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mcrowder: You can't call her out for INT for not sliding, as may have been intimated above.
I didn't say that, and you apparently are not paying attention.
For years NFHS has had a rule that a runner does not have to slide, but if they do slide it must be a legal slide; that if the runner doesn't slide and causes illegal contact (or simply alters the action of the defender) while the defender is in the immediate act of making a play on the runner, the runner is called out. (Dead ball, other runners return; B-R placed at 1B.) Yes, that is called interference!
Using this, and the new 8.6.14, Dakota asked us to draw a line between malicious contact (ejection), crash interference (out), and obstruction (award home). You have arbitrarily decided there is only A or B - all contact is either ejection or obstruction.
Lets modify Dakota's play. Assume that at the last second that R1 realizes that F2 is not going to get out of the way so she attempts to go around, but her knee hits F2's knee, taking F2 down with the ball being uncaught.
Malicious contact, ejection?
Obstruction, award home?
Illegal contact, interference over-rides obstruction, call R1 out?
I think this is a tough call, but I also think that a runner must have some responsibility to avoid contact with a defender in the act of making a play. I believe the runner must deviate and avoid contact if possible and assume that the umpire will call obstruction.
I don't know what the NFHS expects this year. They made the change without editorial comment. I have verified that the change was intentional, but have not, as of this date, received an answer as to why.
Assuming that the defender is relatively stationary, then:
if you believe the runner has a responsibility to avoid contact, and
that contact other than by a legal slide is illegal contact, and
that illegal contact is interference, then
I believe that the combination of 8.6.13 and 8.6.14, along with penalties, reads better this year.
WMB
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