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lawump
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What would you have on these plays under FED rules?

No runners.  B/R hits ground ball.  Throw to first base is wild.  Catcher is backing up the throw when he makes contact with a BENCH (not base) coach who was out in front of his (first base) dugout.  In,

(a) the hinderance/contact is minor.  The B/R takes a stop toward second base, but F2 is able to quickly pick up the ball, so the B/R quickly returns to first base.  In short, the contact did not change the play in any way, shape, or form.

(b) the hinderance/contact is significant allowing the B/R to advance to second base (there is no play at second base).

(c) the hinderance/contact is significant and the B/R advances to second base without a play.  However, the umpire believes that even without the hinderance the B/R would have advanced to second base easily because the throw was so poor.

I'll post my thoughts after I read the responses of others.

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I agree with my more-established and seasoned brethren above.

A. that's nothing - coach, you know better (not these words but something close to let them know they can't be in the way)

B & C - interference.  The throw has nothing to do with this one (as I believe you would agree) - it is INT because the coach made the player rush and not get the true chance to make a play or possibly a good throw.

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I don't know if this is a hill I want to die on, but I'd make a case for INT in all of the above.

Not so much because he actually changed the outcome of the play, but the fact that he even had a potential *impact* on it in the first place!   We get runners for INT even though "they didn't mean it!"  We get - or at least, I've recently seen YouTube footage from a Big Ten game where it was 'got' - an out for a bat tossed into foul ground that causes F2 to stumble an miss a pop-up.  But those things BELONG on the field at that time.  A bench coach belongs ...... well, on the *bench.*

So I guess, until the angry mob tears me to pieces, put me on Team Interference.

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47 minutes ago, HokieUmp said:

but I'd make a case for INT in all of the above.

Can’t make that case for A. Oh sure, for B and C, that case can – and indeed, should – be made for INT because that contact – between the F2 covering an overthrow in Foul Territory and a coach (or other game participant who shouldn’t be where he is) – affects the subsequent play of BR advancing to 2B. 

However, that same contact has no bearing whatsoever on the play upon BR at 1B, and whether or not he is safe. 

Additionally, @lawump did not specify as to which club the interjecting coach belongs; while unlikely, it is not outside the realm of possibility that the bench coach belongs to the Defensive team, and that he wasn’t aware of how rapid and in close proximity his F2 was! Are we going to penalize the offense because the defense can’t keep their own roster members from colliding... beyond the play??! 

So, provided that BR doesn’t take advantage of that contact, then we have no justification for calling him Out. This is eerily similar to calling BR “Out” for a slung bat on a batted ball put in play that does not involve the F2. Warning / Restriction (for coaches) / Ejection? Sure, that’s warranted. There’s codified grounds for that. But a call of “Out”? No grounds for it, unless, again, the BR benefits from it. 

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1 hour ago, HokieUmp said:

Not so much because he actually changed the outcome of the play, but the fact that he even had a potential *impact* on it in the first place!

Potential hindrance is not illegal. All fielders and all runners have the potential to hinder each other all the time, every play.

1 hour ago, HokieUmp said:

We get runners for INT even though "they didn't mean it!"

This is not apposite: that's accidental hindrance, which is actual hindrance not intended. 

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8 hours ago, maven said:

Potential hindrance is not illegal. All fielders and all runners have the potential to hinder each other all the time, every play.

Well, the OP by @lawump DID in fact mention there WAS hindrance, albeit minor.  But what I meant in my write-up, and should have re-worded it, probably, is more along the lines of "a bench coach that's out on the field, and gets near enough to a play like that, has about a 1-in-1 chance of me using 'umpire judgment' to find hindrance."  With the comment, to the head coach that comes out, "tell him to keep his dumb ass of the field, then."

Or.... more sciencey - that potential hindrance is gonna turn into kinetic hindrance, when I get done with it.

8 hours ago, maven said:

This is not apposite: that's accidental hindrance, which is actual hindrance not intended. 

Again, my thought process is:  we get players for violating rules.  Roughly a quarter of the time - and I'm likely being conservative - there's some nonsense defending the action as "he didn't mean it."  Proper response:  "So?"  And so, if we're getting people who were just doing their thing on the field, where they're meant to be, and a legit part of the playing action, then I'm absolutely finding a way to get a coach, who knows full F*#King well he's not to be out there during live play.  It's kinda Old Testamenty of me, but I'm okay with it.

Now, if there's some interpretation/edict/memo that explicitly denies me that judgment, so be it.

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lawump's OP used the ambiguous expression "hindrance/contact." Contact that he stipulates to have no impact whatever on play is not hindrance. This is not a judgment call, but correct perception of the consequences of the contact. It's akin to the BR rounding 1B and bumping into F3 after a safe single. Contact, yes; hindrance, no.

I'd guess lawump used "hindrance/contact" to make his 3 cases as parallel as possible, though the first is materially different (in not being hindrance).

