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Originally Posted by Jim Porter
No, you protect him only one way initially. And then you can use subsequent events during the play, called post-obstruction evidence in Roder's manual, to revise the protection. Post obstruction evidence can include anything and everything that occurs while play is live after the obstruction. Sometimes post-obstruction evidence requires you to extend protection, change protection, or end protection.
With Type B obstruction, you must decide which base the obstructed runner could have reached safely had the obstruction not occurred and protect him initially to that base. Obviously, an obstructed runner could not reach an occupied base safely under any circumstances. Only with post-obstruction evidence can you extend protection to that initially occupied base.
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As you say Jim, with Type B obstruction the umpire needs to judge where the runner will be protected to when the obstruction happens and then watch the play to see if that protection should change. In this play, R1 was obstructed no more then 10 feet from second base, then R1 proceeds to run to an occupied base(no one dragged him there, he ran on his own). Once he realizes that he couldn't advance to third because of R2, he tries to retreat back to second.
Given what the offense did after the obstruction, I can't believe that the umpires still decided to protect R1 back to second. R1 and R2 are the only reason R1 is thrown out at third, if anything, R1 should have been protected to third because of where the ball and the runners were at the time of the obstruction, but because of poor baserunning, R2 stayed on third and as a result R1 was stuck between 2nd and 3rd.
The obstruction protection should have ended and a double play called. Poor base running on the offence, plain and simple and BAD call by the umpires.