Dangerous, Deadly Dangerous

[David Emerling]

Originally posted by cbfoulds
My fav is the caught-foul mechanics error do-over. Nobody but umpires is gonna get excited about the two plays where the lodged-ball/glove sitch happens. Somebody somewhere in Fedland is going to need an armed escort to the car for indicating "Foul" before the ball is caught in foul territory. [/B]

The FED "foul ball" debacle will never happen because any umpire incompetent enough to call "Foul!" before a ball is caught is also incompetent enough not to be aware of the casebook ruling. Consequently, he'll probably go "Oops!" and still call the batter out.

Everyone will have a good chuckle at his expense. The batter will be out. And not a single person on the field will be aware that a FED casebook play had just been violated ... other than, perhaps, the other umpire; who is certainly not going to say a word at this point.

Ridiculous rulings like this don't bother me for some reason. They might as well have ruled:

If, during the course of live ball action, a meteorite hits the playing field, causing such catastrophic disruption of the Earth's atmosphere that it sends the entire planet into an Ice Age - the umpire shall immediately call time and declare the home team the winner of the ball game. The visitors are awarded a forfeit.

I think that would be a bad rule, too. But I don't care. Get my point?

David Emerling
Memphis, TN

[Edited by David Emerling on Feb 9th, 2005 at 10:13 AM]