sock and Alex Rodriguez‘s slap of Bronson Arroyo’s glove. Maybe his most impactful second within the postseason got here in 2018, whereas working because the crew chief and proper discipline umpire for Sport 4 of the ALCS between the Astros — then the defending champions — and Pink Sox. With Houston trailing 2–0 within the backside of the primary inning, Jose Altuve hit an obvious game-tying homer, however West dominated {that a} fan had interfered with Mookie Betts on the fence, hitting the correct fielder’s glove as he tried to catch the ball on the wall. Altuve was known as out, replay upheld the decision, and the Astros went on to lose each the sport and the collection.

West labored six World Sequence (1992, ’97, 2005, ’09, ’12, and ’16). On October 20, 1992, he was the house plate umpire for the primary World Sequence sport performed exterior the US, at Toronto’s Skydome. He additionally labored eight Division Sequence (NL 1995, 2011, ’12, AL 2002, ’05, ’08, ’09, ’16). His whole of 132 postseason video games is tied with Ted Barrett for second behind Gerry Davis’ 151; as with gamers and managers, a profession within the Wild Card period is essential to excessive placement on such counts.

Together with the highlights got here the controversies, seemingly greater than another umpire. In 1983, Braves supervisor Joe Torre adopted West to the walkway of the umpires’ dressing room to dispute a superb assessed towards Bob Watson for protesting a game-ending known as strike. West shoved Torre and was suspended for 3 days and fined $500 by NL president Charles Feeney. It was believed to be the primary in-season suspension of an umpire in main league historical past (lo and behold, Torre can be one of many Corridor of Famers sitting on the 16-member committee to think about West’s case and people of the opposite seven candidates this Sunday).

It wasn’t West’s final suspension. On September 14, 2014, he ejected the Nationals’ Jonathan Papelbon for grabbing his crotch in response to boos after blowing a three-run lead. Papelbon bought in West’s face, and the umpire responded by grabbing him by the jersey and pushing him away. MLB suspended Papelbon for seven video games and West for one for initiating contact.

West was suspended but once more in 2017, when he was given a three-game ban for inappropriate feedback about Adrián Beltré. In response to a query from USA As we speak’s Bob Nightengale for a piece commemorating West’s 5,000th sport, the umpire known as Beltré the most important complainer within the majors. “I advised him, ‘You might be an excellent ballplayer, however you’re the worst umpire within the league. You stink,” he stated to Nightengale. Although West later clarified that he and Beltré have been on pleasant phrases, MLB suspended him in response to an “look of lack of impartiality,” in line with a letter the league despatched to the World Umpires Affiliation, the umps’ union.

In 1990, West and Richie Phillips, the top of the WUA’s predecessor, the Main League Umpires Affiliation, clashed with Nationwide League president Bill White over West’s dealing with of an ejection of the Phillies’ Von Hayes — apparently over a comment the participant made about one other umpire. “In my assembly with Joe West yesterday, I advised him that since he has been concerned in a lot of on-field incidents with gamers, he’s not to bodily contact a participant,” White said in a press release.

In 1999, West was one in every of 57 members of the Phillips-led union who resigned en masse in an try and drive the AL and NL (which had separate swimming pools of umpires on the time) to barter a brand new labor settlement beginning in 2000. The tactic backfired, because the league accepted the resignations even after lots of the umpires tried to rescind them. West was one in every of 22 whose resignation was accepted; the NL determined which of them to simply accept primarily based on efficiency requirements. The union filed expenses with the Nationwide Labor Relations Board, and after arbitration and appeals, some umpires acquired settlements and others have been rehired. West was one in every of 9 rehired primarily based on arbitrator Alan Symonnette’s ruling in Could 2001. “I really feel like a aircraft went down with a variety of my mates,” he stated of the 13 not rehired on the time, 10 of whom by no means umpired once more. He missed the entire 2000 and ’01 seasons and was one in every of 5 umpires who shared in a $3.1 million settlement for again pay and advantages. In 2009, he was elected the president of the WUA, a capability wherein he served till ’18 and oversaw the negotiations of two labor offers. That very same 12 months, the WUA rebranded itself because the Main League Baseball Umpires Affiliation.

