Balk question - Complete Stop?

[SoapySmith]

Been lurking for a while but I had something come up tonight that I wanted to get some feedback from you guys on.  15U game, FED rules.  

 

F1 has a funky way of coming set -- he brings the hands together at about eye level and at the same time as the hands come together, he starts a slow bend of the knees.  Both hands and knees stay in motion until the hands are just below the chin, and which time the hands stop, but the knees keep bending, bringing him lower and right into his delivery.  In other words, the arms and hands stop relative to the upper body (there is of course the continued downward movement solely as a result of the continued knees bending), but an no time is there ever a complete stop of all motion.  This only happens sometimes, though, usually he's stopping--and he's always at least close to stopping--at the bottom of the knee bend before coming to the plate.

 

At this age if I get a F1 that I can tell is going to be "close" to a pause all night, I will tell the catcher right away that I'm going to need a complete stop, and usually they'll take a trip to the mound and take care of it, or if it happens late in the inning I may quietly give the coach a "make sure your pitcher comes to a complete stop, coach" between innings.  Said something to the coach about it tonight (F1 is his kid, of course), and he says "Sure, but only his hands have to stop."  I said no, I need a complete and discernible stop, not just the movement of the hands.  He acts like that's the most asinine thing he's ever heard but instructs F1 to come to a complete stop, and that's the end of it.

 

Please tell me I'm not missing something here.  If he doesn't stop his knees as well as his hands at some point, how is this not a balk?

 

And incidentally, if coach is correct, hypothetically, and F1 has satisfied the "complete stop" simply by stopping the movement of his hands relative to his upper body, then the continued movement of the knees is the beginning of his delivery and he's committed to the plate at that point.  And therefore, if he does stop the knee bend before coming to the plate, I have a start-stop balk. I feel like this is a stupid question.  But this coach just seemed sufficiently sure of himself that it had me second guessing whether there's an interpretation I'm unaware of.

 

Thanks guys.

[Replacematt]

Been lurking for a while but I had something come up tonight that I wanted to get some feedback from you guys on.  15U game, FED rules.  

 

F1 has a funky way of coming set -- he brings the hands together at about eye level and at the same time as the hands come together, he starts a slow bend of the knees.  Both hands and knees stay in motion until the hands are just below the chin, and which time the hands stop, but the knees keep bending, bringing him lower and right into his delivery.  In other words, the arms and hands stop relative to the upper body (there is of course the continued downward movement solely as a result of the continued knees bending), but an no time is there ever a complete stop of all motion.  This only happens sometimes, though, usually he's stopping--and he's always at least close to stopping--at the bottom of the knee bend before coming to the plate.

 

At this age if I get a F1 that I can tell is going to be "close" to a pause all night, I will tell the catcher right away that I'm going to need a complete stop, and usually they'll take a trip to the mound and take care of it, or if it happens late in the inning I may quietly give the coach a "make sure your pitcher comes to a complete stop, coach" between innings.  Said something to the coach about it tonight (F1 is his kid, of course), and he says "Sure, but only his hands have to stop."  I said no, I need a complete and discernible stop, not just the movement of the hands.  He acts like that's the most asinine thing he's ever heard but instructs F1 to come to a complete stop, and that's the end of it.

 

Please tell me I'm not missing something here.  If he doesn't stop his knees as well as his hands at some point, how is this not a balk?

 

And incidentally, if coach is correct, hypothetically, and F1 has satisfied the "complete stop" simply by stopping the movement of his hands relative to his upper body, then the continued movement of the knees is the beginning of his delivery and he's committed to the plate at that point.  And therefore, if he does stop the knee bend before coming to the plate, I have a start-stop balk. I feel like this is a stupid question.  But this coach just seemed sufficiently sure of himself that it had me second guessing whether there's an interpretation I'm unaware of.

 

Thanks guys.

You're right. There's not much more I can say--the rule says complete stop. That means everything must be stopped at the same point in time.

[SoapySmith]

Thanks, glad to know I'm not completely out to lunch on this.  Maybe this is better for posting in one of those "dumb things coaches have said to you" threads!

[umpire_scott]

I would add that many pitchers have issues with coming to a "complete stop".  I used to let it go if they slowed down so much that it met most of the criteria and was pretty consistent.  Not anymore.  I've had far fewer issues by calling more balks on this than less.  Instead of my fear of being looked at as an OOO, I've been looked at as someone that knows the rules.  The faster you call it the faster they fix it.

[GoodOldGus]

I ran into a few left handers this season where they start bringing their leg up before their hands are set.  This is fine if they go directly to first for a possible pick off, but if they continue their action towards the plate it's an obvious balk.

[bluejerred]

I called four balks last night.  I found that calling the balks makes for better pitching overall.  Makes them stop rushing their delivery and focus on the details.  Every time I balked a pitcher last night, they followed up with 4 or 5 really good strikes.

[millerforrest]

There are only 2 people who are required to see a "pause" or "complete stop" by the pitcher and they are the ones umpiring that particular game.

[millerforrest]

Do NOT split hairs on calling balks....if you do, it will become a chicken yelling contest with people from both sides yelling "that's a balk". Nip it if you can. PU, send catcher out. BU, go up to rubber, look down and kick dirt off of it even if its clean while looking straight down and tell the pitcher to pause longer.

[noumpere]

Do NOT split hairs on calling balks....if you do, it will become a chicken yelling contest with people from both sides yelling "that's a balk". Nip it if you can. PU, send catcher out. BU, go up to rubber, look down and kick dirt off of it even if its clean while looking straight down and tell the pitcher to pause longer.

Then when you call a balk on the other team, the coach will ask why his pitcher didn't get a warning.  You're not fooling anyone with those moves.

[Replacematt]

Do NOT split hairs on calling balks....if you do, it will become a chicken yelling contest with people from both sides yelling "that's a balk". Nip it if you can. PU, send catcher out. BU, go up to rubber, look down and kick dirt off of it even if its clean while looking straight down and tell the pitcher to pause longer.

Either he stopped or he didn't. It's not splitting hairs when there's a binary situation.

[noumpere]

 

Do NOT split hairs on calling balks....if you do, it will become a chicken yelling contest with people from both sides yelling "that's a balk". Nip it if you can. PU, send catcher out. BU, go up to rubber, look down and kick dirt off of it even if its clean while looking straight down and tell the pitcher to pause longer.

Either he stopped or he didn't. It's not splitting hairs when there's a binary situation.

 

Either you ends are frizzed or not.  that's splitting hairs.

[JaxRolo]

Do NOT split hairs on calling balks....if you do, it will become a chicken yelling contest with people from both sides yelling "that's a balk". Nip it if you can. PU, send catcher out. BU, go up to rubber, look down and kick dirt off of it even if its clean while looking straight down and tell the pitcher to pause longer.

<br />Either he stopped or he didn't. It's not splitting hairs when there's a binary situation.<br />Didn't realize binaring was aloud in baseball!

[millerforrest]

Only 2 people have to be able to see a "stop" and that's us (the umpires). We can't help if the coaches, players or fans don't see it.

You do it for BOTH teams if it comes to that. Duh?