Another Inquiry on the balk?

[cbfoulds]

Originally posted by hawk0213
IF you can be on the rubber wehn you throw over then why do they say you have to stepoff to throw over? Every book I have read says that the pivot foot must clear the rubber in order to throw over?

I am in no position to question professionals and therefore I wont but is there any publishings or direct quotes that support this rule?

A book by Joe "Spanky" Mcfarland, a longtime college baseball coach, states in his book "Coaching Pitchers", "The pivot foot must clear the rubber, and the stride foot must go toward first base to avoid a balk."

Any help with clarification would be appreciated.

Jon

Because "they" [who say F1 must step off on a pick off move] are idiots.

I suggest that you add a Rule Book to your reading list. Once you do, your "every book I've read" statement will no longer be true.

ORB 8.05(c): "[It is a balk when...] the pitcher, while touching his plate [the rubber], fails to step directly toward a base before throwing to that base."

The comment/ casebook annexed to this rule makes it clear that F1 MAY step off, in which case any number of otherwise illegal acts are now legal. But NOWHERE in any rule book is F1 REQUIRED to step off the rubber before THROWING, provided he takes the required step toward the base.

HS[Fed] version of this rule is 6-2-4(b). Fed 6-1-3 explicitly says that F1 may "turn on his pivot foot ... to step with his non-pivot foot toward a base while throwing ..."

With runners on, I am presuming that F1 is NOT pitching from the wind-up [iow, he's going from the set]. 'Cause under Fed rules, F1 cannot do anything other than pitch from the wind up without steping off the rubber with his pivot foot first.

Maybe ol' Spanky was the victim of a bad editor, who substituted "and" for "or"?

Hope this helps.

--Carter

[Edited by cbfoulds on Aug 8th, 2004 at 05:31 PM]