Umpires Have It Easy

Imagine an umpire. Any umpire.

Now imagine a referee from the other 3 major professional sports standing next to him.

Okay, now which of these 4 guys is not like the others, leaving striped shirts and whatever protective gear out of this?

The umpire, of course.

If you're like me, the basketball and hockey referees in your mind are probably middle-aged, slim, and maybe even slightly athletic with the football referee maybe one notch down on the slimness and athletic scale. These guys are pretty much chasing players down on a rink, field, or court non-stop in between making their ludicrous calls.

Now to the Umpire: I'm guessing most of you pictured an overweight, out of shape balloon waddling around like a penguin on the base paths. Why? Because they can. When was the last time an umpire had to move more than 40 feet to make a call? Hardly ever.

The problem with this is that they should not be allowed to be that out of shape, regardless of the square footage they are responsible for. Mobility should not be compromised.

Sure they don't have to move over 40 feet to make a call, but sometimes they need to move 5 or 10 feet to get into position in a matter of seconds, and where they need to move may not be as obvious as up or down the field (as with other sports). These angles are important. But apparently not so important to MLB to have at least a smidgen of some type of fitness criteria when hiring these oafs.

Mr. Selig, things need to change!