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Originally Posted by CecilOne
No, this has nothing to do with velocity. 
The pitcher screamed/screeched on each pitch after releasing it. The pitcher and coach said it was nothing more than a normal exhale, like other pitchers grunt as part of their effort. This pitcher's "sounds" did not occur until the ball was more than half-way to the plate and the batting team complained that it was a deliberate distraction.
The umpires warned the pitcher not to make the sounds after the ball was half-way to the plate or they would consider it UC. The pitcher eventually was ejected for this.
What are your opinions of the batters' complaints, umpires' judgement, rules basis, etc. for this sitch?
Would you respond differently under various rule sets? |
The umpires let an offensive team's complaints affect what the pitcher could legally do, and then resulted in the pitcher being ejected? What opinion could we possible have?
I'm not sure of the math, but a pitch from pitcher's hand to glove in 40' takes
about 0.6 seconds. And we, as umpires, utilize the difference between the speed of light (sight) versus the speed of sound in making calls from 10 feet away on force plays. Yet, you want us to believe that this umpire, while required (and supposedly) to be in position to call pitch location is judging where a pitch is (more than halfway) when he first hears a grunt or yell or scream released simultaneous with the physical effort of releasing the pitch (and taking into account the time lapse in hearing the sound).
Under every set of rules that I umpire, this was bad officiating, poor judgment, and unfair and unreasonable to the victim (legal pitcher).