OBR Rule 7.09 (h)

[Carl Childress]

quote:

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Originally posted by Art Hager:
A question for clarification:

7.09(h) If, in the judgment of the umpire, a batter runner willfully and deliberately interferes with a batted ball or a fielder in the act of fielding a batted ball, with the obvious intent to break up a double play...

Let's assume r1 and r3. BR hits pop up to f1 and interferes. How do you judge intent?

Now in this play, do we have a 7.09(h) situation? It's a pop up, so what double play would the BR be trying to break up? I guess F1 could let the ball fall in front of him (untouched) and then to to second, but that seems unlikely. I suppose it could be reasonable to give the benefit of the doubt to the defense in this case, although if F1 seems to be planning to catch the pop up, what do you have?

How about the same play with a runner on second only? BR is still a bad guy, but what DP could he be trying to break up?

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Art:

I raised that same issue back in the 70s, and Nick Bremigan said that a double play must be obvious. There are two possibilities, he said:

(1) There is a force situation, the batter hits a ground ball. (R1 or R1, R2, or bases loaded, or R1, R3.) You will not have a double play with this configuration: R2, or R3, or R2 and R3.

(2) There is a pop-up with a runner off his base, as in the play Pete describes. That's the "classic" example of calling out the runner nearer home with the B-R interferes before touching first.

In your play there could be a double play, and I would call it.

R2 is far enough from the base to interfere with the shortstop's fielding of the pop-up. If he had continued, F6 will catch the fly (B1 is out) and throw to F4, who tags second (R2 is out).

Stick with the configurations for a ground ball force or judge whether a runner is far enough from a base to make a double-play possible on a caught fly ball appeal.

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Papa C
Editor, eUmpire