Our association held one of its pre season HS meetings last night. Here is the discussion point:

You are BU, R1 on first. R1 attempts to steal 2B, yuo move to good position and make the call on a close play. For the purposes of the scenario, the call itself does not matter. The coach of the team the call went against comes charging out of the dugout to "discuss" the call. As s/he get close to you, s/he trips/stumbles/falls or momentum carries him/her into you and you are bumped. Do you eject the coach for making physical contact with you?

For the purposes of this discussion, ignore the fact that the coach "charged" out of the dugout.

IMO you can't ignore the "charging". That is what percipitated the stumbling/fall/contact.

The coach is gone.

Roger Greene

Some of the guys I work with would have ejected him during the "charging" part, before he even got that close. Personally, I probably wouldn't have, but I agree with Roger - it was the aggressive inappropriate behavior from the coach that precipitated the contact. He's gone.

I'm going to agree with Roger, too.

Andy, was Emily there & what was her take on that?

Got to agree, if he "charged" out and fell, s/he is gone. Now if he or she calmly walked out and tripped and fell because they were clumsy, I would probably let that go. Coach is going to be embarrassed enough in that case.

Andy,

I think that the coach will be in violation of all of the following
rules, 3-6-6, 3-6-15 and 3-6-16, the latter two
carrying an ejection as penalty unless the offense is
judged to be of a minor nature. Since it seems his action
were aggressive.

JMHO,

I have to agree. The coaches' running out there sets the tone for the situation. Running out in a bellicose manner and then stumbling, whether by accident or intentional, is gonna get the coach a trip to Austin to explain why their presence was no longer necessary on the field. I'm not sure I'd eject them on the charging out on the field. I'd give it serious consideration, it just depends on what kind of discussion we have.

Emily was not at this particular meeting.

The discussion started when the facilitator was discussing ejections and made the statement that any physical contact by a coach toward an umpire was an immediate, automatic ejection. Of course, this brought up a bunch of "what ifs".

The one that I posted was the most interesting and debated situation. I just wanted to throw it out there for thoughts.

Personally, my take was the same as Roger's and yours - I've already ejected the coach due to the "charging" before he got close enough to bump me.

I thought you said to ignore the "charge" Maybe just pointing and laughing real loud would be enough. Brian

Coach charges out of the dugout, without given a time out. As soon as he/she crosses the foul line, GONE!

Bob