FED....Ok This happened to me... A third strike dropped ball.
A. I'm the PU and I don't clear out quick enough and B1, RH batter, drops the bat and button hooks around behind me with F2 in hot pursuit and they head down to 1st....
B. Optional scenario, B1 starts her walk back to her dugout, along 3rd base line, and realizes that she can run about the same time she gets to her team's on-deck circle. A Geometry scholar, she know that the shortest distance between any 2 point is a straight line. Her straight line takes her through the pitching circle...
What routes are considered legal to first base?

A runner establishes her/his own basepath.

A..If F2 has the ball, and B/R loops around to avoid tag, she's out. If she takes off before F2 has possession, from that point to 1B is her path.

B..From the point when she heads to 1B.

C..F2 is dumb if she chases B/R, instead of throwing to 1B.

Bob

Had virtually the same play yesterday, though it was baseball. Strike 3 in the dirt and off the catcher; ball rolls 4 feet up the 1B line; F2 runs out, picks up the ball, and throws to 1B as B1 (rh batter) runs wide to the foul side of F2, out of the baseline. I got fooled and didn't call it, because F2, apparently having decided immediately to make the play at 1B, utterly ignored B1 and didn't look for a tag. But somebody in the stands yelled, "Out of the baseline," and I think the fan was right. I should have called it, because the batter-runner, while F2 had the ball, did run out of the baseline to avoid a tag, not just to avoid interfering. Luckily for me, the throw didn't go astray.

You said that <i>"F2, apparently having decided immediately to make the play at 1B, utterly ignored B1 and didn't look for a tag.</i>

If this is the case, then I would <b>NOT</b> call the BR out for avoiding F2. The rule explicitly states that the runner is out for running out of the baseline <b>to avoid a tag</b>, so if no tag was attempted, then, IMO, the batter was justified in running around the fielder to avoid an interference call. If the throw had gone awry, I would have had the BR safe at 1st.

SamC

Your interpretation was my first impulse, SamC, and that's why I didn't call the runner out for being out of the baseline. But perhaps it matters that he ran significantly farther from the catcher than was necessary to avoid interfering with him. I believe that in the runner's mind his maneuver was to avoid a tag. On the other hand, there wasn't a tag, so the difference between "tag attempt" and "possible tag attempt" is probably significant.

Any route is legal as long as the BR does not interfere with the fielder taking the throw while out of the 3 foot lane, does not enter dead ball territory, and does not change her base path to avoid a tag.

I agree with Sam. It doesn't matter if the BR swung wide because he thought F2 would attempt a tag, since by your description F2 was throwing to F3 all the way. No tag to avoid.

Now, if there was a chance F2 threw <u>because</u> the BR swung wide & was out of reach, well...

Yeah, I guess for a runner to be called out for being out of the baseline, there has to be an attempt at a tag, or at least an obviously anticipated attempt, not just the possibility of a tag. Had F2 made any move that looked like an attempt to tag the runner (which he did not), then it's an out. Good thinking, guys.