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There really are a small, limited number of things that can constitute a legitimate appeal play. The obvious ones are missing a base, leaving a base too soon on a caught fly ball and batting out of order.
Those all make sense are are obvious. ASA and NFHS list one more appealable situation- Attempting to advance to second base after making a turn at first base. Generally, appeals apply to a violation of the playing rules. I don't really get how a runner rounding first base and making an attempt toward second is considered a "violation" of any rule. The runner is legally attempting to advance and isn't doing anything prohibited by rule. That just seems an odd thing to include under the catagory of "appeals", when it seems to fall under the normal rules requiring a tag on an advancing runner.
But the rule is there, for whatever reason, lumped in with other appeals that are violations of specific playing rules. And the rules are clear that this particular play DOES require an actual tag of the runner, not the base!
The NFHS rule adds a little note that this particular appeal can ONLY be executed as a live-ball appeal (that makes it different than all the others, which can be made during a dead ball). The ASA rule doesn't spell that out, but a reading of their rule infers that this is also the case in their game.
(For whatever credit the NFHS gets for clarifying this must be a live-ball appeal, you have to ding them for the sentence that describes this as an appeal play. It is an oddly-worded sentence fragment that in itself makes no sense. There seems to be a word or two missing, or something printed out-of-sequence, or pooly edited. Maybe that is adding to the confusion.)
Let's call this an appeal play (the rules do, after all) and let's agree that it can only be a live-ball appeal (the rules agree with that). Now take a minute to read about live-ball appeals.
"(A live-ball appeal) may be made during a live ball by any fielder in possession of the ball touching the base missed or left too soon on a caught fly ball, or by tagging the runner committing the violation if (the runner) is still on the playing field."
The rule says that tagging the base is an acceptable form of live-ball appeal in two circumstances: A missed base or one left too soon on catch. The play offered here is neither one of those!
That leaves us with tagging the runner as the only means of executing a successful live-ball appeal.
It still bugs me that the rules treat this as some sort of "appealable violation" by the runner, when the runner has the right to try to round the bag and a tag would be required on any other runner rounding any other base and being off of it during a live ball. But I don't see any way in the world that you can get from the rules that simply tagging the base is an acceptable means of making this appeal.
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