Hit by pitch

[Larry1953]

Originally Posted by cbfoulds

I know I'm gonna regret this, and people I respect on this site will curse my name, but I can't resist:

Larry, will you please, in as few words as possible, tell me how in the name of Abner Doubleday the BATTER's uniform [color, design, ANYTHING ABOUT IT] could POSSIBLY "contribute" to his being HBP? Or be "distracting"? Or even be mildly interesting to talk about among umpires?

1) my comment concerned the PITCHER'S uniform (Red Sox throwback 1918 all-white including a solid white hat. (You put the emphasis on BATTER, I didn't) - watch the video per my link.
2) I was wrong. Billy Martin argued the point when the Yankees played the ChiSox when they came out with the clam-digger with white undershirt. A Chicago pitcher actually removed his but the league afterwards ruled it was OK.
3) sorry to have wasted time and bandwidth.

[Larry1953]

Baseball Video Highlights & Clips | CHC@BOS: Byrd is hit in the face by pitch, exits game - Video | MLB.com: Multimedia

The link I mentioned in case you didn't see it

[Larry1953]

Baseball rules corner: regulations prevent pitchers from distracting batters | Baseball Digest | Find Articles at BNET

This article discusses several situations throughout the history of MLB where umpires and the league office made rulings on pitchers having distracting paraphernalia. Protests have actually been lodged about it.

[APG]

Here's my guess on the situation...the batter didn't get out of the way because...it's not always easy getting out of the way of a 90 mile per hour moving object...especially if he was expecting something else.

[Larry1953]

Originally Posted by AllPurposeGamer

Here's my guess on the situation...the batter didn't get out of the way because...it's not always easy getting out of the way of a 90 mile per hour moving object...especially if he was expecting something else.

Exactly. And it is made even less easy by trying to pick up the ball out of a six and a half foot tall tampon on the mound.

[APG]

Originally Posted by Larry1953

Exactly. And it is made even less easy by trying to pick up the ball out of a six and a half foot tall tampon on the mound.

At the risk of entertaining this, as others have made it a point not to, I really doubt that had anything to do with it.

[Larry1953]

Originally Posted by AllPurposeGamer

At the risk of entertaining this, as others have made it a point not to, I really doubt that had anything to do with it.

I presume you watched the video, correct? Did you catch the part toward the end where the camera could not compensate for the intense white of the pitcher's hat when it focused on him? Freeze the video right before Byrd takes it in the left eye. His eye, the ball and the white hat are all in a line. Nah, couldn't have possibly had a thing to do with it. Not the slightest chance.