touch in the infieldfly rule

quiggley94 · #1 (**permalink**) Wed May 05, 2004, 03:57pm

ok i know in fiels fly is a common question here but here goes:
sitc: bases full no outs B1 hits an in feild fly has to make no effort to catch touches ball but it falls to gound, IF is called batter out, runner on third goes homeon a steal stared with the pitch, runner from second makes it to third then goes home and is tagged out. play ends. pitcher appeals 3rd base runners tag up on in feild fly runner is called out. umpire based his call on the touched part of MLB defination of infeild fly rule. is that correct or is the touched not correct.

mcrowder · #2 (**permalink**) Wed May 05, 2004, 04:04pm

How would you have treated this if, say, there was only the runner on 2nd and 3rd?

The only think IF does is calls the batter out as soon as umpire makes the call. Everything else is then called using normal baseball rules. If I understand your situation right, the runners don't have to tag up at all - there was no caught fly ball, so they can not be appealled for having left early. They were allowed to leave.

quiggley94 · #3 (**permalink**) Wed May 05, 2004, 04:31pm

well since under that situation their is no IF there would have been no appeal i suspect. but my main question is the definition of touch included in the IF definition.
"The ball is alive and runners may advance at the risk of the ball being caught, or retouch and advance after the ball is touched, the same as on any fly ball."

[Edited by quiggley94 on May 5th, 2004 at 05:35 PM]

Rich Ives · #4 (**permalink**) Wed May 05, 2004, 07:00pm

An IF is the same as any other fly ball as far as the baserunners are concerned. If it isn't caught they don't have to re-tag.

The only thing different is that the batter is automatically out, removing any force play, so the runners can stay where they are.

DG · #5 (**permalink**) Wed May 05, 2004, 09:28pm

Quote:

Originally posted by quiggley94
well since under that situation their is no IF there would have been no appeal i suspect. but my main question is the definition of touch included in the IF definition.
"The ball is alive and runners may advance at the risk of the ball being caught, or retouch and advance after the ball is touched, the same as on any fly ball."

[Edited by quiggley94 on May 5th, 2004 at 05:35 PM]

As in the case for any fly ball, the moment the ball is touched, you can tag up and advance. The ball could be touched, juggled, and eventually caught, but the time of the tag up starts as soon as the ball is touched. In your case the ball was not caught, so no tag up is necessary.