Check Swing Appeal...Unrequested?

[w_sohl]

Originally posted by Rich Fronheiser
I say "Ball. No, he didn't go" on EVERY checked swing. To not do so is equivalent to what umpires used to do back when I started in the 80s -- have secret signals designed to tell your partner that you don't want your call of "Ball" reversed.

We disagree on the appropriate-ness of that, so there's no sense bringing that up.

BTW, I don't see a gray area. At face value, I either see a swing or see a no swing. Strike or ball. But if that bat moves off the shoulder and I determine that the batter hasn't offered, I say "Ball. No, he didn't go."

That doesn't mean I made the correct call by any means. And it doesn't remove the responsibility of me quickly appealing that pitch when the outcome of that appeal and the timeliness of it could affect the game.

Then again, I've never been bothered with base umpires reversing the ball call to a strike call. To me, it's always just been part of the game.

Rich

I am jumping into the middle of this topic so I am sorry if I am repeating something that was already voiced. I don't see the problem with Rich's mechanic on a checked swing. All he is doing is vocalizing what he thought happened. We do the same thing when we don't call strike, we are telling the players that we don't think he offered and therfore we are calling it a ball. Now if you are 100% sure that you are correct and they ask for an appeal you do not need to grant it, you are the final authority. If i wasn't 100% and I vocalized my opinion and they asked for an appeal I might go with the appeal. I know this will bring a coach out of the dugout if the call is changed, but I would explaine to him the exact same thing, "Coach, I wasn't 100%, so I went to my partner for help." But, just for the sake of argument, I don't vocalize unless I am 100%.