Baseball sure seems opposed to letting women ump in the majors

Some of you may remember Lion in Oil did a post a while back on the first female Cuban umpire to make the equivalent of Cuba's major leagues. I realize Cuba isn't exactly a very forward thinking country, but in terms of letting women ump baseball games, they're light years ahead of us.

As of right now, Ria Cortesio is the only female umpire in American pro baseball, and she's been doing it for nine years - primarily in class A and AA.

She umped a major league exhibition game at the start of this season, the first woman to do so in 20 years. She also umped the All-Star Futures game last year.

"Until I work a regular-season Major League baseball game, I haven't done anything," Cortesio said, "I don't want to be a pioneer. I just want to do my job."

The interesting fact is that there has never been a female umpire who made it to the majors. And the question is why? Certainly female umpires are a lot rarer than male umpires (there have only been 5 total in baseball's history including Cortesio), but it's not like they haven't existed at all.

In fact, Pam Postema, who ended her career in 1996, spent 13 years in the minors - seven of them in AAA.

Although often considered a prospect for major league umpiring, Postema never received the call until 1988, when Baseball Commissioner Bart Giamatti offered her a contract to officiate at the MLB level during spring training. Later that year, Giamatti also offered her a chance to umpire at the "Hall of Fame Game" between the New York Yankess and the Atlanta Braves.

Both opportunities looked promising, but Giamatti died soon thereafter in 1989, and Postema never again got the chance to umpire in the major leagues. In December of 1989, the Triple-A Alliance cancelled Postema's contract after 13 years of well-regarded experience in the minor leagues. She then filed a sex-discrimination lawsuit at the federal level, which was settled out of court.

In 1992, Postema published a book entitled You've Gotta Have Balls to Make It In This League.

Judging by Postema's experience, Cortesio has a mountain to climb despite her nine years of experience. Cortesio has yet to even ump at the AAA level.

So what's the conclusion? I think it's pretty simple. Baseball would prefer not see women umps in the majors.

But let's hope Cortesio can bust through.

-WCK

Best headline ever

This is the Northern Arizona University paper. And this is what happens when you let college students create headlines with no supervision. I like how the newspaper is "The Lumberjack." Lumberjackit indeed my friend.

Thanks to sugargiggle.

-WCK

The Curse of Young Attractive Female Athletes...

I was skimming Simmons's mailbag earlier today and noticed a question comparing Anna Kournikova and Danica Patrick. This got me thinking and of course my mind then jumped to Michelle Wie. What is it about these young, talented female athletes where that combination just seems to be the kiss of death to success in their sports? The minute Kournikova looked like a decent tennis player and started getting attention she seemed to shift her focus from tennis to getting attention from every Russian hockey player and endangering the entire NHL back when hockey was still a sport (how do you say "statutory rape" in Russian?).

And it's the way that these female athletes fall off. It's just not pretty. Like Michelle Wie's near nervous breakdown last month eventually resulting in her just quitting in the middle of a round after a frustrating shot. When was the last time you heard of a professional golfer doing that? This isn't Uncle Frank losing it after a 6-pack and hitting his ball in the water; this is supposed to be a potential top-tier professional women's golfer we're talking about. It's just bizarre.

The other thing I find odd about all this is that it just doesn't seem to happen on the men's side. They're dealing with the same attention and problems handling fame that women athletes are dealing with, but this just doesn't seem to impact them when it comes to excelling at their sports. My theory is that the women know that they CAN get by just on their sex appeal. Look at Kournikova, at one point she was not even in the top 100 players and she was number 2 in endorsements for women's tennis players at about $10 million per year. Michelle Wie is looking eerily similar. I don't know her exact endorsement numbers, but I'll bet they are heading in the same direction of Kournikova's were while her ranking is similarly slipping at an age when she should only be improving. Meanwhile, guys like Jeter and A-Rod who show up on magazine covers in their late teens and early 20's and definitely benefit in endorsements from having female (and i'm sure some male) admirers, just never seem to fade in the same way.

One comment I heard once that is often true is that, in general, women (and Jeff Garcia) think of men as a total package, and a critical failing in one area can kill the guy even though they have any number of great attributes in other areas. Men, on the other hand, see an array of parts and any one great attribute (ie, appearance) can make up for a laundry list of failings in other areas (ie, being the age of consent, attitude, intelligence, and whether they'll take off with your kidneys at 5 am when you pass out). Essentially, women aren't going to be impressed with a guy's appearance if his reason for being in front of them in the first place ain't up to snuff. Meanwhile, as long as Kournikova was wearing those short shorts and running around guys could care less about her tennis ability... as long as she kept running after that ball, perspiring ever so slightly... as the sun gently caressed her perfect, lithe tan body.... floating around like an angel from...

Whoa! It's okay... i'm okay. Just a Kournikova flashback from the last 90's. I'll be fine...

--dwyermaker