Umpires Boycott Use of Instant Replay in Pittsburgh Pirates Games, Cite Health Hazards Of Watching Pirates in Slow Motion

PITTSBURGH - Major League Baseball will start using instant replay tonight, but umpires say they will boycott replays of the sport’s worst team, the Pittsburgh Pirates.  According to Mike Port, Baseball’s Vice President of Umpiring, the umpires say it would be “hazardous to their health to relive, especially in slow motion, any portion of a Pirates game.”

The umpires say they will allow replays of Pirates games from 1992, the year the team last had a winning season, or earlier.  But Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said he “isn’t sure how that could work.”

Mr. Port said that “in principle” the umpires support the use of instant replay technology.  “Anything to slow down an already near-moribund game is good with us.”  But he explained that umpires do not support instant replays that “second-guess” umpires’ decisions.  Rather, the umpires want to confine replays to crotch grabbing, bloopers, and ”shots of beautiful women” in the stands.

Aug 28

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