running lane interference

[DownTownTonyBrown]

Originally posted by 3appleshigh
By making the catcher lob the ball rather than throw the ball, he interfered with the catchers ability to make the play. If this is done by the illegal act of running outside the three foot zone it's interferance, whether the 1st baseman catches or not.
The problem lies in the fact that a real great player drills the BR in the back or the back of the head with a throw and gets the interferance call, but a slightly less qualified player trys to circomvent the player so as not to injure someone. Which is what they are tought to do, since this PC world has taught that one needs to be fair and friendly at all times. So in the spirit of safety i think you need to realize that causing the player to alter his play isjust as much interferance and knocking the ball down.

When I don't call interference, the coach needs to tell his catcher to take his PC butt and sit it in the dugout. Batter-Runner did not force, coerce, cause, or intimidate the catcher into lobbing a ball into right field. It was simply a bad throw. Catcher needs to throw the ball to the first baseman - that's what you do to get runners out. If it happens to hit the runner when the runner is out of the 3-foot lane, it's a dead ball all running stops and not only is the BR is out, nobody else advances because the ball is dead due to the BR interference. Throw the damn ball. Lob it into right field or throw it somewhere besides to the first baseman and the defense loses - runner is safe and any other runners keep running while the defense chases the poor throw.

The running lane restriction is only at first base. Anywhere else on the field it is always a poor throw when you hit the runner or lob it into some other field. I cannot fathom why a lob or some other bad throw should be rewarded with an interference call at first base and not at every other base too. We already have an extra rule at first base that we don't have anywhere else - the 3-foot running lane rule. To guess/surmise/interpret/judge/pull it out of your... I find it ridiculous. You're guessing that the catcher adjusted his throw because of the runner and then you're guessing again that the first baseman couldn't catch the already guessed, misguided throw, again because of the runner's location. Soooo... based upon those guesses let's call an out and stop all the runners.

Even if it was a lob, it was still a bad lob. Reward the defense for that? I can't do it.

Perhaps we're moving toward that kickball rule where "if you hit them with the ball they are out..." and then we're going to add to it by saying "or throw it anywhere in the vicinity of the runner such that your baseman can't reach it to make the force out and the runner is out in that case too."

And one last thing, this idea of "real great players" making the throw while a "slightly less qualified player" making a poor lob so they won't hurt anyone is ludicrous... Are we talking about young men playing baseball or are we talking about Little League? Perhaps women's church league softball?

[Edited by DownTownTonyBrown on May 2nd, 2004 at 11:24 AM]