Fed Rule Book

[Jake80]

Originally posted by Carl Childress

Jake: Just a couple of points. First, don't write your reply in bold face. That's used by the progam to identify quoted material. When you also use the bold attribute, it's hard to tell where the quote stops and your comment begins.

Second, the FED simply wrote in their book something that had been long discussed - and agreed to - by rule experts. The FED casebook for 1982 says: "The addition to this rule [ball hitting beyond imaginary line is fair] was made simply to clarify a long-standing ruling."

Of course, it's a theoretical discussion only: In four thousand games, mas o menos, where I've been on the field, I've never seen it happen.

Finally, you don't need to "explain" to a coach that such a ball is fair. It's black letter law, just like three strikes, four balls, and the plate is in fair territory. {"Really?" the assistant coach from Kansas once asked me.)

BTW: If that play happened on my field, I'd point "fair," and I'd bet ten dollars to a penny nobody would say anything. Here's why:

The rules at every level state something like this: "[A fair ball is one that] first falls on fair territory on or beyond first base or third base." If that line is drawn between first and third, and if that ball falls behind that line, hasn't it hit "on fair territory ... beyond first base or third base"?

Think about it!

[/B][/QUOTE] [/B][/QUOTE]


That explaination makes sense to me. I had not quite pictured "on fair territory - beyond first or third base" that way. I agree that this situation would be rare but now I will know how to handle it. Thanks. Hmmm. Could be that I'm one of those third world umpires.

[mbyron]

Originally posted by Jake80

I'm sorry if anyone took offense. My response was not meant to question the poster just my surprise at that actually being the FED interpretation. I can just imagine trying to explain to a coach that the ball landed behind an "imaginary" line between first and third and then rolled foul without being touched is fair for the purpose of the infield fly. And would that also apply to a non infield fly situation?

The line is "imaginary" only in the sense that they don't chalk it. There really is a line between 1B and 3B, just as there's a line between 1B and 2B. Turns out both can be important to calling a game.

[UMP25]

Think of this line in terms of geometry. Remember what the line between each corner of a square is called? The diagonal.

The diagonal that runs from first to third is this line to which the rules refer when it talks about a ball that passes it.

[bob jenkins]

Originally posted by Jake80



That explaination makes sense to me. I had not quite pictured "on fair territory - beyond first or third base" that way. I agree that this situation would be rare but now I will know how to handle it. Thanks. Hmmm. Could be that I'm one of those third world umpires.

Right -- without any clarification, some would picture the phrase as meaning "behind a line between first and third," some as "outside the infield," and a (very) few as "beyond a 90' arc from the plate connecting first and third." FED clarifies which of those pictures we are to use.