What do you do?
 

Routine batted ball to F4 who has an easy play for the out at first. Just as F4 fields the ball, a ball from another field lands in the infield. F4 goes ahead and makes the play for the out.

Do you a)allow the out, as it was routine, b)call dead ball, award batter first, c)call dead ball and send the batter back to bat, or d)say it is not my problem but the other umpire's to sort out?

I would not kill a play that had started with no effect on either the fielder or BR. I guess that is "a".
If the ball struck one of them, probably have to call a dead. "b" or "c" depending on who is affected.

"d" ONLY IF partner calls it first. ;) :D

I worked at a Complex this weekend that has fields back to back and I make sure to mention at the PLATE meeting to keep playing. I also mention that we will use common sense, with your play I would have an out.

The rule is not super clear in the copy of the rulebook I have digitally. Hopefully it's been edited since then. But it's 8-5-L and the effect is simply a dead ball. I think the effect from M was meant to be attached. When you have spectator interference, you rule as to what would have happened and do that. The rules supplement seems to suggest the same. In this case, I don't think it applies because to interfere you have to interfere with a play.

e) umpire the game in front of me

Nope. Rule doesn't apply

Why? Isn't throwing a ball into the middle of the field interference if it impedes a fielder executing a play?

Yeah, I should have included e), but I believe that would lead us back to a), or doe, or whatever it leads us back to. :D

Who was impeded in this situation?

Nobody, which is why I don't advocate killing it in this situation. I was understand Mike to be saying that whatever you do in any ball on field situation isn't based on your interpretation of the spectator interference rule and if not I'm not sure what rule you do use to fix it.

To start, spectator interference is when a spectator enters the field of play and interferes. No spectator interfered with the play.

Second, there is nothing to fix, you start the play, you finish the play.

Is this wrong, if it affected the fielder or the runner?
"If the ball struck one of them, probably have to call a dead. "b" or "c" depending on who is affected. "

Perhaps a play where someone was actually affected would make this clearer to some.

Grounder to F4, who fields the ball cleanly. As she is beginning to throw to 1st base, she is struck by a ball that came from another field, and she throws errantly, causing the batter runner to be safe.

A) Umpire the game in front of you - runner is safe.
B) Dead ball, reset (do-over)
C) Dead ball, place runners where you think they would have gotten to, no outs.
D) Dead ball, place runners and grant outs where you think they would have gotten to or happened.

My ruling - A. Soon to be ejected DC's ruling is likely B or D.

If a batted ball comes from another field and in your judgement the ball affected the play on your field "we do nothing" ? I agree Umpire your game, however commonsense and advantage/disadvantage has to be used in this OP.

You would have no rules basis for such a ruling.

Would you treat it the same if F4 was distracted by an errant cup that flew over from another field? A leaf? A bird or bee? Dust? A loud cheer? Why would a ball be different from the rest of these?

Well you do if you call it spectator interference. Though whether you can seems less clear. If the fans of the other team threw a medicine ball at the fielder intentionally you'd call it interference right? What if they intentionally threw a softball? So the only difference here is that they weren't watching the game and they didn't do it on purpose. That may be enough to hang your hat on, but I think the spirit of the spectator interference rule was to neutralize non-participants impact on the game. I could be very wrong though.

Read spectator interference. It specifically involves A SPECTATOR entering or reaching into the field of play.

I really don't care what happens, other than a medical emergency, once the play started, it is going to finish before I stop play.

And please, a medicine ball? Really? Just how ****ing young are you? Most of the softball spectators I know couldn't throw a medicine ball 2 feet. Next thing you know, you are going to want to stop the play because someone's pet pigeon landed on 2B and scared the SS.

You can "call it" whatever you want to... but calling this spectator interference is no more accurate than calling it an infield fly.

8-2-N: When a spectator reaches into live ball territory and interferes with a fielder's opportunity to catch a fly ball.

Do we have that here? No.

8-5-L: When a spectator interferes with any thrown or fair batted ball.

Do we have that here? No.

We simply have an object that came from elsewhere distracting someone.

I must have sun stroke from working in the heat all weekend, because that line actually made me laugh out loud.

I feel you, YoungUmp; you were searching for a rule reference that related to a nonparticipant or situation (I really didn't read the OP to be suggesting someone threw the ball on the field, I took it more to be a foul ball off an adjacent field) that possibly affected the play on your field.

