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Any reason you can't treat this as an unannounced sub and a BOO? After B9 was supposed to be B1, but instead, Flex came to bat in B1's slot in the lineup, unannounced (and illegally as well). The illegal substitution was not caught before a pitch was pitched to the next batter. Then, B2 is supposed to bat, but B1 comes to the plate. B1 takes at least 1 pitch, so Flex (in B1's spot) is now legal (well, not legal, but no longer BOO). B1 is now BOO for B2. Once this is caught before a pitch is thrown to the next batter, B2 is out for not batting, Flex must be removed from the basepaths as an illegal substitute (and substituted for --- sidebar, is B9 a legal replacement for FLEX now on the bases?), B1 is out, and now B3 takes her proper spot in the batters box.
Not sure if this is right either, but it seems more defensible by the rules than what they DID do.
PS - Mike, even though offense is at fault, they have every right to protest if the Umpires do not handle the situation correctly... Say, perhaps, umpires ruled everyone out. Even though we have not come to consensus on what was "right" to rectify this, I think we'd all agree that calling both runners out would be wrong, and offense could (and should!) protest.
Just because a team is at fault doesn't mean they can not protest if we don't penalize them correctly.
[Edited by mcrowder on Mar 1st, 2005 at 03:54 PM]
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