Speaker 1: And now an exclusive interview with David Bassey for Dodger Talking.
Speaker 1: The Dodgers and Mets are getting set for Game two
Speaker 1: of this four game series, and we're joined right now
Speaker 1: by a man that was a Major League umpire for
Speaker 1: thirty years and now he's that Mike Pereira for Major
Speaker 1: League Baseball on Friday Night broadcast. And that's the one
Speaker 1: and only great Irishmen, Brian Gorman. Brian, thanks a lot
Speaker 1: for the time.
Speaker 2: Thanks appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 1: This is a lot clearer than zoom a little bit,
Speaker 1: a little bit. Yeah, you need the technology, right, Hey,
Speaker 1: when you look at the game now and how it's
Speaker 1: changed and just how umpires are being graded, do you
Speaker 1: feel for your fellow brethren on just how much they
Speaker 1: have to juggle these days?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we talk about it a lot.
Speaker 3: Since since a pitch clock came into existence, everything's getting condensed.
Speaker 2: They called the same amount of pitches, they call the
Speaker 2: same amount of plays.
Speaker 3: Everything's just done in a short amount of time. So
Speaker 3: the biggest difference from like when I work and from
Speaker 3: the times that you do now is that they don't
Speaker 3: have a break. Used to like between pitches, used to
Speaker 3: be able to take a breath and take a break
Speaker 3: and kind of reset.
Speaker 2: Now they can't do that.
Speaker 3: They're watching picture disengagements and the clock's taken down, and.
Speaker 2: So they're always working.
Speaker 3: So it's intense two and a half hours as opposed
Speaker 3: to a little bit more relaxed three hours.
Speaker 1: Brian, how much more is on the home plate on
Speaker 1: fire with everything that you just said.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's got a busy plate.
Speaker 3: I mean he's he does all picture disengagements, he does
Speaker 3: all batter timeouts. He has to keep track of the
Speaker 3: batter timeouts. A couple of times we've had a situation
Speaker 3: where a batter took a time out and then he
Speaker 3: wants another one, and so you have to remember, no,
Speaker 3: you already took one. So sometimes you know, you know
Speaker 3: there's fifty sixty batters a game, it gets a little
Speaker 3: confusing and say, like, you know, did you already have
Speaker 3: a timeout? As you do one? And so he's busy.
Speaker 3: It's a condensed period of time and he's got a
Speaker 3: lot to do, and then he's got to call balls
Speaker 3: and strikes and get everyone right.
Speaker 1: Yeah right, And they usually do despite what hitters think
Speaker 1: and pictures think.
Speaker 2: Hopefully.
Speaker 3: Yes, the scores are pretty much the same everybody's scoring
Speaker 3: like in the mid mid the high nineties. With adjustments
Speaker 3: that they do for the evaluations, the box that everybody
Speaker 3: sees on the screen, it's not accurate as what they
Speaker 3: get evaluated at. So a lot of people go by
Speaker 3: that box, but that box is just a static box
Speaker 3: from the center field camera. It doesn't take into account
Speaker 3: of batter's height. So the low part of the strike
Speaker 3: zone and the high part of the strike showe which
Speaker 3: is a lot where the controversy comes in, is not accurate.
Speaker 2: So they're getting hit pretty good on social media.
Speaker 1: I understand, yes, exactly. I'm glad you brought that up
Speaker 1: because I had heard that the broadcast that we see
Speaker 1: in that box that we see, that's not the actual
Speaker 1: strike zone. And on game day, how accurate is that
Speaker 1: compared to what we see on TV.
Speaker 2: It's not.
Speaker 3: They do their own adjustments for Major League Baseball, gets
Speaker 3: evaluated their umpires on their own adjustments, and then they
Speaker 3: have post game adjustments where they take into account the
Speaker 3: catcher where like you might get adjusted if the pitch
Speaker 3: gets by the catcher goes back to the screen, but
Speaker 3: it might nick the box. They'll get adjusted for that pitch.
