Illegal Pitches and when's enough?
 

Worked an ASA tournament this weekend. 12U A level. Pretty good ball all weekend with a few exceptions.

Had one young lady pitching and she was doing the little "hop" off the pitcher's plate "every" pitch instead of toe down and dragging. I know it's and IP............but..............coach was told two or three times that it was illegal and he agreed but said she's young and has to work through it, he was going to leave her in the game. Nonsense but that's what he said.

Opposing coach wants it called. It's called a few times and results in a couple of runs being scored.......but the pitching technique never changed. Didn't look like she even tried to change it..........or maybe just couldn't. I don't know.

My partner and I just simply came to the conclusion that we just couldn't call it every pitch. The game would turn into a fiasco fans having fits about letting the girls play, us looking like complete idiots for calling the pitches when no real advantage was being gained.

We simply lived with it, the other team stopped griping when we asked him if he wanted it called every pitch and the game continued on. The illegal pitcher lost the game............but, what would you guys have done? I'm curious.

Thanks

League ball or tourney?

You said A ball - I would think that by this point in the season we've gotten rid of those pesky illegal habits. Call it when you see it. At some point the coach is going to pull her. Not fair to the other team to let the girl do stuff they aren't supposed to be able to do. Call it early and often. Call it every pitch with no one on base if you have to.

I can see some leniency early in the season in league ball. Or at C levels, etc.

Ugh, I hate that argument.

Where does it say IPs should only be called when an advantage is gained? Where is the advantage gained when a pitcher puts her hands together, separates them to scratch her nose, and then puts them back together? Does a pitcher really gain an advantage when she interrupts her pitching motion?

You said tournament play, right? You really can't ignore stuff at that point. Rec ball, yeah, I can see it there. But these girls should know what they're doing especially at A level.

I agree with Manny...

But I would add that not having to pitch with your feet correctly DOES give you an advantage.

Others have said if before but I really think it's passed time to rethink the leap rule. Move the plate back a few feet and let them be airborne if they wish. There have been discussions on this board in the past about the physics/advantage/disadvantage of airborne vs drag. And as far as I'm concerned, when Fed ( and I believe ASA and others) said a few years back that we can take the depth of the divit in front of the pitching plate in mind, they were acknowledging a fact of the game.

As to your original question, I would have used the divit/hole defense if possible, but if that was too much of a stretch then I guess Id call them all and take the s**tstorm that came my way.

First off, as others have already commented nothing in the pitching rules say anything about gaining an advantage. And then, how do you know if she was gaining an advantage or not?

Had a high school girl a couple of years ago in an early season tournament that was doing a little hop out and throw. Talked to coach during her warmups, told him to go out and tell her to drag the foot. First pitch illegal. 2nd pitch illegal. Coach comes out and starts the, but she never gets called illegal, and she is the #1 pitcher on her club team. He goes out and talks to her again. Now she does tries to drag except she cant get the ball anywhere near the plate. She was either illegal throwing strikes, or legal and couldnt get the ball over the plate. If she hadnt been forced to throw legally how would anyone have known she couldnt get the ball over the plate using a legal delivery? As it turned out, the opposing coach came out and told me they just wanted to play ball and he didnt care if she was legal or not. At that point I agreed to let it go. But, I did talk to another umpire later in the season who did one of the illegal pitchers games and he said she was still doing the exact same thing.

Guys,
I know the pitches were illegal. I know I and my partner could have called every pitch. Advantage, disadvantage is really I suppose irrelevant to my question. If a coach "refuses" to remove a pitcher after you've called 10 illegal pitches and it's cost him runs it puts umpires in a funky position. I know in the rule of rules that IP are supposed to be called. After we called about 10 the fans started in with "Quit taking the game away, allow the girls to play!" and all the other crap that goes along with being protective of their kid......they don't understand "all" the nuances that go into pitching.

My question is what would you guys do in a "fun" A level tournament (Not a qualifier in any way.)

