Time?

[oatmealqueen]

Saw this happen in a Fed softball tournament this past weekend.
R1 on 3rd, 1 out. B2 lays down a bunt, and catcher tries to pick R1 off who has taken a lead from 3rd on the bunt. R1 slides, hand first back into 3rd and is called safe by the umpire. R1 requests time and umpire begins to slightly raise hands, stopping at about neck level.
But what he failed to realize was B2 tooling into second.
Time was never verbalized, and no one held up, hesitated or barely noticed the slight raising, then dropping of hands.
Except: one coach on the defensive team who wanted his butt.
Should time have been called? What now?

[TexBlue]

If the blue didn't verbalize it, time was never called. I think we've all started to raise our hands, see something and change our minds. In this situation, his actions didn't imipact anything on the field. The coach ain't getting too much of my butt at all on this. Probably none, actually.

[UmpireErnie]

I am guessing Coach wanted to send the BR back to first, right? So basically Coach is upset that Blue didn't quite make a mistake; and by not making the mistake Coach's team didn't get a benifit it hadn't earned? Gimme a break! I agree with Tex, it's not going to be a long conversation.

[BoomerSooner]

A similar discussion was held over in the baseball forum. Time is actually granted whenever the umpire gives it. The formal signal is just that ... the formality that lets everyone know its been granted. I think any umpire that was half way to calling time (i.e. hands almost up) in the described situation would call R1 out if R1 had been tagged out while getting back to his/her feet after assuming time had been called. The important point however is that time should only be called at the end of all playing action.