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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 12:12pm
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In a thread that's now closed, Papa C. said:
> Let's talk reality: The General Instructions are not a part of the > rules of baseball. Those "instructions" now run about 500 8 1/2 by 11 > pages and are distributed to each major league umpire. The comments in > the "back of the book" were guidelines added AFTER THE RULES 50 years > ago. (snip) > Still, the comments or Mr. Evans are not official > interpretations. But then neither are the "General Instructions to > Umpires." They are so NOT a part of the rules, they don't even have a > decimal number. > > I urge umpires not to justify screwing up by referring to something > that is long, long out of date -- and not canon law anyway. > __________________ Papa C Editor, eUmpire But Papa C, in your own Baseball Rules Differences, Section 465, you actually cite the "General instructions to umpires, following 9.05" as the OBR guideline for whether an umpire should carry his rulebook on the field or not. Are the general instructions so NOT part of the rules that umpires should be urged to ignore them because they are long, long out of date and non canon law anyway, or should they follow the information you've given them in section 485 of the BRD, which tells them - without any editorial comment about the notes being obsolete, not canon law, or generally ignored - to carry their rulebook on the field, because that's the OBR ruling according to the General Instructions? |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 12:38pm
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 01:23pm
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If you get a reply, Dave, see if you can find out how we are supposed to get this information out to the other 99% of umpires in the field who buy and read the rulebooks that contain this "outdated" information but do not frequent the internet boards.
Just a thought, Steve Member EWS |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 03:21pm
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Better yet.. I am waiting for the testimony of upheld protests due to the "pulled foot changed call play". Or a host of evidence establishing a pattern. I'm starting to think only ALIEN MIND RAY BEAMS can explain this goofy behavior. Mike Branch Founder EWS |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 04:12pm
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How did the "pulled foot changed call play" get into this discussion? If the official gets help BEFORE he makes a decision, no problem and no protest. If the official gets help AFTER he makes a decision, that's protestable for misapplication of rule 9.02(a). What could be easier to understand than that? You keep repeating the mantra that "it ain't ILLEGAL". I keep proving it is ILLEGAL. Do you have a learning difficulty? Are you intellectually or visually challenged that you can't understand or even see the facts? Or is it simply that you are determined to cement the burgeoning reputation of EWS for being a home for idiots and malcontents? Cheers, |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 05:10pm
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Phzzzzzzzz... another dud!
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The General Instructions to Umpires are an "OBR guideline" not "rules". How clear does this have to be? Guidelines may be accepted or rejected as appropriate, because they are GUIDELINES and NOT RULES! Anyone who reads and comprehends English understands the difference. Mr Hensley your approach is that of a naysayer with no better motive than to attack the probity of his enemies at every apparent opportunity. Such people are worthless in any sensible discussion because, as you have well established by your post, that approach is trivial, petty and entirely counterproductive to informed debate and knowledgable discourse. You, sir, are behaving like a 5th columnist for the EWS idiot society. I'm sure most reasonable posters will have noticed that by now. It is time to come out of the closet and openly declare your interests and affiliations, too! BTW, was it section 465 or 485 you were citing in your post? Surely you haven't made such a mammoth and unthinkable mistake as to get a citation reference number wrong, have you? Wouldn't that be a crushing error for one so committed to finding such errors for others? (grin) Cheers, |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 05:45pm
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You are being discovered
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Dude.. you are so WRONG. Look that up.. it means incorrect. Anything CAN be protested (mostly). Judgment calls are NOT... but that leaves everything else. They can PROTEST whatever the hell they want. Will it be upheld.. NO. But your line above is wrong, and someone has to call you out. It is NOT up to the umpires to decide what CAN and CANNOT be protested. (I will defer to and umpire not allowing a judgment call protest...but even in that case, I would advise to ALLOW it and move on.. after all what the hell difference does it make.) Coach: I protest! Me: Why? Coach: Because your hat is ugly. Me: Fine, scorekeepers, game is continuing under protest. PLAY! This is the coaches problem.. not mine. Mike Branch Founder, Member EWS [Edited by BJ Moose on Feb 18th, 2001 at 12:56 AM] |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 05:58pm
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I give up what is EWS?
