Veteran umpire Angel Hernandez is in a legal battle with MLB, claiming the league has discriminated against minority officials.
Following last year’s dismissal of the discrimination claim he filed against MLB in 2016, Hernandez filed a brief with the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, according to The Athletic.
The new brief claims MLB altered internal season-ending metrics to prevent minority umpires from being promoted to crew chiefs of the 19 crews.
Hernandez claimed he had favorable evaluations from 2011-16, yet wasn’t promoted.
The filing alleges that “MLB manipulated Mr. Hernandez’s year-end evaluations in order to make his job performance appear worse than it actually was.” The claim states that the evaluations “do not even come close to accurately summarizing Mr. Hernandez’s actual performance in those seasons.”
According to The Athletic, then-MLB Chief Baseball Officer Joe Torre testified in a deposition that “Hernandez has not demonstrated the leadership ability and situation-management skills in critical, high-pressure roles on a consistent basis.”
The 60-year-old Hernandez has been an MLB umpire since 1991.