As for being a wrathful god on the field: my patience for teams that leave their crap in live-ball territory is vanishingly small. Generally, I won't start a half inning with it there. But if I do, and it comes into play... Accordingly, I'm looking for any slight disadvantage such negligence (usually negligence—MC from a bench?) creates for the opposing team. Even old coaches can learn lessons (sometimes a spell sitting on the team bus can facilitate their reflection on these topics).

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FED interference rules do not address team personnel who are unauthorized to be on the field. The only penalty for this is a warning and an ejection on the next violation(3-3-1). The dead ball table in addresses interference by others connected with the team, but each reference in the table offers no guidance on bench personnel.

This might be an instance where 10-3-g is invoked by the UIC to fix a situation not addressed by the rules. If that is the case, the crew needs to have a discussion about what they all saw and to have a remedy that corrects any hindrance that the interference may have caused. Once that decisions made, a conversation with either or both HCs to explain the reasoning for the decision needs to be had understanding that someone may become unhinged.

If it's the offensive coach outside the dugout, I have nothing in A or C since in the OP there was no hindrance, hence no interference. In B I have an out based on the above. If it's a defensive team coach, the play stands as is.

 

 

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I would agree that FED rules do not address this question directly but there is a way to construe an answer by using the 2019 FED rules 3-2-3 and 8-4-2g—

3-2 ART. 3 . . . nor shall the base coach or members of the team at bat fail to vacate any area needed by a fielder in his attempt to put out a batter or runner.

PENALTY: The ball is dead immediately and the runner is out. The batter-runner or runner may be out as in 7-4-1f and 8-4-2g. Other runners return as in 8-2-8.

8-4 ART. 2 . . . Any runner is out when he:

g. …or his being put out is prevented by an illegal act by anyone connected with the team (2-21-1, 3-2-2, 3) …If the umpire is uncertain who would have been played on, the runner closest to home shall be called out; or

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5 hours ago, Kevin_K said:

FED interference rules do not address team personnel who are unauthorized to be on the field.

Not directly, no. BUT: we do have 3-3-1a that prohibits coaches from leaving the dugout during a live ball, and 10-2-3g that requires us to address any advantage that his team gains therefrom.

If his team is hindered, I'm probably just going with the warning from 3-3-1a and allowing the play to stand.

This question falls into the category of "questions about what the rules require when an umpire ignores another rule or uses improper mechanics." The generally correct answer is: enforce the other rule, and use proper mechanics, so the second problem never arises.

In this case: get unauthorized personnel off the field before making the ball live. I'd bet dollars to donuts that lawump's play was not the first one that had the coach on the field.

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You guys have hit the same points I did while discussing this play with various stakeholders (the umpires, the defensive coach, league administrators) in a real world play that generated my post. 

First, when I say "this play"...the play that actually happened to one of my umpire crews was "a".  I just added "b" and "c" to my original post to get everyone's wheels spinning and to compare and contrast.  And yes @maven, I was trying to make them as parallel as possible.  Also, to clear up a factual matter, the hindering coach in my real world play was an offensive bench coach.  In the real world play, my umpire ruled, "that's nothing!"

Second, I like @Kevin_K 's post.  I have known (through my own studies) that unlike various umpire manuals for OBR, FED does not address "authorized person" interference.  I believe that term was first coined by the Jaksa/Roder manual in the 1990's.  But, basically, OBR addresses (through various interpretations) what constitutes "interference" (and what does not) by a person who is authorized to be on the field but is not a fielder, runner, batter, base coach or umpire.  Other than media personnel, FED is silent on this issue (as you guys have pointed out in this thread.

Third, I also like the analogy to loose equipment that has been raised in this thread.  In fact, because there is no FED rule directly on point, I specifically analogized to the the "loose equipment" rule (which allows for umpire judgment to determine whether to call an out, advance a runner, or return a runner).   More specifically, when discussing this play with the DHC, he said, "if it had been a bucket, he would be automatically out."  This opened the door for me to tell him that his understanding of the loose equipment rule was wrong as nothing was "automatic".  Furthermore, I told the DHC (who wanted an "out") that there was no rule directly on point for this play, but that it should (in my opinion) be treated just like the loose equipment rule in that the umpire has to use his judgment.  Because the umpire judged that the "hinderance" did not in any way, shape, or form change the result of the play...the umpire was correct in judging that there was no interference.  (BTW, the defensive head coach agreed that the result of the play was unaffected by the contact with the bench coach.)  While I have tremendous respect for @Senor Azul, if he is suggesting that play "a" (in my OP) should result in an "out", I respectfully disagree for the reasons set forth by others in this thread (as well as by me in this paragraph).  

Finally, I also told  the various persons that I spoke with that a team warning should have been issued under 3-3-1 (a) (which you guys also brought up in this thread).

 

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