Hand to mouth, FED

[Rita C]

I found this in my 2002 high school rule book.

6-2-1 Illegal acts include bringing the pitching hand in contact with the mouth without distinctly wiping off the pitching hand before it touches the ball.

6-2-1 Penalty: for defacing the ball (a-e) the ball is dead immediately. The umpire may eject the pitcher. If such defaced ball is pitched and then detected, it is an illegal pitch.

6-2-4c balk if making an illegal pitch from any position.

But (assuming it hasn't changed in the last ten years) it isn't an illegal pitch unless the ball is PITCHED! So just going to the mouth shouldn't be a balk?

I bring this up because this was apparently miscalled in a Senior Little League World Series game. Little League uses OBR so the infraction should have been penalized by a ball to the batter. Unfortunately, the umpires ruled by "high school rules".

But did they? or has the penalty changed since 2002?

Rita