Tough guy, tough umpire, hero
Word that Steve Palermo was seriously ill had been quietly circulating through the baseball community for months, so word of his passing on Sunday didn’t come as a shock.
It did, however, devastate those who knew this good man, who showed courage not only in his battle with lung cancer but the partial paralysis he suffered from a gunshot wound in 1991.
Palermo was on his way to becoming one of the game’s all-time great umpires before taking a bullet breaking up a robbery outside a Dallas restaurant. Hero that he was, Palermo came to the rescue of two waitresses who were being beaten by attackers.
Palermo was one of five men who bolted from the dining area to the parking lot, but he was the unlucky one — an assailant fired a .32 calibre pistol that struck the umpire in the mid-section.
The bullet “hit me, belt high, and tore a path through my body,” Palermo told NPR earlier this year. “And then instantly, I was paralyzed. I just kind of melted into the pavement. I knew right away that, oh boy, this is serious.”
Doctors told Palermo he would likely be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life, but he proved them wrong within months. Over time, Palermo was able to walk stiffly with a cane, although he never umpired again. Still, he was always at the ballpark in his hometown Kansas City and remained attached in an official capacity as an umpire supervisor in the commissioner’s office.
Palermo was a beacon of optimism and good humour — a miracle in itself given the career that was stolen from him. There are plenty of talented umpires who’ve taken Palermo’s place, but few who were blessed with his charisma and passion for the game.
Palermo umpired in a different time, when baseball valued personalities more than data. Some would call it antediluvian, but pull up any YouTube video of a ’70s or ’80s-era game and see for yourself why fans actually knew umpires’ names back then. Each one seemed to have a distinctive style calling balls and strikes (Dutch Rennert) or working the bases (Ron Luciano) or arguing close calls with Orioles manager Earl Weaver.
You don’t see that kind of theatre anymore, as instant replay has wiped out the need to blister an umpire in full view of the fans. Buck Showalter said, “Arguing used to be a skill that you’d work on. But not anymore.”
Umps today seem similarly bland and anonymous. But Palermo was one of the hot-blooded ones; he didn’t mind the in-your-face diplomacy, even from the theatrical Weaver.
Palermo loved to repeat an old joke about the Orioles’ legendary manager.
“I always said we had an off-season so Earl could go home and think up what he was going to do the next year,” Palermo said.
Weaver even allowed himself to be miked one night in 1980, allowing YouTube to preserve an argument of Biblical proportions with Tom Haller. It didn’t take much to set Weaver off, as the fireworks began after just one blown call (or so he thought).
“You’re out here for one reason and that’s to (bleep) us!” Weaver shouted at Haller, who was working the bases. “And you’re going to have your chance tomorrow night (behind the plate).”
Whether or not an umpire retaliated depended on each one’s temperament. Palermo, with a short fuse of his own, once gave Weaver 60 seconds to get back in the dugout or else the game would be forfeited. Weaver kept up his blistering attack, kicking dirt from home plate all over Palermo’s legs — but had the presence of mind to stop after 45 seconds.
“And that was the end of it,” Palermo said with a laugh.
Modernists dismiss such antics the way they wave off chewing tobacco — stepping-stones on the road to enlightenment. Baseball is a smarter, more digitized sport, and as part of commissioner Rob Manfred’s brain trust, Palermo rode shotgun on that effort. But you wonder what Palermo really thought when games would come to a halt so umpires could huddle over a video camera, trying to determine if they’d missed a call or not.
Lou Piniella recently told me, “If you ask the average fan what they’d rather see, a good manager and a good umpire arguing with each other, or three unsure umpires standing around, waiting to hear (from Replay Central), I guarantee it’s the former, not the latter.”
One present-day manager went even further, estimating there are “at least six to eight” umpires who don’t belong in the big leagues today. But they’re protected by instant replay and superslow motion, which sees and knows all.
The less-skilled umps are the ones whose calls are constantly challenged. Just a hunch, but we’re guessing Palermo would’ve flourished in this data-driven environment, too. Piniella said, “Steve was already one of the great ones” before his career was ended.
He commanded respect to the end, although never asked for sympathy. That was Palermo’s legacy — an enduring spirit, on the field and off.
Tough guy, tough umpire, but a sweetheart of a man who deserved better. He’ll be missed.