I was watching the Maryland 3-A high school championship game Friday and thought there was something odd about what one pitcher was doing but couldn't put my finger on it. By the end of the second inning I realized what it was. She stepped on the rubber each time with the ball and hand in her glove, held that positon for 2-3 seconds, and then went into her pitching motion. Hands were never seperated at any time before the pitch.

Lots of questions then entered my mind. Has she gotten away with this all year (they were the defending state champions)? Did the ump ever notice it (as I said it took me a couple of innings to figure it out). And how would I explain it to the coach that it took me 2 innings to catch it?

That's my question to you. If it took you a couple of innings to realize that the pitcher had been illegal since the beginning how would you handle it?

I would call the illegal pitch when I noticed it, being careful of the base runners situations after I hadn't called it for a few innings till I noticed it. It's still illegal and probably something like this should have been noticed on her first pitch or first warm-up pitch. Needs to take the signal or appear to be taking a signal with the hands seperated. The pitch starts when one hand is taken off the ball after the hands have been brought together. So in her case she is illegal as soon as she walks on the pitchers plate with the hands together. There are preliminaries that have to be followed on every pitch and she has been getting away with not following them.

[Edited by Ed Maeder on May 31st, 2004 at 03:40 PM]

Jimmy, What team did she play for???? I did the semi betweem Severna Park and I forget the other team at Randazzo Park. Don't remember seeing anything wrong with the Sererna Park pitcher.

Del-Blue,

She pitched for Severna Park ( they were playing Fallston, the eventual winner). Blonde girl. Don't take me wrong: I'm not pointing the finger at the ump. As I said it took me a couple of innings to figure it out. I was just wondering how one would approach the subject after 2 innings of it slipping by.

LJ, et. al.,

If she was doing every thing else correctly, i.e. taking a sign, etc, and her motion was pretty natural (which it sounds like it was) I would probably wait until the inning was over, then take out my lineup card and go have a chat with the girl' coach. I'd let him know that what she was doing was technically illegal and ask him to fix it.

Basically, all of the pre-pitch preliminaries are intended to prevent the pitcher from quick pitching the battem so if IMJ, she was not trying to quick pitch, I would probably let it go.

SamC

Jimmy,

Sounds like the same pitcher that pitched in my game. I cam understand you not seeing it right away, cause I don't remember it al all. If I had, I probably would have handeled it the same was as Sam suggested

SamC.

Since the move is IP, if I did as you suggestion, regardless
of the situation the next time it happened, I would call it.
The ball has to be in one or the other hand, with hands spearated.
If she was doing this all year, then it probably was going to be
tough for her to make the adjustment. State playoffs or not,
this should be called.

JMHO