I didn't like the position the coach put us in but I can also see the other side where "It's kid's softball and they're kids" angle. I supposed we could have taken the hard line and of course become the "ruinators" of the afternoon for probably 60 plus kids and adults.

Would the hard line be the course you would all take? Call every pitch and turn a game into a fiasco?

As it was the game ended 3 to 0 and we gave the winning team 2 of the 3 runs. Why only 2 runs......we were trying to drive a point home....albiet being selective when we called IP a time or two.

Go ahead, I'm ready for your wrath.

How does calling the game by the rules make the umpires ruin the game? Isnt it the coaches fault for either not teaching the girl to pitch properly in the first place or not removing her when itbecame obvious it was going to cost runs and the game?

10 illegal pitches? Ive had games where I have called girls probably 25 or 30 times. If the pitch is illegal, call it.

yes!!!

If they decide to change the rules thats fine, until then the umpires job is to call the game per the rules as they exist.

Linknblue,

I'll answer as honestly as I can, even if I ruin my reputation:rolleyes:. In your specific scenario I guess after x number of consecutive illegals, I might ask the coach if the pitcher could give me something, anything that would show an attempt at improvement. I might also ask the opposing coach if this is how they would like the rest of the game enforced. Hopefully, some combination of these two things would give everyone something we could live with. And before anyone says this bastardizes the game, what about this. What do we do when a team is far ahead and the coach tells us that they're going to have one of their players leave base early so the inning can end quicker? Do we refuse to call the runner out because the coach is trying to shorten the game, or do we accept that it's being done for the benefit of all?

Do I want this scenario to happen? Have I had it in the past? No to both. But I would hope that both coaches and myself could find a way to get past this mess.

This is one of the conundrums of umpiring. I face it even at the high school and Juco level from time to time. A pitcher just can't stop leaping, no matter how often you call IPs.

Those girls are the ones who, when they were playing 12U, were doing it and not being called on it by sympathetic umpires who wanted to avoid being the "ruinators". They move up to 14U and 16U, and still eventually get away with it. And then when they're playing high school ball or in national qualifiers, where rules are expected to be enforced with prejudice, they can't adjust to what they've been doing for years, and those umpires become the bad guys/gals.

Meanwhile, the umpires at 12U who do call it a few times and then stop, they become "the other umpires [who] let us do it!" Now you've contributed to another conundrum in our trade--inconsistency.

And here's another problem that rears its ugly head from time to time: You get the opposing head coach to agree to cut the pitcher some slack because it's ruining the game. So then this pitcher starts dominating the game, and he's getting frustrated that his players can't hit anything. Now he complains that she's getting away with much more than what was agreed upon, and what was supposed to be a fun game turns into a snipe war. No thanks.

Look, you do what you feel you have to do, but it shouldn't be because you want to avoid lopsided games or sh!tstorms from the fans. But realize that your decision to ignore the infractions contribute to long-lasting effects beyond what happens in your game. It doesn't help the girl, and it causes blowback to umpires who will call it as required.

I have never viewed this strategy as one to illegally shorten the game. It's the offensive coach's effort to stem the bleeding. And I've never seen a time where the opposing coaches and players complain about it.

Unfortunately I have seen 2 or 3 cases of opposing coaches going nuts over it. "Our players aren't learning anything if you give them free outs". Even saw a coach pull her team and forfiet. Problem is, in games that are that lopsided, noone is learning anything. Losing team is simply frustrated and can do nothing correctly, and winning team is simply learning to be lazy and take chances they normally wouldnt.

If she's doing it every pitch, then it takes seven of them for the first run to score; 4 more to score a second run, etc. Fifteen illegal pitches in a row and you have 2 runs, and a 3-0 count.

I've said this to a lot of umpires I'm training - the BEST time (for you and for the players and coach) to catch the illegal pitch is the first time you see it. If they're doing it a lot, and you let a few go and then call it, they likely now have runners on - the penalty is greater because you waited. If she's illegal on pitch one ... CALL IT. The penalty there is simply a ball. Next pitch still illegal... CALL IT. Another ball. Give them time to fix it if they are going to try to fix it.