2021 NFHS Rule Changes

[lawump]

I have it from a very reliable source that there will not be a 2021 edition of the NFHS rule book.  Due to the virus, there will be no baseball rules change process this year.  The 2020 edition of the rule book will be the rule book for the 2021 baseball season.

[Jimurray]

14 minutes ago, lawump said:

I have it from a very reliable source that there will not be a 2021 edition of the NFHS rule book.  Due to the virus, there will be no baseball rules change process this year.  The 2020 edition of the rule book will be the rule book for the 2021 baseball season.

What if the survey shows a majority want a delayed dead ball ball with coach choice?  Would they publish a 2021 then?  

[maven]

1 hour ago, Jimurray said:

What if the survey shows a majority want a delayed dead ball ball with coach choice?  Would they publish a 2021 then?  

Seriously? No process = no changes. Pretty straightforward, and that issue is hardly urgent (bitching about that difference goes back decades).

[LRZ]

1 hour ago, lawump said:

2021 baseball season

Optimist.

[umpstu]

10 hours ago, LRZ said:

Optimist.

Making lemonade out of lemons.

[Jimurray]

11 hours ago, maven said:

Seriously? No process = no changes. Pretty straightforward, and that issue is hardly urgent (bitching about that difference goes back decades).

I'm just trying to support this small business that might need activity with a hook, in this thread and another one, that might generate some discussion if that is what generates some income to this business. But how did you and @lawumpvote as to that particular survey question? No need to answer as we know many are dealing with very much more important stuff.

[The Man in Blue]

Two cents ... and I expect change coming back ...

I don't like the idea of a delayed dead ball on a balk at this level. 

At the high school level, which is still a "learning" level to some degree, an immediate dead ball brings more focus by the pitcher on his (or her) actions that resulted in a balk.  With a delayed dead ball, it lessons the impact in the pitcher's mind, thus lessening the significance of needing to fix it.  By letting the play go on, the pitcher does not associate the outcome with his actions.  By killing it right away, it is clearly associated to the pitcher's actions.

Coming from the softball world where an illegal pitch (the equivalent) is a delayed dead ball AND the penalty has been lessened ... and this is purely anecdotal in my experience ...  In softball, an illegal pitch used to be the equivalent of a balk -- the batter was awarded a ball and all runners advanced one base.  Meaningful penalty, makes the pitcher think twice about what she did.  In the last two years, organizations have been removing the advancement of the runners from the penalty.  Pitchers have become less cognizant of illegal pitches and less likely to correct them -- meaning they are committing far more illegal pitches.

[Tborze]

[lawump]

On 4/24/2020 at 10:18 PM, Jimurray said:

I'm just trying to support this small business that might need activity with a hook, in this thread and another one, that might generate some discussion if that is what generates some income to this business. But how did you and @lawumpvote as to that particular survey question? No need to answer as we know many are dealing with very much more important stuff.

I voted to change to a delayed dead ball balk rule, twice, while on the committee.

[maven]

 

[grayhawk]

3 hours ago, lawump said:

I voted to change to a delayed dead ball balk rule, twice, while on the committee.

As the Instructional Chairman for our association, how can I expect our umpires to get the rule for a DDB balk correct when they can't even figure out the no new inning after two and a half hours for sub-varsity games? 

[lawump]

23 minutes ago, grayhawk said:

As the Instructional Chairman for our association, how can I expect our umpires to get the rule for a DDB balk correct when they can't even figure out the no new inning after two and a half hours for sub-varsity games? 

LOL. 

One of my rationales was that almost all (not 100%...but I'm guessing a super-majority) high school umpires officiate other levels of baseball besides high school.  And whether they umpire Little League, Dixie, USSSA, NCAA, American Legion, Babe Ruth, etc...they have to know the delayed dead ball balk rule.  So, I would expect that a super-majority of high school umpires should already know the rule.

Maybe I'm wrong; but this is certainly the case for the four states I have umpired amateur baseball in my life:  Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina and South Carolina.

[Jimurray]

22 hours ago, lawump said:

LOL. 

