The Peasants Are Revolting ("You're Telling Me?--They Stink On Ice")

Today a number of umpires released a statement denouncing baseball's reliance on the Questec Umpire Information System. MLB feels that the system can be used to evaluate umps. The umpires who are just starting to merge their two factions are afraid of the repecussions:

The umpires said in their statement that the computer is "heavily dependent upon decisions and actions by the Questec ballpark operators, almost none of whom have any experience in professional baseball" and that it "often incorrectly interprets the strike zone,'' producing "unacceptable inconsistencies between strike zones from ballpark to ballpark and from day-to-day in the same ballpark."

The funny thing is that they are right. I wrote extensively about this last summer, twice. Given the physics involved there is no way that the system can be accurate.

But it doesn't matter. The owners are in control and they want to use it, petitions be damned. The umps are just too fragmented and weak to stem the tide. Expect the system to be instituted throughout baseball, but also expect the acrimony between the owners and the umps to increase as their contract runs out. At least they won't be dumb enough to quit en masse again, I hope.