Balk or not? FED
 

Rule 6 Section 1 ART. 3 . . . For the set position, ..... He shall go to the set position without interruption and in one continuous motion. He shall come to a complete and discernible stop (a change of direction is not considered an acceptable stop) with the ball in both hands in front of the body and his glove at or below his chin. Natural preliminary motions such as only one stretch may be made. During these preliminary motions and during the set position until a delivery motion occurs, the pitcher may turn on his pivot foot or lift it in a jump turn to step with the non-pivot foot toward a base while throwing or feinting as outlined in 6-2-4 and 2-28-5, or he may lift his pivot foot in a step backward off the pitcher's plate which must be in or partially within the 24-inch length of the pitcher's plate....


Situation: Runner on 1st. Left handed pitcher. Pitcher brings his hands together and slowly starts his preliminary motion that would normally precede coming to a pause. As he is doing this (not even close to a pause) he steps toward 1st and throws.

Legal or not?

Legal. In FED and all codes. No pause / stop needed when throwing to a base.

"During these preliminary motions and during the set position until a delivery motion occurs, the pitcher may turn on his pivot foot or lift it in a jump turn to step with the non-pivot foot toward a base while throwing or feinting as outlined in 6-2-4 and 2-28-5, or he may lift his pivot foot in a step backward off the pitcher's plate which must be in or partially within the 24-inch length of the pitcher's plate"

In your thread, the pitcher did exactly what the rule allows him to do, so why would you say it is NOT legal.

I didn't say it was not legal. I was expecting people more experienced than myself to support or verify the way I interpreted it : that it was a legal move.

Got it. My bad

Just as a little background, I was doing a game last Saturday and a play happened as I described in the original post. I heard the usual mumbling and chirping "that's a balk" from the offensive dugout / fanbase which I ignored.

Between innings one of the coaches (he was very calm and cordial) inquired about the move. I said it was legal. Later in the game, he then got his rule book and pointed out the phrase " He shall go to the set position without interruption and in one continuous motion. He shall come to a complete and discernible stop..."

I told him to keep reading until he gets to the part that says "During these preliminary motions...the pitcher may turn on his pivot foot or lift it in a jump turn to step with the non-pivot foot toward a base while throwing .."

He seemed satisfied with my answer but I just wanted to be sure I was interpreting the rule as a whole correctly.

Thanks.

Did he watch the rest of the game from the parking lot?

No reason for that.

If a coach pulls a rule book
 

Back in the day when I knew all of the rules and was full of piss and vinegar, if a coach pulled out a rule book, he was questioning my ability to umpire that game. He would have been in the parking lot as soon as I saw it.

Now in my older, more wisen (is that a word?) state and thanks to this forum, I allow the coach to ask his question and I answer it succinctly and tell him I will scan the relavent sections of the reference manual to which I refer and send him an email.

I had a friend that would bet the coach $50 that the coach was wrong and the assigner would be the arbitrater. He got an extra $200 that season.:)

If a coach wants to calmly and respectfully discuss rules with me between innings, I'll let him.

Coach coming out of the dugout a little while later than we discussed a rule, with the book open to the rule asking me to clarify is COMPLETELY different than coach coming out of the dugout with book held high (not even opened), telling me I don't know the rules.