Dead-ball Area &

[Warren Willson]

Originally posted by chris s
Warren, above you mention throwing while falling the same as having fallen? I have one HS field that has a skinned infield, slopes towards FBL.When it rains, we have a nice pig wallow area that is chalked off, gives F3 about ten feet of live ball area. Numerous times I have seen a pop foul get caught and fielder gets throw off as he is falling on his ass. I guess this would be a time play?(grin) ass hits mud before throw, award bases. Throw gets off before ass hits, play it! Would you agree?

My purely personal opinion, Chris, is that

(1) IF the fielder is in dead ball territory when he releases the throw AND
(2) IF he is in the act of "falling" when he releases the throw AND
(3) IF he subsequently "falls" on his behind THEN

IMHO the ball is DEAD and the throw is NOT allowed. OTOH,

(1) IF the fielder is NOT in dead ball territory when he releases the throw OR
(2) IF the fielder is NOT in the act of "falling" when he releases the throw i.e. he has complete body control OR
(3) IF the fielder does NOT subsequently "fall" on his behind THEN

IMHO the ball is ALIVE and the throw IS allowed.

I stress that this is purely a personal opinion, but you can certainly see the timing issue with respect to when the fielder has actually released the ball (Time of the Throw) and whether he was in the act of "falling" at that time.

Cheers,


[Edited by Warren Willson on Feb 25th, 2001 at 05:23 PM]