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Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Retrosheet Introduces Umpire Ejection Information

Baseball data powerhouse Retrosheet recently added a key umpire statistic to their 100,000-game database. The new section, appropriately titled "Ejection Information," is similar in part to the season-by-season portion of the UEFL Portal's Historical Data page, though Retrosheet's data, in consistency with the theme of that website, remains more concise in nature.

The Retrosheet.org logo, copyright Retrosheet
To access the new feature, visit any Retrosheet umpire page (e.g., Joe West) and navigate to the bottom. For West, all 147 of his 1977-2011 ejections are logged on the website, including date, team, ejected person's name and probable reason for ejection.

As discovered in comparing UEFL Historical Data with Retrosheet ejection data and similar to Retrosheet president Dave Smith's explanation Retrosheet's occasional discrepency with official data, the data is subject to official scorer or other baseball-related error.

Now, at least, when you see the following message on the UEFL, you will know exactly what it means:

The information used here was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet.  Interested parties may contact Retrosheet at "www.retrosheet.org".
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10 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 25, 2012 at 11:53 PM

    Great summary statistics of mlb umpiring history and ejections. It's a good collection for sure, but no QOC? Where's all the fun? lol

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  2. Big MarcJune 26, 2012 at 1:10 AM

    Hole-e-shit,

    My god, I have to stop reading the retrosheet stuff. They have Babe Ruth ejections recorded with reasons. Brick Owens ejected Ruth 4 times from 1917-1932. Clark Griffith, played, managed and umpired. Has ejections stats in all 3 catergory's. Also, Klem worked the plate one year like 151 of 156 games.

    If you go oever there (retro), plan on a couple of hours

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  3. Jimmy JackJune 26, 2012 at 7:03 AM

    Ah, Gil. You've once again taken hours out of my day while I play with the latest toy you have presented here. Take caution everyone, Big Marc is right. Babe Ruth ejections are addicting just like all the old-school big shots.

    I know we discussed it here in the past, but take a look at Bill Klem's profile and his 255 career ejections (world record, right?). My favorite is 7-9-1906: NY Roger Bresnahan ejected for "tipping cap to Klem after called 3rd strike." GENIUS! Also enjoy Dan McGan on 9-20-1905 (Arguing over condition of ball in play) and Philadelphia's John McCloskey and Togie Pittinger on 6-9-1906 ("Stalling tactics; game finally forfeited). Then there's jostling the umpire, bench jockeying, protesting order to stop heckling, brawling and - here we go - Dizzy Dean's ejection on 7-2-1934 for arguing an infield fly call.

    Prepare to spend time looking at this neat stuff.

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  4. Rich FronheiserJune 26, 2012 at 7:32 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  5. AnonymousJune 26, 2012 at 7:33 AM

    Klem had no ejections in 1932. Notice how his ejections (for the most part) slowed as he got older. Did Klem learn from experience or did the players/managers finally figure out not to screw with the old catfish.

    Some of his early days make me think baseball was like one big out of control adult amateur league of today. :)

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  6. AnonymousJune 26, 2012 at 8:26 AM

    To bad there is no video for any of the ejections. That would be amazing. Probably a good thing. I would watch every ejection. I was hoping to see some Ken Kaiser ejections.

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  7. ak482June 26, 2012 at 8:47 AM

    Love this tool and especially if the reasons are identifiable. I was browsing Larry Barnett's profile and he ran Tony Fernandez for calling him "fatso", there are some beauties. Plus, considering the just recent technologies of looking at an umpire's strike zone; if a particular umpire had a lot of balls & strikes ejections, could possibly be some strike zone consistency issues.

    Also, it clears up some perceptions regarding umpire ejection rates as a measure of control/temperament. Case in point: in 1984, Steve Rippley had a whopping 18 ejections in only 92 games (an unreal rate of nearly 20%). Just from first blush, you wouldn't want to breathe wrong near the guy. But the ejection tool shows that 16 of them were charged to him as the home plate umpire in the infamous August 12 beanball war between the Padres and Braves.

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  8. AnonymousJune 26, 2012 at 12:01 PM

    I'm loving the entries. Here are some of the best Weaver ejections:


    8- 2-1969 BOX BAL A Bill Haller Smoking in dugout
    5-27-1972 BOX BAL A Red Flaherty Piling dirt on second base in argument
    4-15-1973(2) BOX BAL A Jim Evans Kicking dirt arguing safe/out call
    8-15-1975(1) BOX BAL A Ron Luciano Call at 1B
    8-15-1975(2) BOX BAL A Ron Luciano During exchange of lineups
    6-28-1976 BOX BAL A Jim Evans Throwing hat on field after HR
    6-18-1979 BOX BAL A Larry Barnett Shredding rulebook to protest call
    9-17-1980 BOX BAL A Bill Haller Balk call
    7-17-1982 BOX BAL A Terry Cooney Striking ump while arguing play at 1B
    9-29-1985(1) BOX BAL A Nick Bremigan
    9-29-1985(2) BOX BAL A Jim Evans During lineup exchange bef Game 2 of DH

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  9. AnonymousJune 26, 2012 at 12:01 PM

    The 9-17-80 balk call is the famous Haller/Weaver video.

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  10. Scott StevensonJuly 26, 2012 at 12:35 AM

    That's a great site! Just for fun, I looked up Doug Harvey (who I've had the pleasure of meeting), and twice in his career, he went 3+ years with no ejections

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