Is this obstruction?

[Adam]

Originally Posted by Larry1953

Well, jeesh, it would have been awful easy to have said there was a difference between a fielder in the act of fielding a batted ball versus a thrown ball. I seriously doubt there is a distinction, at least at the LL level, now or 15 years ago. The rule refers to fielding A BALL that has gone past a fielder (not specifying whether it was a thrown ball or a batted ball) and it does so immediately after a lot of verbiage about a fielder setting up for a THROWN ball. They just happened to give an example of a fielder missing a batted ball, but that necessarily mean that such an example was meant to exclude THROWN balls.

If an umpire has attended a clinic or has a casebook reference that instructs umpires to make a distinction between thrown and batted balls I'd be delighted to have the reference. I'm just trying to get the call right when I volunteer to ump next year and, as it stands, I think I have the LL rulebook on my side.

I deleted my comment because I thought it was unnecessarily harsh. That said, you really have two choices.

1. Plug through the book all by your lonesome and be sure of yourself.

2. Plug through the book and take the learned advice from the umpires here on the forum (or other umpires to whom you have access) on the nuances of various rule and how they are supposed to apply to a real game.