But, you used a specified and intentionally limited rule to try to cover this; just like we cannot declare umpire interference when an umpire DOES interfere, but not in the defined way, we cannot use spectator interference in the undefined way.

There are two options. 1) Unless you absolutely/positively have someone in imminent danger of serious injury, DON'T be the leming that yells "Time" whenever a ball approaches your field during live play. Sure, if you can stop it before live play, not a bad plan; but once the ball is in live play, 10-4.E says SHALL NOT CALL TIME while any play is in progress. 2) If you DO kill play on your field, the PU has to apply 10-4.G (the ONLY rule that can apply when violating 10-4.E) and make a best judgment ruling awarding bases; and do-over and even apparent outs aren't legal options. Anything else is a lost protest. Since that never leaves people happy, try not to get there.

No, you cannot apply 10.1, either; it is covered in 10.4 that you shall not call time.

Happy to be of service, sir. :)

Obviously you misread the tone of my reply if it was able to make you angry enough to swear at me. The point of using an extreme example is to make one think about the limits of the way one is reading the rule. Obviously it isn't going to happen. So what? The rules supplement is fairly clear and also not in harmony with the actual definition of interference. I don't think positing it for discussion including the phrase at the end I may be very wrong is as terrible a thing as your tone suggests.

That said, I'm content enough with being told that this isn't the way it's done and should it ever happen, I'll know how to deal with it.

Don't think it's sunstroke because we were calling in cloudy weather this weekend and it made me laugh too.

Please clarify if/how wrong you think this is.
Just to be sure I am reading all responses correctly.

Completely wrong. Unfortunate, obviously. But you simply don't kill a play unless you have to.

What happens when this fly ball from the other field hits F4 - and you kill it... and they throw out the BR anyway? You cannot call BR out if you've killed a live ball play.

99% of the time, that errant ball is going to have no effect on the play - perhaps a momentary distraction that doesn't change the outcome. But if you kill play when you see that ball fly onto your field, you've just changed the possible outcome.

Steve, thank you for the RULE, Cecil, I am with you we know that we are playing on fields that are close and it is possible that a SOFTBALL, could fly into our field. Play on and if nothing is effected, good. If in the 1 in a 1,000,000, chance the play is effected deal with it.

+1

Here's one for you from a couple years ago.
I am PU.
B hits a foul ball that has just gone over the fence just beyond the edge of the infield grass on the 3B side.
Lo and behold, a foul ball from the other field collides with our foul ball mid-flight.

What are the odds of that???

I agree now.
Just to clarify, I never said just for a ball/object flying in; only if it struck a directly involved player. As said now, not then either.

Ruling? :D

whether it was out of play on contact or in play. :p :D :D :eek:

Foul ball. Rule 1. Foul Ball.C

Back to the OP; what we did was exactly what, IMO, we should have done when this happened. We allowed everything to continue to conclusion, had the out at first. Of course, the OC, who was losing and in his last at bat, wanted it to be a dead ball and his runner awarded first. Explained the ruling to him, and we moved on.

What surprised me was the number of umpires after the game who advised that we should have immediately called a dead ball, and ruled on what would have happened in our judgment had the ball hit from the other field not landed on ours. When I pressed them for a ruling to back that, they, as you can probably guess, resorted to the "fan interference" rule. I was floored, so I thought I would see what happened if I posted it here. Guess I shouldn't have been too surprised by their opinions, in hindsight.

Foul ball with a cosmic moment....

Had a case with a ball coming from behind me as PU, not seen until pitcher in motion, let it go on.
BU saw it coming before pitcher moved, called no-pitch.
I think we were both correct. Agree?

Stopping a play before the ball is put into play is perfect. However, I disagree with killing the ball as you have seen here, those who support that seem to want to always rule with the offense. And I believe Steve noted that there shouldn't be a presumption of an out.

Well, I don't buy that. If you can presume the runner would be safe, you should be able to presume s/he would not. This is what happens when you try to extend the rules beyond what is offered in the book or interpretation by an authorized official.

And AFA a spectator doing something intentionally, when was the last time a coach admitted some idiot fan was indeed with his team and should be penalized accordingly? I've heard more denials of association from coaches involving fans than the Roman guard heard from Peter.

Only 4 denials? Over how many years? :D

Uh Oh ! ;)

Have you decided to branch out as far as your affiliations go??? AFA :D

No, per event

I forgot how far you old people are behind in this computer stuff.

As Far As