[ljudge]

Looks like this stirred up some good discussion which is what I believe MJT wanted us to do.

A few of you had this right on. Our ruling had it spelled out as SouthGARef had in his #2 and #3. We didn't discuss #1 in this answer but I suppose that's certainly an option.

A couple of points:

1) First Touching isn't a foul, but rather a violation (which makes the act illegal). There can be more than 1 instance of 1st touching so the touching is illegal.

2) In point #1 the rules clearly say that a BIB is illegal as per 9.3.5b (for those of you who disagree b/c he "couldn't have seen it" still doesn't make the act legal). So you have to enforce the BIB...now whether you call it or not is another story.

3) I thought some of you would say the BIB would be legal because R40 did touch the ball before the BIB. But that was due to a batted ball. This year's rules tell you to ignore touching by R on a MUFF by K but doesn't say anything about a BAT by K. But common sense to us says that the a BAT would also apply to this rule. After all, why wouldn't it? I don't think the people making up the rules intended for K to get an advantage by purposely batting the ball into R and giving K a free shot at a BIB to get to the loose ball. Just our interpretation of course.

All for now. I'll put up another post next Thursday which is my day. I will still chime in on the discussion if people have other stuff to say but since there was an overwhelming response I wanted to get the ruling I had out there. Perhaps some of you may still dispute this but that's what makes it fun.

Thanks a bunch,
Ljudge