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Old Tue Oct 17, 2000, 12:11pm
PeteBooth PeteBooth is offline
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Location: Newburgh NY
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8.02(d) F1 shall not Intentionally Pitch at the Batter. If, in the umpire's judgment, circumstances warrant, both teams may be officially "warned" prior to the game or at any time during the game. (League Presidents may take additional action under authority provided in Rule 9.05) To pitch at a batter's head is unsportsmanlike and highly dangerous. It should be_and is_condemned by everybody. Umpires should act without hesitation in enforcement of this rule.

Most of us have seen "bean balls" on at least 2 occassions this year. The 1 involving Roger Clemens and Mike Piazza and last night involving Dave Veres and Jay Patton of the Mets. There were probably others througout the season as well.

The point: If I read the last part of 8.02(d), an umpire can eject F1 when a ball is thrown at a batter's head.
I have yet to see this happen this year.

IMO before someone gets seriously injured for life, the last part of rule 8.02(d) should read: It is an automatic ejection and probably should come with some sort of suspension as well.

Roger Clemens and Dave Veres should have been removed immediately and followed by at least a 2 or 3 game suspension (with loss of pay).

At the amateur level, this should be strictly enforced, because as most of us know it doesn't take much now-a-days to erupt teams have bedlam on our hands.

The message we want to send is UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES - THROW AT A BATTER'S HEAD.

Yes F1 in order to be an effective pitcher has to throw inside, but there are limits. There's nothing wrong with brushing a hitter back off the plate, but F1 can achieve that without going to the head area.

A PRO athlete KNOWS when they "are cheating" at the plate and should expect a brush back pitch - That's part of baseball - but not the Head area. Nothing wrong with busting one inside at the chest level.

I know why F1 does it - TO INTIMIDATE but there are other ways to imtimidate. Not trying to take out the Brush Back pitch but we need to stop pitcher's from throwing at the head area.

JMO


Pete Booth
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