John Kibler
baseball umpire
John William Kibler (January 9, 1929 – February 18, 2010) was an umpire for the National League from 1965 to 1989. He wore uniform number 9 for most of his career.
Early life
Kibler was born in Piseco, New York, on January 9, 1929. He served in the Navy during the Korean War and was a member of the New York State Police before becoming an umpire. He worked in the minors for six seasons in the Georgia–Florida League (1958), Pioneer League (1959), South Atlantic League (1960–1961), American Association (1962), and International League (1963).
Major League Baseball career
He joined the National League full-time starting in 1965 after two partial seasons in 1963–64. He officiated in the 1981 National League Division Series, five National League Championship Series' (1972, 1975, 1979, 1984–Game 5 only, and 1987—crew chief), four World Series (1971, 1978, 1982, and 1986—crew chief), and four Major League Baseball All-Star Games (1965, 1974, 1980—crew chief, and 1985). He also umpired at the no-hitters of Ken Holtzman (1971, third base), Nolan Ryan's fifth no-hitter (1981, third base), Bob Forsch's second no-hitter (1983, second base), and Tom Browning's perfect game (1988, second base). He served as the home plate umpire for the Cardinals inaugural game at Busch Memorial Stadium on May 12, 1966.
1986 World Series
Kibler was the crew chief of umpiring for the 1986 World Series.
The public source identifies “John Kibler” as baseball umpire. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around John, Kibler and baseball.
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This entry incorporates text from “John Kibler” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.