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My first question is what does EWS stand for? If it is another umpire board or umpire group I don't think I can take any more -- but I'm liable to try especially if name-calling is not rampant... I know I'm not going to convince you that Warren is simply correct on the issue of an umpire not legally changing a judgment call. This seems to have been beaten to death and you do not seem inclined to change. What has apparently worked for you and gone unchallenged i.e. changing judgment calls "to get it right" after the fact does not make it correct and within the accepted norms of upper level baseball. In ten years of baseball I have had perhaps two or three attempts to protest none of which had any legitimacy to them. So this tells me from my experience games are rarely protested. There is often a cost involved. Also coaches are less likely to protest when officials seem to be in charge. I would not dispute that you give coaches positive vibes therefore your "modified approach" works for you. By golly if the leagues you work in are happy when an umpire changes a judgment call such as a pulled foot or a missed tag than give them what they want. If you want to judge whether that is accepted norm we would have to submit it to some type of vote. Here there seems to be an awful lot of members but few regular posters. Than the Internet represents according to someone's computation only 1% of all umpires (I have no clue as to the basis of this estimate) so that really might not carry enough weight. I think at some time as mature adults we need to bring an issue to a close. "I think the rose was red. says Warren "No it was definitely yellow., says Mike. Warren attempts another approach showing the history of the rose the preponderance of red among roses etc. al. We don't know whether anyone else is actually listening and worse yet whether they care. But it is clear YOU remain unconvinced. That is the time to bring it to a close. I happen to be very supportive of most positions or interpretations Warren makes. Why when I stated out he was posting as the Great Kola. But the thing I hate about these boards is that we allow ourselves to go down a slippery slope of name calling rather than just saying "Thank you sir but I choose to remain unconvinced" Next topic PLEASE. |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 06:35pm
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Re: You have already been discovered...
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*sigh* Obviously you didn't read OBR 4.19, did you Moose? "No protest shall ever be permitted on judgement decisions by the umpire...When ever a manager protests a game because of alleged misapplication of the rules the protest will not be recognized unless the umpires are notified at the time the play under protest occurs and before the next pitch is made or a runner retired." This passage clearly allows that protests: 1. Over judgement calls, or 2. That are not made because of alleged misapplication of rules, or 3. That are made too late, or 4. That are not properly notified under the rules, except on a game ending play,... ...will not be either permitted or recognized. Permitted by whom? Recognized by whom? Who is charged under OBR 9.01(b) to "...enforce all of these rules"? The UMPIRE is, Moose! Protests can ONLY be legally made over an alleged misapplication of the RULES, Moose. Otherwise the UMPIRE is charged with refusing to recognize or permit such a protest under the RULES, Moose! Try reading OBR 9.02(b) and you will discover the ONLY legal cause a manager has for protest. Tch, tch, tch. Curiouser and curiouser... Now I don't know what cockamamie ideas you will come up with about this issue, but they surely can't be any more idiotic than the ones you've so generously shared about the legality or illegality of changing judgement calls. All the same, give it your best shot! After all, once a proven idiot the only way left open is UP, Dude! Cheers, [Edited by Warren Willson on Feb 17th, 2001 at 05:43 PM] |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 07:09pm
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Moose's argument that an umpire should "accept" any protest, without attempting to quash it because it is over a judgment call, is supported by at least two authoritative opinions I am aware of.
This issue has been the subject of lively debate in various discussion forums for years. Last year, it came up on the eteamz.com discussion board right around this time. The focus at that time was on Little League's protest rule, and whether an umpire could or should "reject" a protest because it was over a judgment decision rather than a disputed rule interpretation. It so happened one of the participants in that discussion was going to be attending a Little League rules clinic that very weekend, that was to be attended by Andy Konyar, UIC for Little League Baseball. He took that question (and a number of others) to the meeting and came back with the gospel according to Andy K. On this issue, Andy supported my argument (which is the same as Moose's) that an umpire should acknowledge and announce a coach's protest when it is made, and not attempt to "deny" or "disallow" or "reject" the protest. Ruling on the validity of the protest is the protest committee's job, not the umpire's. The other authoritative opinion is the Professional Interpretation as reported by Jim Evans in Baseball Rules Annotated. He says: > Professional Interpretation: At times, a manager may insist on lodging > a protest on a decision which is, in essence, a judgment call. After > explaining the prohibition against protesting judgment calls, the > umpire should go ahead and accept the protest in order to proceed with > the game in a timely manner. It will then be the league presidents > responsibility to nullify the improperly lodged protest. There can be no doubt that this remains the current professional interpretation, as just about every protest in MLB you read about is, in fact, over a disputed judgment call. The homerun that should have been fan interference in the ALCS game a couple of years