ASA Slopitch Intentional Walk
 

Howdy:

Our league plays under ASA Slopitch rules but I can not find an interpretation.
The league has a no intentional walks rule.
Are 4 consecutive balls to a male batter (who has already hit 4 home runs), batting in front of another male considered an intentional walk?
What separates and intentional walk from strategy?

Thank you.

Standard ASA rules do not prohibit intentionally walking a batter as a game strategy. They don't let you put a batter on first base automatically, without throwing pitches. Pitches must be delivered (and, unless you're playing senior slow pitch, you would only have to deliver three straight balls, since the batter's start out with a 1-1 count).

So your league has obviously come up with some of their own rules that are NOT standard ASA rules. You would have to ask your league directors what exactly their intention is with their "no intentional walk" rule. I'm afraid that they are the only ones who could answer that question. ASA isn't going to have an interpretation for a rule that isn't in their rule book!

Pitcher, catcher, anyone on defense that you consider of authority: Hey, Blue.
Umpire: Yes, sir/ma'am
Defense: Walk him/her
Umpire: Okay, batter, walk.

Now, if you want to tick off the umpire by throwing three lousy pitches, knock yourself out. Just note, if there is stealing and there are runners on base and the ball gets away/by the catcher.........

My bad...and proof that I'm not much of a slow pitch guy! I guess that the phrase "pitches must be thrown" from the fastpitch rulings was stuck in my head.

But it still means that your league is not following ASA rules and you'd have to get them to carify what they mean.

Barring any local rule to the contrary, pitches do not need to be thrown in SP for an intentional walk (ASA 8-1-C-3). Notifying the umpire of the desire for an intentional walk suffices.

FP requires the pitches to be thrown.

The pitcher could always pitch the ball 15 feet short of the plate.

[quote="Irishmafia"]See bold above.

Well, we're talking about a league with a silly "no IW" rule. What do you expect?

I wouldn't say anything to the pitcher one way or the other. If he wants to walk the batter, let him walk the batter. He pitched the ball legally.

So...
 

Correct me if I am wrong, from what I am reading...

An intentional walk can only occur when the pitcher directs the ump to send the batter to first base, regardless of the count.

If the pitcher throws enough consecutive pitches, in a manner that makes the ump say "ball" or "illegal pitch", that result in the batter having a count of 4 balls (either 4-0 or 4-1 from a 1-1 league) then, that is not an intentional walk.

If a pitcher INTENTIONALLY throws the number of pitches out of the strike zone for the purpose of not allowing the batter to hit the ball, would you say the batter was walked intentionally?

It looks like you are looking for scoring information and to most umpires, that really doesn't matter.

The issue here is that the league has a rule prohibiting something without providing a definition for that something or a penalty for doing that something. Typical local rule in my experience. What do they say ...

Local Rules are made by Fools.