I am amazed to see this, it is also interesting to see someone who was so hated stick around for 30 years in MLB.
Some of his worst calls and iconic moments.
The MLB umpires must have the most powerful labor union in the entire country.
I can’t access the “greatest hits” in the second link, but man, he was terrible. Just objectively awful. A completely unpredictable strike zone and Hellen Keller’s eye. I hope he’s happy in his retirement. The rest of us sure will be.
And the union be the first and loudest about how they’re completely, immediately floored, struck dumb, BLINDSIDED with the announcement of another incremental step toward their eventual irrelevance. Any goodwill fans may have had is shot. All we want is honestly and best effort competence. We are (may I presume) extremely understanding of mistakes but seeing this sort of protectionist behavior in the face of bad acts is why terms like defund have entered the public lexicon.
My favorite from earlier this year. Three straight balls called strikes to Wyatt Langford.
Ejects a guy for looking at him.
I wish him well in his future endeavors. I’m sure whatever he does next, he’ll be much better at it. (Can’t get much worse).
Was he bad the entire 30 years or just the last few? Maybe he is declining?
He was bad for at least 20 years. Also a long history of being an ass.
Mr. Hernandez called only 10 games last year due to a back injury.
I don’t follow baseball, and haven’t watched a full game in decades. I couldn’t tell you the names of 10 active players. But somehow I know about Angel Hernandez and how he was the worst umpire in baseball. Are there any theories of why he was so bad and why it was tolerated for so long? Was he particularly bad in favor of a particular team or teams or equally bad against everyone?
It is extremely hard to get rid of umpires for being bad at their job. Someone else might be able to provide the details.
By statistics, he is only below average and not actually the worst. What he adds to the equation is being very combative and even more so, notorious for escalating heated moments leading to tossing players from games where he was actually at fault.
He also made a lot of very obvious wrong calls.
Sounds like he was bad at his job, and he knew it. I suspect that might make anyone a bit hair trigger when their job is in the public eye.
That said, the remedy isn’t to enforce everything with an iron fist and crush questioning, it’s to either get better, or get out of that position.
I’ve read this before. I this means that he wasn’t really all that bad. So was it that some of his bad calls were particularly bad or that he was the most unpleasant person?
May Scott Foster (NBA) follow his lead.
The problem with Hernandez wasn’t that he was wrong or even that he was often wrong. Umpires, especially behind the plate, make tens or hundreds of calls a game in real time and often not from the best angle. It’s that he was often so egregiously wrong, especially behind the plate. Not like expanding the zone a bit but consistently so but just straight up wrong.
He has made some famously bad calls, but what makes it worse was being so confrontational. He escalated things and quickly. That is the manager’s job, not an umpires.
He made major historical strides and achievements as the first blind umpire.
It’s his fuck you attitude. And the sense that some of these blown calls smell a lot like malicious retribution. The three ball strikeout linked above. Ejections. They aren’t accidents.
Mistakes are fine and stuff like artful checkswings and creative catcher setups to try to sway an umpire’s call are a delightful part of the game.
But you get a guy like this, a pariah, who not only fucks up but does so in a way and at a time that directly brings an end to (or rapidly hastens) his profession and its rich and beloved traditions for no apparent benefit to himself. Disgraceful.
It wasn’t that he was making constant mistakes. It really seemed like he was doing it on purpose.