Ball hits Bat
 

Phillies game: Closest Halladay came to giving up a hit was on the last batter. The dribbler in front of the plate rolled against the dropped bat (it was stationary) and Ruiz almost overran it before reaching back and making the throw from his knees.

I thought I saw the home plate umpire stick his left arm out like he was signaling a delayed dead ball.

For what? If anything, it would be INT.

I think it was just a fair ball indication.

I didn't say why he did it, I was just voicing my observation. It wasn't even close to being foul so there was no reason for him to signal fair.

I noticed that myself and ran it back a few times on the DVR to make sure of what I saw.

Totally seemed like a fair ball point toward the infielded, mask in hand. He didn't make the signal until the catcher actually touched the ball (at which point it did become a fair ball), which was after the ball hit the bat.

Yeah, the play seemed to be pretty obviously over fair ground, but I couldn't fault an umpire for signalling fair here. There was the potential for the ball to be either foul or dead on this one a few different ways- if the ball had touched the batter, if the batter had interfered with the catcher, if the bat had hit the ball instead of the other way around, if the ball had rolled foul after hitting the bat or if the bat had been over foul ground when the ball touched it.

Since they were still in the relative vicinity of home plate, why not signal fair just so there's no question about it. Though in the back of my evil umpire mind, I was imagining all the different ways this play could have blown up and created a controversial end to a historic game!

Cannot find on-line, but from today's print edition of the USAToday, PU John Hirschbeck said he would have called Brandon "Phillips out for veering far out of the baseline had Ruiz failed to throw him out."

"I saw the ball roll up and catch the bat," Hirschbeck said. "Then I saw (Phillips) out of the lane the last 45 feet to first base. I was going to call out Phillips for batter-runner interference."

Okay, now we are back to saying the wrong thing. Here is an MLB umpire stating that simply because a BR is out of the lane, he was going to call him out.

No mention of interferring with Howard receiving the ball at 1B or the ball itself.

Not only that, but if there was INT, why wait to see the result of the play? FTM, why would a MLB umpire comment on an INT call on a possible play that did not exist?

I also noticed where the runner was, part of how great Ruiz did was throwing over the runner w/o throwing over Howard. :cool:

I would give the ump the benefit of the doubt on a newspaper quote and assume the implication that he know there has to actually be a hindrance, like Howard not being able to catch the ball because of the runner in the way.

Of course, we don't need misstatements of the rules to further mislead the public and players; but that would mean shutting down all sports reporters and commentators. :rolleyes:

But why make any statement at all? We are talking about a professional sports official in MLB. He basically admitted he either failed to do his job or didn't have the nerve to make the call, but had no problem bragging about it after the fact. We really don't know since the call wasn't made when the INT occurred.

And you point is?

Of course he should not have said anything, even at our level, walk away from reporters (or run if it's the CW).

But, just pointing out that a reporter comment or apparent quote can't be assumed to be the whole explanation.


Second typo today, is fo supposed to be of or for? Anyway, I thought we agree that TH should not ever explain rules.