Umpire Joe West is awarded $500,000 in defamation lawsuit against former player Paul Lo Duca

April 13, 2021

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You can scream at him, curse at him, and call him names, but if you attempt to discredit veteran umpire Joe West’s credibility, well, be ready to pay a lot bigger price than simply being thrown out of a game.
West, Major League Baseball’s senior umpire who’s scheduled in May to pass Hall of Famer Bill Klem for the most games umpired in history, was awarded $500,000 plus interest Monday by the New York Supreme Court in his defamation lawsuit against former player Paul Lo Duca.

West sued Paul Lo Duca for defamation in 2019 after Lo Duca said on a podcast that his former New York Mets teammate, reliever Billy Wagner, bribed West into giving him a bigger strike zone by letting him use his 1957 vintage Chevrolet car.

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