Falling Onto the Fielder...and Not Getting Up
 

Situation: I'm flying solo on a 10U rec game. R1 on first. Batter bunts down the first base line. F3 comes in and fields the ball, then throws to F4 covering first. The throw takes F4 into the BR's path. She makes the catch to retire the BR, and then there's a crash between the BR and F4. F4 goes down and the BR lands on top of her.

F4 makes absolutely no effort to get up, despite the fact that R1, now on second base, takes off for third. She lies there crying while the retired BR stays on her. The collision was very minor from my perspective, so I don't call Time. R1 makes it to third, and there is still no effort on F4's part to try to get up. The defensive team's coaches are yelling for Time from the first base dugout.

I still don't call Time because it doesn't appear to me that the results of the crash are serious enough to warrant it. The retired BR finally gets up off F4, and F4 continues to lie there whimpering. The third base coach sends R1 home, and she scores easily.

I finally call Time when R1 scores, and allow the coaches onto the field to check on F4. They start complaining that I should have killed play to check on the seriousness of their player's injury (she was fine). They also complained that the retired BR prevented F4 from making any plays on R1, and I should either rule R1 out or send her back to second base. I countered that I didn't see F4 make any kind of attempt to get up and make a play on R1, and that the retired BR intentionally held F4 down.

Come to find out later that F4 had some kind of brittle bone affliction, and that's why the coaches wanted to check on her right away. They also told me she is very prone to emotional breakdowns when she gets hurt in any way. Yes, I felt like the Big Bad Umpire with no compassion.

So, should I have penalized the retired BR for interference? Again, I didn't see that she did anything other than just lie there after the crash. Yeah, she probably could have gotten up a lot sooner, but because I didn't see F4 do anything but lie there, I didn't think there was any violation.

You're a big meanie.

Seriously, how could you possibly know she has some affliction?

Prone to emotional breakdowns, when injured, aren't we all. :rolleyes:

It's 10U rec. If the wind blows someone might cry.

I'm don't have a problem with you keeping it live or calling time. You were there and you made the decision you thought was right for your situation.

Don't let the coaches give you second thoughts - I'm sure the offensive coach wanted the ball to remain live.

Emphasis mine. What was the BR doing? Was the BR making an effort to get off of F3? If the BR is taking her sweet time to get off of F3, I'm calling time and keeping R1 at 2B. If the BR got off of F3 and F3 continues to lay there crying, R1 can continue until no further play can be made.

What rule would you use?

The Interference definition in ASA requires the fielder to "[attempt] to execute a play." Since F4 wasn't making any attempt whatsoever to get up, I didn't feel a call of Interference was appropriate.

Perhaps there's another ASA rule that penalizes a retired runner for doing what the BR did in my game. But I can't think of one.

Nah, you're good here. Since you keep noting that F4 made no attempt to move, I assume that had she made even the slightest effort to continue with the play, you would have made an INT call at that point IF there was a play with which to interfere.

The rule would be interference if F3 attempted to get up and the BR continued to lay on top of her. What the BR do, you didn't ever say if the BR made an immediate or delayed attempt to get off of F3. That would make the difference if I would rule interference or to let the play continue as you did.

Would any of you treat this differently with older players?
I would not, but can't imagine the "no effort" by the fielder scenario. :eek:

I did say in my original post when the retired BR finally got off of F4. I wrote, "I still don't call Time because it doesn't appear to me that the results of the crash are serious enough to warrant it. The retired BR finally gets up off F4, and F4 continues to lie there whimpering. The third base coach sends R1 home, and she scores easily.

Again there was never an attempt by F4 to make a play. It didn't happen while the retired BR was on her, and it didn't happen after she finally got off her. She stayed on the ground until all play ended, I finally called Time, and the coaches came onto the field.

You are correct given the bolded part of your response.

However, that is not what was described in the OP. If F4 is making absolutely no effort to get up and/or make a play, you have no rule basis to stop play and keep the runner at second base. The only exception would be if you thought a player had a serious injury.

One thing to consider
 

This is 10U rec we are talking about and not a 18U Gold National Tournament. If F4 is lying on the ground crying with the BR lying on top of her kill the play and award R1 the base you believe should would have obtained (Rule 4-10). By rule we can kill this and we should if there is any doubt about the girl being ok or not.