Speaker 3: So it's a lot different than what people see on
Speaker 3: the screen. I almost kind of wish that it wasn't
Speaker 3: on there because it's just frustrating.
Speaker 1: Former Major League umpire Brian Gorman is our guest. He
Speaker 1: is now part of Major League Baseball umpire operations and.
Speaker 2: Also a TV star.
Speaker 1: He's the guy that they go to on Apple TV
Speaker 1: in the zoom room when there is some questions about
Speaker 1: the rules, like last Friday night where Michael Conforto tagged
Speaker 1: up with a juggle in the outfield at City Field
Speaker 1: since the Mets.
Speaker 2: Are in town.
Speaker 1: Brian, what do you remember about that play and did
Speaker 1: you know that it should have been allowed right away?
Speaker 2: Why did it take so long?
Speaker 3: Well, the two unusual plays in one game. It's usually,
Speaker 3: you know, three or four games go by and they
Speaker 3: don't even have to come to me.
Speaker 2: They had two plays in one game.
Speaker 3: The first one was the juggle out in the outfield
Speaker 3: where the ball touches the suentelder, it gets deflected and
Speaker 3: in fact, I think the right fielder will und up
Speaker 3: catching the ball most of the time that ball has dropped,
Speaker 3: so this play never happens. But if anybody's tagging, he
Speaker 3: can go on first touch, and the theory behind that
Speaker 3: is like a good outfielder can juggle the ball all
Speaker 3: the way into the infield and prevent the guy from advancing,
Speaker 3: so as soon as the ball is touched, the runners
Speaker 3: can take off. Apparently some guys know it, because the
Speaker 3: guys took off on first touch. In fact, there was
Speaker 3: a play at second where he could have probably tagged
Speaker 3: Gotani and he didn't, so you know, he just advanced
Speaker 3: on the tag, so he was safe at second and
Speaker 3: then they went to review. So when they go to
Speaker 3: the review, they call it a matrix shot. They have
Speaker 3: one camera faced on the outfielder, they have another camera
Speaker 3: faced on the guy tagging up, and they sink it
Speaker 3: with the timestamp so they make sure the guy actually
Speaker 3: did tag up in time. Then there was another tag
Speaker 3: up at first, so they do both tags at the
Speaker 3: same time, and I think that's what took some time.
Speaker 3: So they're you know, there's fourteen feeds home and away
Speaker 3: and they have to go through every feed in case
Speaker 3: there's a feed that.
Speaker 2: Shows something different. So that's what takes time. In New York.
Speaker 1: Brian Gorman is our guest. All right, that other play
Speaker 1: on Friday Night where obstruction was called twice. One time
Speaker 1: we all noticed it because Tascar Hernandez made a great
Speaker 1: throw to throw out the runner at home Starling Marte.
Speaker 1: The other time the Dodgers Tascar Hernandez scored safely. Can
Speaker 1: you take us through that obstruction play? Because what is
Speaker 1: the distance? The third baseman is a little bit too
Speaker 1: close for comfort.
Speaker 2: Sure, there's two types of obstruction.
Speaker 3: One is a play being made on the obstructed runner,
Speaker 3: and one is a play not being made on it.
Speaker 3: And it's got two different benefits. The play that's not
Speaker 3: being made on it, the umpire lets the play go
Speaker 3: through and waits.
Speaker 2: To see what happens.
Speaker 3: That if the obstructed runner gets thrown out on a
Speaker 3: close play, which actually happened, then he enforces the obstruction.
Speaker 3: If he scores easily, or if he gets out or
Speaker 3: thrown out by forty feet, they don't enforce the obstruction.
Speaker 3: So a lot of people don't know the obstructions even
Speaker 3: called until the play happens.
Speaker 2: After which they got obstructed.
Speaker 3: The play at third that you're talking about, he actually
Speaker 3: strolled in front of the batter tagging up and prevented
Speaker 3: him from getting a clearer view of the guy catching it.
