This happened today. ASA youth fastpitch. Team playing with nine. Injury occurs bringing # to eight. Playing shorthanded and preparing to take the out at bat when sub arrives and fills in. Problem avoided.

But this got me thinking. Eariler this year this scenario happened when I was doing the field and I forgot about it till now. Same situation. Playing shorthanded with 8. With 2 outs defense prepared to walk batter before automatic out and offensive coach and plate ump confered and said this was not legal. Batter can't be walked to get to the automatic out. I even remember a rule being sited. Game continued with out being skipped over. I forgot about this until today.

I've been looking all evening amd can't find anything that states this. Am I dreaming? Hallucinating? I'm sure the incident happened that way but now I can't find anything to back it up.

Little Jimmy,

It may have been a local league rule. I cannot find anything
stating this in the ASA Rule Book. There is at least one association
that states it, but am unable to locate it at the present.
Still looking.

What? You're gonna give the batter sixteen balls and still have her at the plate? You could be in for a l-o-n-g afternoon.

Four balls is a walk - whether intentional or otherwise.

Next batter! If the next batter is an automatic out, so be it.

HUH!

I have heard that ISA will not allow you to walk a batter to get to an out as in this situation.
Not sure exactly how it is applied but have frequently heard about it from coaches I know.

If such a rule exists, it is an absurd rule, IMO.

The offense is already being given grace by being allowed to continue play (a team is 9 players, not 8). To further protect them by not allowing the defense to take advantage of the hole in the lineup is, well, absurd.

Do they also award an automatic out for fly balls into the gap in the outfield where the missing player would be when the shorthanded team is on defense?

And to Homer's point... How do you tell the difference between an intentional walk and four bad pitches? Or do you just give unlimited BALLs to the batter ahead of the absent player?

Sorry for the mini-rant, but this is just ridiculous.

During the initial year in which ASA permitted teams to play shorthanded, a team was not allowed to intentionally walk batters to reach the vacant position.

After that, they determined that they were already allowing a team to continue playing under a scenario which should have been a forfeit, so why deprive the defense of using that vacant position to end an inning.

Some local leagues use this rule especially with rec leagues. Reason behind this type of rule is that these so-called rec leagues are for fun and using the intentional walk to get the automatic out takes that fun out of the game for these folks.

Our rec leagues address this in a much easier to deal with way - they just don't enforce the automatic out! Simple & easy.

Of course, this is a yute rec fast pitch league, not an AA league. And not saying I necessarily agree with it - but it is easy to deal with. It does have the consistency of either you are there to play ball for fun or you are there to seriously go after wins.

The league even allows "borrowing" players from the other team if a team has fewer than 8 show up in order to avoid having everyone go home, although in this latter case, the league standings will officially record a forfeit. But the kids get to play anyway.

I have been in leagues with a rule like this. The application was that if you walked (intentionally, semi-intentionally, or just accidentally) the batter before the automatic out, you didn't GET the automatic out - that batter was simply skipped. No ... you don't give the preceding batter 16 balls - you walk them as normal, but don't give defense the out.

I think the rule is silly, but in extremely recreational or extremely educational leagues, I do see the application as being a way to force the defense to pitch, and not just go for the "cheap" out.

That actually makes some sense. Perhaps that is what everyone has been talking about, but I was just visualizing that the IW was not allowed. Allowing the IW, but not then enforcing the automatic out, is simple, easy, and effective for the purpose.

Tonight I remembered where this rule came from. I started working a local fastpitch summer league that uses (loosely) NSA rules. Took out the book today to refreshen the mind and right there, NSA 4-4-c, covers the disallowing of a walk to get to the automatic out. So the rule does exist, but not in the ASA game I was doing when this originally came up. Guess it just goes to show you that you got to keep on your toes when you switch from one organization to another.

Tom,

You're right. Some leagues just disregard the automatic out and just bat the order like there's noone missing, especially the rec leagues. I think that rule is just as good too, although it doesn't really teach the players anything. It just makes things more enjoyable.

Brent

If you ask me, folks, we shouldn't allow an IW in a rec league in the first place. A rec league, that is.

In a high-level league, if there are 8 players, game's over. And the IW is kosher. ISF rules, that is.