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-   -   Infield Fly Rule (https://forum.officiating.com/softball/9096-infield-fly-rule.html)

paparada Tue Jun 24, 2003 03:10pm

I have a thought and wanted to know what others think. The infield fly rule was adopted from baseball. I would like to see one modification to it for softball. I think it should include a single runner on first and heres why.
In baseball your have 90 foot bases and although the rule doesn't necessarily mean the exact infield around the bases, this is 8100 sq ft. In softball, you have shorter bases, 60 ft or so league dependent, approx. 3600 sq ft or so and therefore a smaller area (once again I understand it is not just the cicumference). If the rule is in place to stop a double play, does this not make sense considering the samller field? Please any thoughts.

Dakota Tue Jun 24, 2003 03:20pm

Actually, it seems to me with the shorter base lines, the defense would have even less of a chance to get a double play with just a single runner on 1st than with baseball - by the time the fly hit the ground and the fielder fielded it and threw to 2nd for the first out, unless the BR is slow, the BR will beat out the throw for the DP the vast majority of the time, so there is little to gain for the defense. JMO, anyway.

Dakota Tue Jun 24, 2003 03:21pm

PS, welcome to the board! http://www.stopstart.freeserve.co.uk/smilie/bigwave.gif

SamNVa Tue Jun 24, 2003 03:38pm

paparada,

Your proposal doesn't make any sense for softball and here's why: with the short distances between the bases, even the slowest batter should be able to reach 1st before a fielder could let a popup hit the ground, pick it up, throw it to 2nd and then relay the throw to 1st. So the odds of getting a double play in that situation are vanishingly small.

SamC

whiskers_ump Tue Jun 24, 2003 08:56pm

Odds even get smaller if the ball hits ground and
evades the fielder by bouncing away from or spinning
back. :D

glen

WestMichBlue Thu Jun 26, 2003 12:44am

Actually the size of the field is irrelevent. The issue is that runners are pinned to their base while the ball is in the air, while the batter is hot-footing it to 1B. You are never going to get the batter-runner out.

If the rule is designed to keep you from getting more outs (2 or 3) than you deserved (1), then you need at least 2 runners in force position.

WMB


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