OBR-Dead ball/Fair ball

[JohnnyG]

I believe we have all seen this at every level in one way or another. The situation is that a pitch went behind the batter. The pitched ball hits the bat and goes fair without touching the batter. The umpire calls dead ball (with arms in the air) then seeing the ball goes fair, points fair. The batter runs to first and is called out by the throw from the catcher. Of course, there is confusion from the offensive coach. The plate umpire never asked for help from the base umpire and the final decision was the batter/runner was out at first. I was trying to find something in the OBR about this situation. I believe in NFHS, you have to stick with “Dead ball”. Was the umpires ruling correct? And, what would be the explanation?

[SH0102]

The umpire made his call too quickly, it happens to us all.

but once an umpire yells “foul” or “time”, the ball is dead.

Its unfortunate, but the at-bat should have resumed with a strike added to the count (or stayed at 2 strikes if he had that before this play) with everyone knowing the umpire erred.

But to put the batter at a disadvantage because he hears foul or “dead ball” is not right either.

 

[JohnnyG]

That was my thought and common sense and fair play. I wasn’t sure if there was anything “technically” in the OBR 

[maven]

35 minutes ago, JohnnyG said:

I was trying to find something in the OBR about this situation. I believe in NFHS, you have to stick with “Dead ball”. Was the umpires ruling correct?

You are correct about FED: if the umpire rules a ball foul AND the ball touches the ground (not mentioned in the OP but likely), then the ball is dead by rule and it's foul regardless of what happens next.

OBR does not address this point, though some pro manuals might. Part of the reason why is that pro rules and pro manuals are for, well, pro umpires who don't make this kind of mistake (which is to say: it might happen once in a decade over 100K games).

For amateur ball, I generally recommend treating as in FED: when the call is made and the ball has hit the ground, someone will be disadvantaged by the call. Rather than try to undo the disadvantage, it's almost always easier to just eat the erroneous foul call.

We see this kind of question periodically: "umpire screwed up the mechanics/call, what do the rules say about what to do?" Rule books are generally not written to address all possible errors (the bad foul call is especially common, so FED added it). The general answer is: be a better umpire, though that doesn't help in the moment.

[Ruben]

Something very similar happened in the Red Sox/Twins game on April 15th.  Christian Vazquez was judged to have been hit by a pitch in real time, and HP umpire Jordan Baker called time. Vazquez stopped, while the ball rolled in fair territory and a fielder threw to 1st base. 

On replay, the ball hit the knob of the bat and since it was a fair ball, they upheld the out at 1st base. So, OBR, in practice, differs from FED.

See the "Twins overturn HBP call" video on this page https://www.mlb.com/gameday/red-sox-vs-twins/2021/04/15/634554#game_state=final,lock_state=final,game_tab=videos,game=634554

[MadMax]

7 hours ago, ShaunH said:

The umpire made his call too quickly, it happens to us all.

Sure, but let this serve as encouragement to us that if we are in a reviewable / video-replay-able environment, we actually should “jump on (things like) this” slower and less assertively. 

Even having a multi-umpire crew should be considered as a factor in this. Granted, 2-man has its challenges, and you’re not always paired with the most... alert and dependable of partners. Multi-umpire crews typically have better rapport, coordination, and at least familiarity with each other, such that a PU can counsel with his BUs on events like this. It’s simple things such as, instead of grabbing every bat twitch as a swing attempt, go for that appeal to the (appropriate) BU! Let a questionable pitch play out, and then, at the close of the play, consult the BU(s). Based on all of your collaborative input, you get the play ruling correct. 

And really, these sorts of things don’t happen that often. Far fewer than a PU making a play-killing call too quickly.