Remember what may seem to you to be nothing major as far as contact may be more severe to her. In this scenario I am giving the benefit of the doubt to F4.

This can and will be debated ad naseum.
Bottom line it is the umpire on the field evaluating the situation and making his call.
I have no problem with the decision made on the field.

Which is why I dislike the rule. Many, if not most, are not medically trained. I actually find it humorous that all these ailments were divulged after there was a problem.

Unfortunately, in the first couple of years of this I experienced LOADS of coaches and parents start screaming and hollering the moment Lil' Susie said ouch. OTOH, I've also experienced players telling their coaches and parents to shut up and sit down when this started. Like I said, I'm hesitating and waiting until I see something which gives me cause to be concerned.

If F3 never attempted to get up either with the BR on top or not, I completely agree with Manny A's ruling on the field. If F3 is so easily "injured", maybe she be the DP and play the outfield. Just saying, LOL.

I don't disagree
 

I, too, will go with the officials judgement on the field. All I am saying is we are talking about 10 year olds here! Common sense needs to prevail. Any time player safety is a concern we should, when reasonable to do so, err on the side of caution. This can be taken to an extreme and I'm not advocating that. But come on. There was contact and the player was lying on top of F4 in a 10U REC GAME! The official said he didn't think there was much to the contact. Maybe to an adult it wasn't much, but that same contact to a 10U could be more severe.

All I am saying is take the age of the kids into account. Would you call time if this same thing happened in a pee-wee game or T-Ball?

I don't disagree
 

This can be take to an extreme. However, I do believe the age of the kids involved should be taken into consideration. Besides, by rule, the umpire can call time to see to the kids condition and award the bases he/she felt they would have made, which could be home in this scenario. The offense gets a score out of it and the defense gets to check on their player in a more timely fashion.

And again, I'm not a medical professional and, unfortunately, this is taken to the extreme and there are players who are actually COACHED to do this type of thing. Just where do we draw the line?

As an umpire, I'm not there for the players, I'm there for the game.

RANT

The game has risks, period. If anyone does not want to be exposed to those risks, even 10yo, maybe they should find something else to do. If there is a fragile or sick individual, common sense should tell a parent to not put that child in harm's way, not throw her out there and expect the rest of the world to adjust.

And AGAIN until recently, the game played out for decades and you dealt with the injury later and that was WITHOUT safety bases, cages on helmets, etc. Yes, it's dangerous, but answer me this, who put the players in the situation here? Wasn't any softball organization, it wasn't the umpires, it wasn't the field owners. It IS the parents and coaches. Remember when there were special rules for 10U? Why were they changed? Because the parents wanted Lil' Susie to be competitive and be able to demonstrate their on-field prowess. IOW, they were already chasing the carrot.

A few years ago, there was a proposed code change in ASA to create a national championship for 8U level. Thank God, this was shot down, but after persistence from a certain Western state, ASA gave up and allowed that region to have a 8U championship under the ASA banner. Now we are starting to read about 6U ball. GMAFB!

This is real simple. You want a REC game to be called as a REC game, use rules that give you the environment desired. However, if you want to play with Championship Play rules, that is how the game should be officiated. I'm a firm believer that an umpire should give the 10U game the same effort, respect and professionalism as a 18U G game. And remember, the same coaches and parents who want to crucify the umpire for not stopping the game soon enough will be screaming about the 1/4 inch the 10yo foot is off the PP or how the 10yo lost contact with the base when switching feet and demand a LBR violation. However, the teams and leagues cannot have it both ways, either you get a professional umpire or a REC umpire.

JMHO

Well, I personally wouldn't umpire a T-Ball game. Heaven help those leagues that feel they need umpires for their T-Ball programs! :D

I fully understand my role out there when it comes to player injuries during a live ball. And I judged that there was nothing wrong with F4 which, as it turned out, was correct.

Also, while this was a rec league game, the two teams involved are very competitive that I've seen quite often in weekend ASA tournaments. They use this league as tune-ups for their tournament participation. The game, in toto, was better played than many high school JV games I've umpired.

But that's really not the reason why I posted this. I wanted to get an answer purely from a rules' perspective, and I got that.

Nope - unless BR interferes, you've got nothing, and for BR to interfere, the fielder has to be trying to make a play.

No, RS13 states this is not a crash.

Thanks, Irish.