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Guest Dick
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If the pitcher pitches the ball to home plate but their foot was ruled off of the rubber by the umpire, is the correct call a balk or a no pitch?  Coach Dick

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39 minutes ago, Guest Dick said:

If the pitcher pitches the ball to home plate but their foot was ruled off of the rubber by the umpire, is the correct call a balk or a no pitch?  Coach Dick

Coach

 

We are very leary about replying to one sentence questions when we are not at the field of play, to see everything that happened during the whole game from beginning to end, including witnessing what happened on the field during the situation concerning the question.

We have all had incidences where the question and situation described to our superior officer's by a coach in no way, even by the stretch of the imagination, was anywhere in the ball park of what happened or what we told the coach had happened.

We do not want to be a site where questions are posed and then the answer is put up on telephone poles with the umpires picture in the local area due to sore feelings.

Will the answer to whatever the situation is, keep a player, coach, umpire, or league official from obtaining their dream job in Major League Baseball?

There are some league's that have rules that supercede the regular rule book. Courtesy runners, etcetera.

We pretty much need the play by play for each inning of the game and then the exact situation on the field for any descriptions concerning the play in question.

We also need the area in that particular rule set and the book it is from, so that we can see the words from that book that both the coach and the umpire are looking at concerning the situation. The words may mean what the coach is saying in some cases and in other cases the words mean what the umpire was saying, even though they are looking at the same words.

Nobody is perfect, coaches, umpires, fans, players, etc. etc.

We are not into those that would (and I am not saying the poster is one) print off the answers and take them to the plate with them or to the next board of directors meeting or whatever.

I am surprised the leaders that you report to, have not answered this question for you already.

 

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Pitching without ever being properly engaged with the rubber is an illegal pitch. With runners on, an illegal pitch is a balk.

As a game management solution, I'd try to fix this before calling an illegal pitch, like any other illegal pitching position. I'd also allow some leeway for crappy fields with moon craters near the rubber.

So if F1 was pitching without properly engaging, and he did it with runners on, a balk call would be correct by rule. But for good game management, probably not good umpiring. It sounds like the kind of thing that newer umpires sometimes find in the rule book and then start looking to enforce on the field.

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1 hour ago, Guest Dick said:

If the pitcher pitches the ball to home plate but their foot was ruled off of the rubber by the umpire, is the correct call a balk or a no pitch?  Coach Dick

Coach, could you give us a little more information? You said the foot was ruled off the rubber. Therefore a call was made. Care to tell us what the call was and what happened?

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I have had a college pitcher in some fairly well-regarded summer wood bat league go through the entire "pitching process" with the pivot foot about 6" in front of the rubber.  And,. the field was well enough maintained that there was no need to do so.  Assuming that's (or similar) what happened in the OP, the answer has been given, and the umpire was correct to call it (we don't know whether he got the ruling right).

If the pivot foot just broke contact with the rubber, as in the picture above, or in some "re-positioning" during the wind-up, then no call should have been made,

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On ‎6‎/‎10‎/‎2017 at 5:05 PM, maven said:

Pitching without ever being properly engaged with the rubber is an illegal pitch. With runners on, an illegal pitch is a balk.

As a game management solution, I'd try to fix this before calling an illegal pitch, like any other illegal pitching position. I'd also allow some leeway for crappy fields with moon craters near the rubber.

So if F1 was pitching without properly engaging, and he did it with runners on, a balk call would be correct by rule. But for good game management, probably not good umpiring. It sounds like the kind of thing that newer umpires sometimes find in the rule book and then start looking to enforce on the field.

This............its always the coach with the worst maintained mound that asks this.......................    

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A "no pitch" is typically reserved for cases where the umpire isn't ready, or sometimes if the batter isn't ready but it doesn't meet the threshold of "quick pitch", or some other case where they need to kill a play as the pitch is being delivered.

Any illegal act by the pitcher is an illegal pitch - and if there are runners on base it is a balk.

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Had a 1st base coach try and get a call for illegal pitch this weekend, I was U1 in A... pitcher is on the rubber but of course there is a divot in front of the rubber so when he made his pivot in the windup or started in the stretch his foot was maybe a WHOLE INCH off the front of the rubber.

Asked the coach if he wanted me calling that illegal against his F1 all game as well since the condition of the mound was the issue and not the pitcher trying to gain any advantage. Conversation ended real quick from there :-)

 

 

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