I recall that there used to be a rule that when tagging up, a runner need only wait until the first fielder touches the ball, rather than until the ball is actually caught. This rule was designed to prevent an outfielder from juggling a ball as he runs in with it, thereby holding the runners to their bases.
In yesterday's Diamondbacks/Royals game, the third baseman had the ball knocked out of his glove (in foul territory) by the shortstop, and the left fielder tried to barehand it and failed. The announcer said something about the runner on third was tagging up when the ball was nearly caught by the third baseman and would have had to come back to the base first if the outfielder had managed to snag the ball.
I went to MLB's web site to try to find the rule to show that he was wrong, and was not able to do so. Is MLB's site incomplete? I can't believe that this rule would be removed for the reason outlined in the first paragraph.
Thanks!
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