[David Emerling]

Originally posted by UMP25

Here's where I respectfully disagree, Dave. I believe that too many of us make these calls that difficult when in such situations they really are simpler than what we think.

Here, the umpire making the call (Eddings) and MLB both quickly and simply admitted the wrong ruling was made; yet on this board we've had guys go round and round as if they're actually trying to say the ruling shouldn't have been made because it wasn't batter's interference on a play at the plate.

When such a play develops, I ask myself in a rather "simplistic" way: "Did the batter screw up the catcher's ability to make a play at the plate?" Like you and many others here, I've been umpiring long enough to know the answer to this, and to know that such plays don't always require a complex analysis.

We as umpires tend to be so overly analytical that I believe we are our worst enemies, particularly on open forums like this. In other words, if umpires are asked for the time, we should just give it and not tell someone how to build a watch.

But any official's job is to make certain fine discernments that often make a HUGE difference.

Call it fair ... and it's a grand slam! Call it foul ... and it's nothing. Big difference. And we're often talking about fractions of inches. Yet, we must decide.

Granted, when you look at the videoclip the first thing that jumps out and offends your eyes is Carpenter's hindrance of the catcher. That's not something we see very often. The whole play is practically screaming, "Batter's interference!"

Yet, there can be no doubt that the only reason Carpenter backed out of the box was to prevent a fastball from ringing off his calf. The reason the catcher ended up so far to one side (the same side as Carpenter) was because he had to lunge in that direction to even catch the ball ... which came very close to being a WILD pitch.

In analyzing this play, nobody seems to ask, "What in the hell was the catcher doing almost 10-feet to the left of the plate?" Of course, the answer is, "To catch the ball."

You can't call a player out for batter's interference when the defense forces his hand by throwing the ball at the batter. The batter must be granted escape privileges, and, if while doing that "escape" he happens to inadvertently find himself hindering the catcher ... that's too bad for the defense.

Yet, ultimately, Carpenter did interfere.

It's no fun making these quick decisions that will almost certainly be questioned with very little time to reflect on exactly what happened ... but that's no reason to simply shrug one's shoulder and dismiss it by saying, "it's simpler than we're making it."

I think you WANT it to be simple but, in fact, these are often difficult calls.

I'm convinced that Carpenter was called for interference for his INITIAL move and not for the second move (that I pointed out) he made back toward the plate.

MLB, the umpires, and the teams collectively shrugged their shoulders on this play because it was a relatively unimportant event in a relatively unimportant game. It makes an ESPN highlight and life goes on.

Had this been the winning run in an important game and Carpenter was called for batter's interference for doing nothing more than leaping out of the way of an extremely off target pitch ... it would be another piece of baseball history that would be played over and over and over again almost as much as Gary Carter waving that ball fair down the left line. It wouldn't be forgotten, rather, it would be emblazoned in our memories for all time.

And the tagline would be ... THE UMP BLEW IT!

David Emerling
Memphis, TN

[Edited by David Emerling on Aug 13th, 2005 at 03:43 AM]