Speaker 3: That's called obstruction. You don't have to touch him, and
Speaker 3: it doesn't have to be intentional. I don't know if
Speaker 3: he did an intentional Max says he did, so you know,
Speaker 3: I believe him. If he gets in front of him,
Speaker 3: but he obstructs the vision of the field of tagging up,
Speaker 3: that's called obstruction. And if he gets thrown out in
Speaker 3: a close play, which happened, it's reversed to a safe
Speaker 3: On the other case, he did walk in front of him,
Speaker 3: but the umpire thought that he didn't obstruct his view.
Speaker 3: So you can get closed and not obstruct them, or
Speaker 3: you can get far away and obstruct them.
Speaker 2: So it's it's a judgment called by the umpire.
Speaker 1: Is that something that whoever's uppying third base may have
Speaker 1: that rule at the forefront of their mind that night
Speaker 1: and maybe focusing on it, because I've heard a lot
Speaker 1: of third basement obstruct but it's never called right.
Speaker 3: The funny thing about it is that the umpires also
Speaker 3: watching for the tag up. He's lining it up, and
Speaker 3: he has the same vision as the guy tagging, so
Speaker 3: if he's getting in a way of him, he's probably
Speaker 3: getting away of the umpire as well. So it almost
Speaker 3: brings it to your attention because you're trying to light
Speaker 3: up the tag up with the catch as well. So
Speaker 3: Max kind of gotten away of both of them. And
Speaker 3: that's when Trip Gibson was the third base umpire.
Speaker 2: He called it right away.
Speaker 1: We all know Trip Gibson's name in Los Angeles now,
Speaker 1: Brian Gorman.
Speaker 2: He's a hell of an upfire. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Hey, before I let you go so many years umpiring
Speaker 1: major League baseball, when you come back to Dodgers Stadium
Speaker 1: and you're here on quite an often basis, what do
Speaker 1: you remember the most? Were there any like interactions with
Speaker 1: Tommy Lasorda or anybody else on the Dodgers that stick
Speaker 1: out to you?
Speaker 2: Sure? He was one of my first ejections. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think it was my first year. I don't even
Speaker 2: know if I had a job yet.
Speaker 3: I was going up and down from Triple A and
Speaker 3: I called a couple of pitches he didn't like.
Speaker 2: He started yelling from the dugout.
Speaker 3: He got ejected, and then the paper the next day
Speaker 3: he said I liked his dad. I'm not so sure
Speaker 3: about the side, but I worked my last game here
Speaker 3: and stadium.
Speaker 2: It was fun. It was.
Speaker 3: My My family was all here and walked off the
Speaker 3: field and the first person shuck my hand was Mookie
Speaker 3: Betts and Dave Roberts came out and he shook my hand.
Speaker 3: They had it on the scoreboard before the game that
Speaker 3: I was retiring. It was kind of surprising, but I've
Speaker 3: got a lot of good feelings here in Dodgers Dodger Stadium.
Speaker 1: Squarers always say they missed the camaraderie with their teammates
Speaker 1: and just being around the guys.
Speaker 2: What do umpires miss?
Speaker 3: The most same thing, same thing we You know, we
Speaker 3: travel as a group before from from April to October,
Speaker 3: and there's a lot of card games. You know that
Speaker 3: we travel together. We go out together, so you know,
Speaker 3: you form a little bond and like a family bond.
Speaker 3: Sometimes if a guy gets hurt, they'll bring another guy in.
Speaker 3: But everything we do is juicually together. You know, if
Speaker 3: somebody has an off day and they go home and stuff,
Speaker 3: but you get to know the guys and their families,
Speaker 3: and after you retire, you kind of missed that part.
Speaker 3: It's it is the camaraderie, that same thing I imagined
Speaker 3: with the players.
Speaker 1: Thanks for sharing with all of us, Brian Gorman. We
Speaker 1: don't get to tap into the knowledge of an umpire
Speaker 1: that has the experience that you have and continue to
Speaker 1: do a great job. And you are Baseball's Mike Pereira.
Speaker 2: I just means I'm old. I think you there.
Speaker 1: He is one of the best umpires in his day.
Speaker 1: Brian Gorman now helping Major League Baseball keep everybody in line.