One of my rationales was that almost all (not 100%...but I'm guessing a super-majority) high school umpires officiate other levels of baseball besides high school.  And whether they umpire Little League, Dixie, USSSA, NCAA, American Legion, Babe Ruth, etc...they have to know the delayed dead ball balk rule.  So, I would expect that a super-majority of high school umpires should already know the rule.

Maybe I'm wrong; but this is certainly the case for the four states I have umpired amateur baseball in my life:  Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina and South Carolina.

If this was not the case in some states (I know of a PONY umpire group that used coach choice because the OBR rule was too complicated) wouldn't FED using coach choice be better than an immediate dead ball? Don't even use the FED criteria for ignoring CO/CI. Call time at the end of all playing action and ask the coach if he wants the penalty or the play. It would be a little more advantageous to the offense in cases where OBR would ignore the balk and have runner out advancing at his own risk. It also might allow multiple runs if playing action continued. OBR kills the ball when a fly ball is caught because the batter will not advance one base. If you kill it at the end of playing action you might have an overthrow or error that allows more than one run to score. But @The Man in Blue has a point about the skill level. "that's a balk" can spook a pitcher and allow a free swing on an easy pitch. Do we want to give that advantage to the offense?

[grayhawk]

On 4/27/2020 at 9:16 AM, lawump said:

LOL. 

One of my rationales was that almost all (not 100%...but I'm guessing a super-majority) high school umpires officiate other levels of baseball besides high school.  And whether they umpire Little League, Dixie, USSSA, NCAA, American Legion, Babe Ruth, etc...they have to know the delayed dead ball balk rule.  So, I would expect that a super-majority of high school umpires should already know the rule.

Maybe I'm wrong; but this is certainly the case for the four states I have umpired amateur baseball in my life:  Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina and South Carolina.

Even if you know the rule, that doesn't mean you will administer it correctly on the field.  Lots of variables to manage. As a comparison, how many times have you seen umpires screw up catcher's obstruction? And that happens WAY more than a balk followed by the ball being put into play, and especially more than a balk being followed by a base hit or a home run.

Nope, not worth it.

[lawump]

Just now, grayhawk said:

Even if you know the rule, that doesn't mean you will administer it correctly on the field.  Lots of variables to manage. As a comparison, how many times have you seen umpires screw up catcher's obstruction? And that happens WAY more than a balk followed by the ball being put into play, and especially more than a balk being followed by a base hit or a home run.

Nope, not worth it.

Other than the time I had a three-man crew comprised of all veterans (all had worked at least one state championship game) kick the CO rule 3-times in the SAME playoff game against the same team (they took multiple runs off the board against the that team...who ended up losing by one run)...I've never seen it incorrectly administered in a game.   (That's a true story.)

With that said, umpires not doing their job (learning and administering the rules correctly) shouldn't result in a kid having a home run (or even a hit) taken away from him, IMHO.  I know that it doesn't happen often, but it has absolutely happened.  (It has happened in my district a couple of times over the years.)  And I know one could get into a debate about "how many times does this actually happen" to justify changing the rule...and I appreciate the dissenting view...but for me, one time is too much as you're penalizing the offense for the mistake of the defense which is, IMHO, against the total "spirit" of the rules.  

I know this has been hashed out and argued a number of times on these boards over the years...so I won't go further.  Outside of this forum, I just know that twice I had enough votes on the baseball rules committee to change this rule to the OBR rule, but that twice the NFHS executive committee rejected it.  So, while I am not privy to the executive committee's thinking, I don't see this rule changing anytime soon...even if 100% of all umpires in this year's survey state they want a delayed dead ball.  So, in reality, I've moved on.  I expect the current rule to be the rule for a long, long time in NFHS.

 

[Jimurray]

30 minutes ago, lawump said:

Other than the time I had a three-man crew comprised of all veterans (all had worked at least one state championship game) kick the CO rule 3-times in the SAME playoff game against the same team (they took multiple runs off the board against the that team...who ended up losing by one run)...I've never seen it incorrectly administered in a game.   (That's a true story.)

