The Official Rules of Baseball aren't perfect-- not by a long shot. There are so many omissions, inconsistencies, and simply wrong assertions that careful study may be amusing, but it is unlikely to be illuminating. Buy a copy of Jaksa and Roder to get a clear understanding of the rules of baseball as they are actually played "under OBR rules."
There isn't any inconsistency between 5.09 and 7.08. 5.09 simply tells us that in this situation (and in several others,) the ball is dead, and the runners are under no liability to be put out. Note that the runner who was struck by the fair batted ball is already out, and is no longer a runner. By 7.08, the remaining runners either return to their time-of-pitch base, or advance one base only if they are forced to advance. If the the batter-runner was not struck by the ball, then he is awarded first. As far as I know, the placement of the B/R is not explicitly stated anywhere in the rules, although you can infer it from 10.05(e) which credits B/R with a base hit. Or, if you aren't bothered by the idea that every B/R is forced to first, then he is among the runners "forced to advance," and is therefore placed at first.
J/R Chapter 13 is titled "Offensive Interference", Section II is Runner Interference, and subsection A refers to Batted Balls. You'll find everthing you need to know in the next few pages. It's a lot better than reading rule 10 on scorekeeping to find out what happens to the batter-runner when enforcing 7.08.
|