(ThyBlackMan.com) Incredibly, the 2020 Major League Baseball season will start this week. COVID-19 has played havoc on the planet in many significant ways and has affected sports and sports leagues in a big way. This season will be a truncated 60-game MLB regular season with multiple differences than the average MLB season. There will be a lot of different safety measures to keep MLB players and staff safe and healthy through this pandemic. Of course, there is not baseball without umpires and one of the most well-known umpires is Joe West, who needs to umpire 65 games to break the all-time record for most regular-season games worked by an umpire.
West is among those who don’t believe in how coronavirus deaths are being reported accurately. Not surprisingly, the Major League Baseball Umpires Association has distanced themselves from West’s comments considering how many have died from coronavirus. Other than Joe West making news, there could be significant history made this 2020 Major League Baseball season with two umpires reaching new heights.
Although there is a growing sentiment and support around an electronic strike zone in baseball, there will be umpires for the 2020 Major League Baseball season. Each umpire is part of an umpire crew, which consists of a group of four umpires and an umpire crew stays together as a team throughout the season. The crew chief of each umpire crew oversees that four man crew. Among the responsibilities of a crew chief include having the last word on disputes with players, making the call for an umpire replay review and deciding when to bring out the tarp for a rain delay. Prior to the coronavirus breakout in America, Major League Baseball appointed its first African American umpire crew chief, promoting Kerwin Danley to the position back in February of this year.
Last year, there were six Black umpires on Major League Baseball’s 76-member full-time staff. Kerwin Danley, joined the MLB staff in 1998, and is now getting the opportunity to be the first African American umpire crew chief in Major League Baseball history. The sport known for Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier hired Emmett Ashford as its first African-American umpire in 1966, according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum library and research center staff. Now Danley gets the chance to manage his own crew and he did not run from the importance of the history made. He said, “I’m very honored, very excited to be the first. But it’s not just about me. It’s much more than that. It shows African American kids there is something else they can make it in, besides playing.” It was also notable for Danley that his promotion came in February, which is Black History Month.
The retirements of multiple crew chiefs led to the promotion to crew chief for Kerwin Danley and Alfonso Marquez, who was elevated to the first Hispanic crew chief born outside the United States, and second overall in MLB history. Marquez was the first Mexican-born umpire to work in the majors, starting in 1999. Both men have paid their dues to get to their new positions. Danley has worked two World Series and 10 other postseason rounds, along with two All-Star Games. He called his first game in the majors in 1992 and made the call for one of the most exciting plays in postseason baseball history which is Derek Jeter’s defensive “flip” play at home play during the 2001 American League playoffs. Now Danley and Marquez can make history of their own in an historic 2020.
Staff Writer; Mark Hines
