The story of Randy Christal and John Bible, as told to me by a member of the horn faithful and confirmed by a joking Roger Clemons about shltty umpires throughout his career.
Christal and Bible are professional sports officials. Referees in the Fall and Umpires in the Spring. Both call the Austin area home and have done so for decades. College officials make decent money (especially as a supplement to a regular income), and with these guys being so close to home, you could imagine what it's like to get to watch some premier baseball on a Tuesday evening, make some money, all while staying within 20 miles or so of your house. Things were great. As Texas was making CWS runs with regularity under Cliff Gustafson, Christal and Bible were fixtures on the diamond at Disch-Faulk on the weekends and on Tuesdays. Were they homers? Who knows, you'd like to think they would call it straight. Why risk it?
Everything was perfect until Roger Clemons came to town for Texas. The fireballing right hander was the biggest prize in College Baseball, and Texas had him. Roger Clemons is known throughout baseball for his next level competitive edge, and he had no problem telling everyone in attendance when they weren't matching his level of excellence. One night, Roger wasn't getting the Strike calls behind the plate that he wanted, and Randy Christal wasn't giving it to him. And then it happened again, this time with Bible. And then it seemed Christal and Bible had it out for Clemons, according to Clemons. So Clemons walks into Gustafson's office one day, boiling over with frustration, and he promptly tells Gustafson that if Christal or Bible are on the field of a Texas game when he was slated to pitch, that Gus could find someone else to throw that day.
Soon thereafter, when Christal and Bible were to get the phone call that they had been assigned to a Texas game to ump, the phone didn't ring. And it continued to not ring. When Christal and Bible questioned as to why they had stopped getting assigned to Texas games on the weekend and in the middle of the week, they were given the run around. They finally utilized their stature as longtime officials to get to the truth. They were told that Clemons wouldn't pitch with them on the field. They were indignant. They felt they were fair. Their opinion mattered not, Gus had spoken, and that was that.
Enough time goes by that both Bible and Christal begin to miss the regular money in the Spring. Perhaps the wives were getting antsy, who knows. But it got bad enough that Bible and Christal go to meet with Gustafson, and it is there that they promise to be better, to be "more fair." What does more fair mean? You do the math.
After that episode in the 1980s, do you think Bible and Christal, representing two of the six officials crews in entirety of Big 12 Football that A&M was involved with 1996 - 2011, do you think Christal and Bible knew in the back of their mind where their bread was buttered? That if they pissed off the longhorns that they may not work again?
How could it not?
