Backswing and Legal Delivery - ASA
 

After a particular pitcher, and numerous complaints the other night, and some disagreement between the umpires working the game, we went to look at the exact wording of the book describing exactly how far back a pitcher's arm could go and still be legal.

The book says the arm can go toward the rear (past the leg). How far is too far. The only other part that addresses anything on the motion says she can't have 2 revolutions (which I take to mean 2 FULL revolutions), and she can't have the wrist further out to the side than her elbow.

So... how far back is too far? Is it legal for a girl's backswing to go past the leg at all (one coach contended no)? Is it legal for the backswing to go 6 inches past the leg? 12 inches? 45 degrees? 90 degrees? Etc.

Based on the rule that you quote, there is no limit short of a full revolution.

Around here, we have a pitcher that usually has a straightforward windmill delivery. Every so often, she will exaggerate her backswing, bringing the hand up past the twelve o'clock position to where the ball is almost pointing at the batter, then come back around with a full windmill delivery. She ends up making about 1 3/4 revolutions with her arm from where she stops her backswing. As I mentioned, she doesn't do this on every pitch, just often enough to try to disrupt the batter's timing.

Our ASA UIC and his staff have all seen her pitch and have declared her legal.

It's usually pretty funny when she does this motion to watch the opposing team coaches start scrambling to find their (never been opened) rulebooks and justfy why this "has to be illegal"! :)

Your post answered your question. Why would anyone think there is a limit as long as it is not two full rotations? Sounds to me like someone is considering a "rotation" as passing the hip which we all know isn't part of the rule.

Well, the only comment from another umpire that caused us to consider this, is the "to the rear" part.

Once the arm moves past 90 degrees (or pointing toward 2nd base), and is still going up, is it no longer going rearward - in fact, it's going forward, if forward is defined as toward the plate.

I did not think this was the intent of the rule - but there was enough difference of opinion from various levels of officials that I promised I'd come out here and get a definitive answer.

In this context, "to the rear" means a reversed rotation.