6.02 (a) (c)

[socalblue1]

Originally Posted by PeteBooth

Garth, as with most rule changes the Players Union will get involved.

About 10 yrs. ago or so, the Umpires were instructed to call balks in line with the rules, not the way things were. During that time, there were more balks called in 1/2 of the season compared to all of the preceding year.

After the All Star break things went back to "normal" which tells me that the Players Union got involved.

In a nutshell, baseball can change any of it's rules but ultimately, the Players Union will have the final say.

You really think that an umpire in the World Series will call Derek Jeter out on strike three if he fails to show up in the batter's box in accordance with the rules.

Pete Booth

The rule changes in 2006 were all approved by the player union, with differing start dates (IE: all changes were active in MiLB last year, with only a few in MLB). All changes from 2006 are now relevant across all professional baseball.

The mechanic is stated above is was taught at Evans in Oct (AZ Classic).

[johnnyg08]

this is a good rule change...if I remember correctly, a batter still couldn't, by rule, jump in and hit the pitch...but it wasn't a dead ball sitch...this is a nice, umpire friendly, rule change.