With that said, umpires not doing their job (learning and administering the rules correctly) shouldn't result in a kid having a home run (or even a hit) taken away from him, IMHO.  I know that it doesn't happen often, but it has absolutely happened.  (It has happened in my district a couple of times over the years.)  And I know one could get into a debate about "how many times does this actually happen" to justify changing the rule...and I appreciate the dissenting view...but for me, one time is too much as you're penalizing the offense for the mistake of the defense which is, IMHO, against the total "spirit" of the rules.  

I know this has been hashed out and argued a number of times on these boards over the years...so I won't go further.  Outside of this forum, I just know that twice I had enough votes on the baseball rules committee to change this rule to the OBR rule, but that twice the NFHS executive committee rejected it.  So, while I am not privy to the executive committee's thinking, I don't see this rule changing anytime soon...even if 100% of all umpires in this year's survey state they want a delayed dead ball.  So, in reality, I've moved on.  I expect the current rule to be the rule for a long, long time in NFHS.

 

So why is NFHS asking the survey question?  It would pain me to enforce Coach choice on a delayed dead ball ball because I can ace the OBR rule but that compromise would allow those rare home runs. 

[yawetag]

With coach-choice, what stops a coach from taking the advantage and just having his runners circle the bases until they've all either scored or been thrown out? The worst that can happen is he gets to advance all his base runners and the batter gets another shot. The best is that he gets at least two runs.

The OBR way is the best - the batter still gets a chance to hit, but he and the runners only get one base for "free".

[Jimurray]

53 minutes ago, yawetag said:

With coach-choice, what stops a coach from taking the advantage and just having his runners circle the bases until they've all either scored or been thrown out? The worst that can happen is he gets to advance all his base runners and the batter gets another shot. The best is that he gets at least two runs.

The OBR way is the best - the batter still gets a chance to hit, but he and the runners only get one base for "free".

True but in all three codes on CO/CI the coach can force the defense to play on however many runners he advances for multiple runs or the third out if his batter is put out at 1B. He does have to trade an out for that advantage though and I wonder if that might ever happen. 

[Mudisfun]

On 4/27/2020 at 8:52 AM, grayhawk said:

As the Instructional Chairman for our association, how can I expect our umpires to get the rule for a DDB balk correct when they can't even figure out the no new inning after two and a half hours for sub-varsity games? 

I thought it was a drop dead... man.

 

kidding.

[grayhawk]

7 hours ago, Mudisfun said:

I thought it was a drop dead... man.

 

kidding.

[johnnyg08]

On 4/27/2020 at 10:52 AM, grayhawk said:

As the Instructional Chairman for our association, how can I expect our umpires to get the rule for a DDB balk correct when they can't even figure out the no new inning after two and a half hours for sub-varsity games? 

Yikes...for sub varsity...2.5 hrs should be drop dead time. Eeeek!

[Donny7]

2 hours ago, johnnyg08 said:

Yikes...for sub varsity...2.5 hrs should be drop dead time. Eeeek!

Mr. Moderator johnnyg. You better be careful posting to an April 2020 topic. Someone may whup-out the dreaded ZOMBIE on you. 

[BT_Blue]

1 hour ago, Donny7 said:

Mr. Moderator johnnyg. You better be careful posting to an April 2020 topic. Someone may whup-out the dreaded ZOMBIE on you. 

He's accrued some cashe on the page. However, he will be taken out back and flogged if he does it again! Lol 

[johnnyg08]

On 3/1/2021 at 12:00 AM, Donny7 said:

Mr. Moderator johnnyg. You better be careful posting to an April 2020 topic. Someone may whup-out the dreaded ZOMBIE on you. 

Last year was such a blur, it felt like the movie Back to the Future. 

[Thunderheads]

On 3/1/2021 at 1:00 AM, Donny7 said:

Mr. Moderator johnnyg. You better be careful posting to an April 2020 topic. Someone may whup-out the dreaded ZOMBIE on you. 

As another moderator, this would/should be overlooked.  @johnnyg08 is correct .... this is probably not a bad thread to re-ignite due to the fact that most of us didn't do a high school game last year.   It may be a nice refresher ....