Home run - missed the plate!!

[Larry1953]

Originally Posted by RichMSN

From a coaching perspective, sure. From an umpiring perspective, I don't care if he crawls on his belly and touches the bag with his tongue as he goes by.

The next batter hit a home run. The call took a run off the board.

I guess from an umpiring perspective, Danley was just supposed to assume that Brown might have brushed the "wrong" side of the bag when he screwed up his stride and stagger-stepped across the bag, leaving even the runner unsure if he touched it (to one account) and admitting that he missed it in another.

As an aside, I've never been one to subscribe to the "die are cast" concept of baseball causality of outcome. Yeah, I know it is done with earned runs and all, but that's not the way life is. So who is to say that Mayberry, with one out and R3 isn't called on to put on a squeeze - and he pops up into a DP and the Phillies "lose" a run? The HR was not a given - the pitcher goes from the stretch instead of the windup, chooses a different pitch and location; the batter has a different stroke in a sac fly situation versus bases empty. If you can't "assume the double play" when it comes to officially scoring errors, you surely can't assume a HR in an entirely different matrix.

[MD Longhorn]

I'm in agreement with those who say that if you don't KNOW he missed the base, then he didn't miss it. However, in the OP, the umpire KNEW he stepped on black. All comments about dirt aside - if you KNOW the player stepped only on black - are some of you really saying you'll not allow the appeal - and worse (apparently) eject the coach for arguing when YOU are the one that is wrong? That's awful. It's not game management. It's cheating.

Seems to me it's pretty easy for a guy to step on home plate during a dead ball - we shouldn't reward him for being lazy about it and missing, however narrowly.