Right, all that's left to do is explain to the OC your reasoning for not calling it. Believe me, most college coaches are fully aware of this rule. Delaying the game is never mentioned in the NCAA book.

I disagree. I suspect that very very few NCAA coaches know the ASA rule.

Now, back to the question... Mike - coming from where you're coming from, I'm very curious given your response. If the situation Andy described is not what ASA wants this rule used for, then what is the point of the rule?

And if it's delay, why have the rule at all - we already have rules about how quickly a pitcher must pitch ... so what would the intent be of the "ball on the batter" rule... when SHOULD we use it, in your opinion?

That is nothing more than a blind assumption with little to no evidence to back it up, but that's not important. I realize the OP is about ASA, but since NCAA has been mentioned, I wasn't sure if Mike was speaking code specific or umpiring in general.

I would bet many college coaches do know the rule, because in the college game I saw it called in it was actually the offensive coach that argued for the call.

Batter had a 1-1 count, called strike on outside corner and catcher fires ball to 1st believing it to be strike 3. Umipire gives count of 1-2 and offensive coach immediately calls time and approaches PU. I can only hear bits and pieces of the conversation but the coach asked the umpire if it was not a rule if the ball was not returned immediately to the pitcher it was a ball to the batter. The umpire had to agree it was in fact a rule and went back behind the plate and made the count 2-2.

Now that being said, the argument did not exactly work in the offensive coaches favor. I would have to say the next pitch did not look like it was any where near the strike zone and he rang the batter up on a called 3rd strike.

Thanks RK. I agree that the NCAA coaches likely know most of the NCAA rules.

I have heard the supposed reasoning behind this particular rule was from the Men's FP game several years ago.

Teams got in the habit of the catcher throwing the ball back to F5 after every pitch who would just lob it to the pitcher from a very short distance. Well this grew into F5 walking the ball back to the pitcher after every pitch and giving a little pep talk.

I don't know if there is any truth to that, but I can certainly accept this as most of the Men's FP pitchers I have seen are extreme primma donnas....

I'm speaking in a general manner. The purpose of this rule is purely game control that need not be a "gotcha" especially led to it by the opposition.

I am certainly not calling a ball and a crap throw back to the pitcher.

But it does raise an interesting issue that spreads throughout these threads like cancer. It's the case of, "You don't know what the intent was so just call the play according to the book. Who are you to ignore a rule or apply it however you want? Oh, but by the way, I can do that because it's me and not you, so ha."

This is why clinics exist - to allow the national organizations disseminate information uniformly. It also helps people here that we have more than one person who are in those rooms when these things are discussed - we get it first hand.