Imagine this scenario without the defense paying attention...

Game ending base-on-balls, the offense comes out to celebrate, the defense leaves dejected. BR mingles with her team. They line up at 1st and 3rd to shake hands, and proceed across the diamond, shaking hands with their opponents. Offense mingles a little longer, does some cheer or huddle or "Great Job Girls", and proceeds to the dugout.

"YOU'RE OUT!!! Bring 'em back onto the field!"

I don't think so. Can you imagine getting future assignments after that? I can't. This is what some refer to as "picking nits (or boogers)". 99.99% of the time, we're leaving this one alone.

Usually it's rather obvious when the defense is paying attention and waiting for the BR to enter the dugout, but if it's not, and they are, we have to call this out. WE should ALWAYS be paying attention.

Yes.

But assuming she did not enter DBT, it is an appeal. And, if any infielder remains in fair territory, and the umpires have not left the field, the appeal should be honored.

I can't imagine a declaration that the appeal was not honored because defense had left the field when they are standing there staring them in the face.

My guess is this crew was NOT paying attention and neither of them knew for sure what happened, so they made something up to avoid making a call.

Pretty sad in any game, but especially in a national tournament.

Just curious why you keep calling this (and treating this like) an appeal. It's not. And it shouldn't be treated as one. Had BR overrun the base and went to the dugout, then it's an appeal. This one is in NO WAY an appeal. Defense's position on the field is irrelevant.

I changed the scenario to make it an appeal, admittedly leaving out a lot of detail. The only point was the crew was making stuff up either way.

Gotcha. Fair enough.

Sort of a reverse situation, but I have seen what looked like a bottom-7th, home team losing, 2-out, nobody on, game-ending third strike where the defense left the field celebrating and the BR calmly walked to 1B (weaving her way through the defensive team as they streamed across the baseline on the way to the dugout) because nobody noticed that the blue had indicated (by lack of ringing her up and remaining in an attentive stance) that it was a non-caught 3K. He directed the defensive team back to the field and continued play.

Why would she stop at 1B?

That was my thought exactly

F2 had tossed the ball to the circle (habit?), and all of the defense had not gotten to the dugout (the infielders or players closest to the right side of the field were more or less crossing the baseline on the way to the visitor's dugout as she went to 1B and the outfielders were still crossing the infield on their way to the dugout) so once the last two or three of the defense remaining on the field realized she had gone, they sort of picked up the ball and stopped moving to the dugout and looked at her (uncertain what was going on) and would have been in a position to hold her from advancing to 2B.

Maybe blue could have awarded her 2B on obstruction, since she had to weave between 2 or 3 defensive players (impeding her progress) on the way to 1B.