Phillies protest IR ruling

[Larry1953]

Originally Posted by bob jenkins

1) We only know what the initial (or close to it) memo / press release said. It's certainly possible (and I would say likely) that it has been discussed / clarified over the past three years, even if it hasn't been published to us.

2) When in doubt, keep it live. IT's a lot easier to send the runner back than to try to guess where he would have ended up if the play was killed in error. So, the fact that they didn't declare a home run initially means nothing.

The crew ended up getting the call right. It would be a good idea to rewrite the replay rule/procedure to very clearly allow them to rule the way they did. It is obviously poorly written as the confusing semantics of the way it is now written is what caused the protest.

Furthermore, I don't see why replay can't be slightly expanded to allow review of fan interference in a ground rule double situation to properly place the runners so an obvious run by R1 on a gapper is not negated by having to otherwise stop him at third. In 2009, MLB told a crew that used replay for that was wrong to do so. Not much different mechanically than the West call, so why not incorporate that too?