Ken Kaiser

During a period in which many umpires were criticized for their weights, Kaiser was the heaviest in the AL; he was listed at 288 pounds (131 kg) from 1983 through 1998. Apart from the unlikelihood that he maintained that precise weight for fifteen years, there are ample reasons to believe that his weight topped 300 pounds (140 kg) for much of that time. Although he noted in his 2003 autobiography that he already weighed 260 pounds (120 kg) in high school, the AL listed his weight at 220 pounds (100 kg) from 1977 to 1979 and at 200 from 1980 to 1982 before revising the figure to 288 pounds (131 kg) in 1983. Also, the heaviest umpires during that era in the National League—John McSherry, listed at 328 pounds (149 kg) from 1992 to 1996, and Eric Gregg, listed at 325 pounds (147 kg) were both later noted as actually exceeding those figures significantly; McSherry, who died on the field of a heart attack in 1996, was believed to have approached 400 pounds (180 kg) [3] and Gregg also conceded that his weight approached that level. After McSherry's death, Gregg took a two-month leave of absence in which he lost 60 pounds (27 kg) but was still listed at 305 pounds (138 kg) the following year. The major leagues strongly encouraged other umpires to reduce their weight during that period, though Kaiser's was still listed at 288 pounds (131 kg) for two more years before dropping to 270 pounds (120 kg) in his final season. In a June 2004 column for ESPN's MLB Insider, pitcher Tom Candiotti recalled that Kaiser "wouldn't move three steps to call a play."[4] Candiotti's assessment of Kaiser was seconded by one of his American League colleagues, Durwood Merrill, who noted that Kaiser usually "marched to the beat of his own drummer" in his autobiography, You're Out and You're Ugly, Too.