Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.
EsqUmp:
As a structural engineer I would normally agree with you counselor but this is case if you are damned if you do and damned if you do not.
If one leaves a bat near HP and a player falls over it, or one "[s]afely, carefully and cautiously remove the bat." and a player falls over it. Either case, if a player gets hurt, the "remover" of the bat will be the on considered civilly liable, and if you are even have the lawyer I think you are, you will be the one that sues the umpire and I do not mean that in a derogatory way.
MTD, Sr.
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What is interesting is the number of people who comment when they have never moved the bat. They do not speak from experience because they have never done it. I have removed hundreds of bats safely, carefully and cautiously. I have never had a problem doing it. No ball has ever hit a moved bat. No player has ever tripped over a moved bat. I have never hit anyone with a moved bat.
Keeping in mind that ASA refuses to put in print that umpires are not to remove the bat, what seems to be a greater chance for liability: 1) Sliding a bat away from the plate where a runner is barreling in and can either be hurt by the bat or turn the bat into a flying projectile or 2) sliding a bat away 5 or 10 feet where no body is or where an on-deck batter or retired runner can grab it?
Not once have I ever had a single issue removing the bat. So why not remove it?