Illegal bat

[dumbdumb]

 

[Velho]

From this article https://www.knoxnews.com/story/sports/college/university-of-tennessee/other-sports/2022/04/02/jordan-beck-illegal-bat-tennessee-baseball-vanderbilt-mike-honcho/7243998001/

"Beck was called out for using an illegal bat without the required sticker indicating it was tested and approved for use in Tennessee’s series against Vanderbilt. Beck and Vols coach Tony Vitello explained the sticker came off during batting practice at Hawkins Field before Tennessee’s 6-2 win."

 

The umpires convened and examined the bat before calling Beck out.

"In pre-series bat testing, a sticker with the logo of the opposing team is placed on legal bats," SEC associate commissioner for communications Herb Vincent said in a statement to Knox News. "There was a sticker on the bat in question, but it was not an appropriate sticker on the bat. It was a sticker from a midweek game. Therefore, the bat was deemed illegal.”

[midtnump]

To me it was a horrible decision by the plate umpire. UT played a wednesday game instead of Tuesday, and loaded the bus early Thursday morning for the 4hr drive to Nashville. What wasn't said in the story was per NCAA rules, all the bats for both teams were inspected Thursday with both team reps present. The bat in question passed, if it had been found to not pass it would have been conviscated and held til the end of the series. The bat had the appropriate NCAA approval sticker by the bat manufacturer, an approval sticker from the game the night before. Since the bat met with NCAA approval it was on the offical NCAA approval bat approval list. So the only thing in question was the fact that a silly little sticker came off of the bat. So my question is the plate umpire knowing the process and knowing that it wasn't conviscated on thursday, how do you take away a home run over a sticker that probably wasn't stuck on very well and hold it in the highest proof of legality when you had all the other information there?? 

[Replacematt]

1 hour ago, midtnump said:

To me it was a horrible decision by the plate umpire. UT played a wednesday game instead of Tuesday, and loaded the bus early Thursday morning for the 4hr drive to Nashville. What wasn't said in the story was per NCAA rules, all the bats for both teams were inspected Thursday with both team reps present. The bat in question passed, if it had been found to not pass it would have been conviscated and held til the end of the series. The bat had the appropriate NCAA approval sticker by the bat manufacturer, an approval sticker from the game the night before. Since the bat met with NCAA approval it was on the offical NCAA approval bat approval list. So the only thing in question was the fact that a silly little sticker came off of the bat. So my question is the plate umpire knowing the process and knowing that it wasn't conviscated on thursday, how do you take away a home run over a sticker that probably wasn't stuck on very well and hold it in the highest proof of legality when you had all the other information there?? 

The only information we have is that it didn't have the appropriate sticker. 

It's a very generous assumption that bat was present for testing, as shown by your own commentary. 

[midtnump]

It was confirmed that the bat in question did go thru the inspection on Thursday, confirmed by another SEC umpire that is a good friend of mine. He spoke with one of the umps on the field after the game. 

[Richvee]

1 hour ago, midtnump said:

To me it was a horrible decision by the plate umpire  

So you think he should have just overlooked a rule then explain to defensive team… “ yeah, you’re right. There’s no sticker for this series on the bat. But it probably went through testing and the sticker probably just fell off, so I’m not going to enforce the rule this time.” 
 

Try explaining that call to the NCAA and your assignor. Then sit back and see when you get another Friday night #5 vs. # 1 SEC game assignment. 

[Velho]

I find this interesting from a process perspective (a big part of what I do for a living) there is a room for improvement (ok, a lot of room). Better adhesive on the stickers they use, take photographs & capture serial number from the manufacturer sticker during testing for example.

6 minutes ago, midtnump said:

how do you take away a home run over a sticker that probably wasn't stuck on very well and hold it in the highest proof of legality when you had all the other information there?? 

Either it has a proper sticker or it doesn't. Once it was identified, how can the umpire ignore it? They seem to have enforced the penalty by rule. This seems very straightforward with the current ruleset. 

Good lesson for Beck (and others) to be diligent. Maybe immediately taking the bat and sticker to umps would have resolved the issue before the game started.

That kind of diligence will serve them well in in baseball and beyond - which is what we should be most worried about for 99.9999%+ of all players, imo. 

[Replacematt]

1 hour ago, midtnump said:

It was confirmed that the bat in question did go thru the inspection on Thursday, confirmed by another SEC umpire that is a good friend of mine. He spoke with one of the umps on the field after the game. 

FOAF isn't confirmation, especially when the assertion within would not be provable even from the primary source.