ago was protested - protest denied, judgment decision. Last year, the Rangers protested a balk call. Bzzzzt. One other reason the umpire should not attempt to deny a protest on the field is because umpires' rulings frequently (hell, almost always) involve both judgment and rule application. Sometimes, it's not completely clear whether the argument is over the umpire's judgment, or his interpretation of the applicable rule. Rather than hash that out on the field, it's better and fairer to let a protest committee sort through the facts and resolve the matter. Infield fly rule is a good example of a rule that has equal parts judgment and rule application, and depending on how the umpire describes his decision making process, what appeared to be a judgment call could have indeed been a misapplication of the rule. This situation (coach demanding to protest a judgment call) is best summed up with the old joke about the guy who took his wife camping and deer hunting, and then the next morning, hearing a gunshot followed by loud arguing, he ran to the scene and saw his wife holding her gun on a terrified park ranger with his hands up, saying "OK, lady, OK. He's your deer. But at least let me get my saddle off of him." In this situation, let the coach have his deer. Then use his protest fee to treat the protest committee to beer and pizza. |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 08:04pm
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> Why would anyone need an "editorial comment" when they already have
> the words right there? Do you even own a BRD, Warren? In the BRD section I cited, Carl uses the General Instructions reference to carrying your rulebook. The clear inference is that, for OBR, the cite from the General Instructions is operative. He says nothing about it being unofficial, obsolete, or generally ignored in practice. The conflict between his BRD reference and his position on the General Instructions as expressed recently in this discussion forum is obvious, and as a paying customer of the BRD and a paying subscriber to eumpire.com, my question asking him to reconcile that conflict is entirely appropriate. > The General Instructions to Umpires are an "OBR guideline" not > "rules". How clear does this have to be? Guidelines may be accepted or > rejected as appropriate, because they are GUIDELINES and NOT RULES! > Anyone who reads and comprehends English understands the difference. Yet none of that was included in the BRD citation. > Mr Hensley your approach is that of a naysayer with no better motive > than to attack the probity of his enemies at every apparent > opportunity. "Enemies," eh Warren? No, I think of them as peers, colleagues, correspondents, or, at the most heated moments, opponents. Never "enemies." I leave the warfare fantasies and schoolgirlish cliques to others. And who are you to speculate as to my motives? Here's a novel idea you might try - you be responsible for what YOU say and why you say it, and I'll be responsible for what I say, and why I say it. > Such people are worthless in any sensible discussion > because, as you have well established by your post, that approach is > trivial, petty and entirely counterproductive to informed debate and > knowledgable discourse. "Such people are worthless?" And you never engage in personal attacks, right? If you practiced what you preach, you'd have said "such approaches are worthless." That's the difference between attacking the message and attacking the messenger. Back in the 80's, I was a moderator for the Public Forum/Nonprofit Connection on the online service GEnie. One of those duties included deleting and returning posts containing personal attacks to their senders, with an explanation of the transgression and how they could fix it. If you had posted there like you post here, you'd have gotten about an 80% rejection rate. Oh, by the way, your statement above begs the question. Can you make any argument without tripping over a logical fallacy? > You, sir, are behaving like a 5th columnist for the EWS idiot society. > I'm sure most reasonable posters will have noticed that by now. It is > time to come out of the closet and openly declare your interests and > affiliations, too! You're behaving like U.S. Senator Joe McCarthy. > BTW, was it section 465 or 485 you were citing in your post? Surely > you haven't made such a mammoth and unthinkable mistake as to get a > citation reference number wrong, have you? Wouldn't that be a crushing > error for one so committed to finding such errors for others? (grin) Oops, my bad. The correct reference is 465. Thanks for pointing out the typo. |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 08:30pm
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Just The Facts 'Mam
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As to protests my association advises us to accept protests and move on and be pretty damn sure you aren't screwing up a rule. So I might tell a coach he can't protest my ball and strike calls but once he says he still wants to -- sign the book and move on with the show. Jim/NY |
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 08:57pm
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One of the summer leagues I work requires a $10 fee for a protest, payable at the time of the protest, nonrefundable if the protest is denied. Needless to say there aren't many protests. Not only are coaches afraid of losing $10 they could be spending for beer after the game, they don't want to have to hand a $10 bill to the umpire after yelling at him!
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Sat Feb 17, 2001, 10:20pm
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$10 is a bargain. The minimum fee in the various leagues I call is $20, although, come to think of it, I think I recall our MSBL league is going to experiment this year and do away with the protest fee.
I think a protest fee should be high enough to dissuade the manager from protesting frivolously, but low enough to not pose an undue burden when a legitimate issue of controversy exists. In other words, twenty bucks.  |
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