Intent of the Rule

[Jim Porter]

Jim,

I'm not much for this back and forth business. But I feel I must respond to your slight misrepresentation of my opinion.

You said, "Now, I think it's been determined on both sides of the aisle that this is a balk. The question has been, does one enforce it?"

That may have been decided on your side of the aisle, but not mine. And please stop fueling this idea that there are two sides. There are not. There are independent opinions. I align myself in this debate with no, "side".

A balk is a judgment call. While I agree that, under most circumstances, the improper act by the pitcher would be a balk, I do not agree in this instance. A balk is a judgment call. Say it with me, "A balk is a judgment call."

You created a new situation with your altered scenario that doesn't apply to the debate. We've been discussing a pitcher who disengages improperly, and now you're starting to talk about a pitcher who never even diengages. The two situations are quite different.

Next, you bring up yet another situation in which the coach tells his pitcher to go from the stretch, but he delivers anyway. Then you tell me that I've placed R1 at a huge disadvantage. How? The pitcher delivered legally! I didn't even have to make a balk judgment.

You also talk about consistency. I'm glad you brought that up. In my opinion, one of the reasons we are so inconsistent from one umpire to another, is because too many umpires are enforcing the black-and-white letter of the rules, rather than using discretion, judgment, common sense, and spirit and intent.

Young umpires tend to get a small amount of rules information, and they get all excited and run right out onto the field to start penalizing and enforcing. This causes headaches for the experienced umpires who are doing their part to uphold the traditions of the umpire as an impartial arbiter, assuring one team does not gain an advantage over the other not intended by the rules.