The 2010 season might have been peak West when it got here to controversies. That April, he publicly blasted the Yankees and Pink Sox for his or her gradual tempo of play in a season-opening collection — a case wherein the info and public opinion have been on his aspect. “They’re two of the most effective groups in baseball. Why are they taking part in the slowest?” he told the Bergen Document. “The gamers aren’t working with us. That is embarrassing — a shame to baseball.” MLB was none too pleased even earlier than West dredged up that controversy within the wake of his dealing with of two balk calls and the next ejections of White Sox pitcher Mark Buehrle and supervisor Ozzie Guillen in late Could.

Each Guillen and Buehrle made feedback within the aftermath that also resonate. Said the supervisor, “[S]ometimes he thinks individuals pay to look at him umpire,” a remark that has come to outline West within the eyes of some, although Guillen additionally added, “He’s the kind of man that wishes to regulate the sport, and to me is without doubt one of the greatest umpires within the sport, little question.” Said the pitcher, “I feel he’s too frightened about selling his CD, and I feel he likes seeing his title within the papers a bit of bit an excessive amount of as a substitute of worrying concerning the guidelines.” Ouch. Between West’s dealing with of the state of affairs and his having a public relations agent (!) inform the media he was obtainable to revisit his pace-of-play feedback, MLB determined to name him him to the carpet, fining him an undisclosed quantity.

Guillen’s feedback specifically encapsulate the best way West was considered as a polarizing determine inside the sport. In participant polls by Sports Illustrated and ESPN The Journal, he usually made the lists of each the best and worst umpires. In a 2010 ESPN poll, he completed second to CB Bucknor for worst umpire and first when it got here to having the quickest set off to eject gamers. For what it’s value, West’s 196 ejections rank fourth all-time, 167 fewer than Klem’s document whole.

By the point of that 2010 ballot, the introduction of pitch monitoring gave rise to analyses of umpires’ accuracy in calling balls and strikes. A 2007 Hardball Times study primarily based on the restricted Pitch f/x information from that 12 months discovered him to have “the fewest variety of additional balls and strikes… an indication of consistency.” The Statcast period was much less sort to West, tracing his decline in his advancing years. By way of the analysis by Umpire Scorecards, West’s 90.9% accuracy at calling balls and strikes nonetheless ranks because the third-lowest for any umpire with at the very least 100 video games behind the plate since 2015; lots of the umpires with fewer video games have been additionally close to the top of their careers. West’s inaccuracy boils right down to being about two calls under common per sport; his -424.5 right calls above anticipated nonetheless ranks second, even two seasons after his retirement.

Nonetheless, as he climbed the longevity ladder, West acquired gestures of respect and waves of publicity that resulted in profiles such because the aforementioned ones by Rosenberg and Kurkjian; whoever was doing PR for him actually earned their preserve. Shortly after he umpired his 5,000th sport on June 19, 2017, he served as the house plate umpire of the All-Star Sport (his second time doing so). When Nelson Cruz got here to the plate within the sixth inning, he had NL catcher Yadier Molina {photograph} him with West. “He’s a legend,” Cruz said afterwards. “I feel that’s the one likelihood it’s a must to take an image with Joe West.”

On August 15, 2018, West passed Froemming for second on the checklist of video games umpired. On Could 25, 2021, he overtook Klem along with his 5,376th sport. He retired on the finish of that season, ending with a complete of 5,460 video games, a document that will by no means be damaged.

So, are Montague and West worthy of the Corridor of Fame? Actually, even after doing all of this analysis — the primary time I’ve ever written about umpires at size — I’m not fully certain. My Corridor of Fame work has all the time been pushed by comparative evaluation, and umps simply don’t give us an entire lot to work with in that sense, at the very least not the best way that the info at FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Statcast and different websites do for gamers.

My hunch is that each in all probability belong in Cooperstown, warts and all. However on a poll the place I’m significantly eager on the pioneering work of player-turned-broadcaster-turned-executive Invoice White and the comparative success of supervisor Jim Leyland and in addition intrigued by the breadth of government Hank Peters’ function in constructing powerhouse groups, I’m unsure I’d place both umpire on my three-slot poll. I think West’s standing will in all probability end in his election nonetheless, and I wouldn’t be stunned if Montague is honored as properly.