Another Illegal pitch

[Dakota]

Originally Posted by IRISHMAFIA

...However, the comment I'm questioning is starting a pitching motion before the hands are separated. And again, even if there were something in ASA, now you would need to define a "pitching motion" 'cause there are probably as many of those as there are umpires.

In my original response, I was just responding to the technical point about when the pitch starts by rule, not whether the OP pitcher was violating any rule.

Definitionally in ASA, nothing before the hands separating is part of the pitch, so if it was illegal in ASA, it would have to be illegal preliminaries, not illegal pitching motion per se. re: the OP, the pitcher is not violating any of the preliminaries with the possible exception of the 1 sec touch, and by interpretation, ASA allows touch and go, so nothing there, either.

NFHS, OTOH, allows the umpire to determine the start of the windup as the start of the pitch, which can occur before the hands separate, but not before the hands come together. So, again, the OP pitcher is not violating any NFHS rule, either (apart from the technical 1 sec violation).