Interference or not

[Carl Childress]

Originally posted by mick

By "Play on," I simply meant there should be no penalty. I'm not convinced the ball should be dead. If we're going to treat the confusion at the dugout as incidental, not worthy of a penalty, why should we stop play?

R3, R2. F1 tries to pick off R2, and the shortstop and runner get tangled up. We don't stop play. We allow the defense to make an out, or the offense to score a run.

Let's just "Play on."

What'ya think?

Carl,
I sense a slight difference between the plays.

On the pick off play, all the players are where they "should be" when the incidental contact is manifested; but on the pass ball, the player, who went on the trip last fall, was somewhere he "should not have been".

Given that the incidental contact with the catcher did not "apparently affect the play" at third, there is a potential (I didn't see the play very well.) that the catcher could have been disadvantaged by prolonged contact, by slight or severe injury or by otherwise having been hindered by the accident.

By not calling "Time", we have left open the door for additional ugliness due to an impotent act.

By killing the play, we have now protected that defense from a subsequent unfair disadvantage that may have been gained by an accidental player being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and we have ensured safety and fairness, with no need for toilet paper.

mick
[/QUOTE]I wouldn't throw you out of my association for that argument. But "both were they were supposed to be" isn't the final arbiter every time.

In my play, the catcher was certainly where he was supposed to be -- keeping the ball alive at the lip of the dugout. The offensive player was completely in the dugout, out of harm's way, until he tripped, probably on the hull of a sunflower seed.

I've only talked on the phone to the umpire who faced the play and called interference. I haven't probed. He's supposed to be at today's 4-man mechanics clinic. (1:00 to 4:30: We're getting ready for the play-offs and it's state mandated training for anyone who wants to move along the food chain.)

More later today. I hope.