[greymule]

Well, 10-8-B in the ancient 2002 book says, "Play will be suspended whenever the plate umpire leaves the umpires [sic] position to brush the plate or to perform other duties not directly connected with the calling of plays."

Does the test question say that the umpire left the umpire's position?

I've always assumed that play was suspended whenever an umpire addressed a player, even if "time" was not literally called. "Batter, tuck your shirt in." "First baseman, kick the bag in, will you?" "Catcher, let me see the ball." "Coach, get that bat in the dugout." All those mean "time out."

Question #97 seems to draw a definite line indicating that practically any non-call communication from the ump to a player suspends play. We can stretch this a little further and create some real inanities. Ball returned to the infield after Abel's single. Abel is standing on 1B. Catcher asks, "Two out, Blue?" As we say, "Yeah," F4 tosses the ball to F1 and R1 breaks for 2B and is put out. Was play suspended when the ump answered the catcher?

What if, in question #97, the ump answered, "Two and one," and five full seconds later, the runner was put out after breaking for 2B on F2's throw back to F1?

Guess the lesson is, as Mike says, not to give the count unless there has been a genuine suspension of play.





[Edited by greymule on Feb 20th, 2003 at 02:13 PM]