Who's Down Wit' OBP loves the O-Dawg.

Zack is just wrong this year. He's not pitching well tonight as evidenced by the 87 pitches through 4. But he's given up 0 runs despite 2 walks and the Indians having a BABIP of .555 (5 of 9) because he's got 8 K's.

SI

Andruw Jones: 2 for 3 with a walk, double, homer, 2 runs, and 3 RBIs tonight

Good day for a castoff

SI

Watching Nick Swisher come into pitch for the Yanks (and he did a DECENT job!!) was great :D.

Woah! I have Nick Swisher on a fantasy team. Do I get pitching stats from him? :D

Nick Swisher is unquestionably the Yankees' MVP so far. Hard to believe they tried to give the RF job to nady when Swisher clearly has more talent. I wish they had traded him before he showed what he can do.

Yeah, the errors and pitching killed them. The bottom of the ninth was very remeniscent of last year's opener, though. Zimmerman came up, everyone was on their feet, and we just knew something was going to happen. Sure enough, he launched one over the centerfield wall. The problem is, last year that was good for a walk off. This year, it brought it to 9-8. Then, with 0 outs, Dunn, Dukes and Johnson blue it. Dukes especially, swinging at two that bounced before they hit the plate.

I know - I red that in the recap! :p

On the way to the in-laws this weekend I was listening to a post game show on WLW. The host was polling fans on who was better, Pete Rose or Frank Robinson and Rose was the runaway victor. I really wish people in Cincy understood that scrappiness isn't the end all and be all for a baseball player.

Wow - being an umpire this timing play is nuts..

Rare 'four-out play' helps Dodgers down Diamondbacks - Big League Stew - MLB - Yahoo! Sports

Baseball novices sometimes complain the sport's complex layers of rules make the game too difficult for the uninformed masses to enjoy.

Purists could always counter: What do you mean? Three strikes and you're out. Three outs and the inning's over. Nine innings (usually) and the game ends. What's so hard to understand?

Well, for one thing, sometimes there's four outs in an inning, like in the Dodgers' confusing 3-1 victory over the Diamondbacks on Sunday.

"Baseball is three outs, I thought," Andre Ethier told the L.A. Times on Sunday.

You're right, Andre, it is ... except when an obscure rule says it's not.

Follow along closely here, because it gets complicated: The Dodgers were trailing 1-0 with one out in the second inning when the perfect storm of baseball weirdness happened.

With runners on second and third base, the Dodgers' Randy Wolf hit a line drive back to Arizona pitcher Dan Haren, who turned and threw toward second base in order to complete what should have been an inning-ending double play.

Had infielder Felipe Lopez just stepped on second base, he would have doubled off Juan Pierre and that would have been it. Three outs, end of inning.

Instead, he ignored the bag, took a few more steps and tagged Pierre.

Meanwhile, the runner on third base, the aforementioned Ethier, ran toward home on contact and actually touched the plate a split-second before Pierre was tagged, which umpires noticed.

Doesn’t matter. The Dodgers are out. Right? Wrong.

From the LA Times:

"When it happened, [coach] Bob Schaefer said, 'That's the four-out play.' "

— Dodgers manager Joe Torre

The what?

Because Lopez, the player with the ball, moved to tag a runner and not the base itself, he more or less put Pierre in a rundown, which extended the life of the play, giving the other baserunner time to score.

If the D-backs had appealed to umpires that Ethier had left third base early — which he had — then umps would have ruled it the fourth out of the inning and the run would have been taken off the board. The D-backs never appealed because they didn't think they needed to. The defense just left the field after Pierre was tagged, incorrectly thinking that the inning was over without the run at home counting.
Got it?

"They did get it right,” Melvin said of the umpires. "That is the call: If you tag the runner at second, you have to go to appeal before you come off the field to get the runner at third."

Ethier had no idea his run counted until he took his place on defense in the field.

"I see some people talking, and I'm not understanding," Ethier said. "And you see a run go up. It was kind of shocking."

Video of the play at MLB.com is disappointingly uninformative and ends abruptly. Use your imagination to fill in the visual blanks.

It's easier to understand the play if you liken it to a rundown when multiple runners are caught off the bag, but a man scores before the other is tagged out.

Ok, I'm pretty sure I follow.

But why? I don't understand why it is necessarily "putting a guy in a rundown" when he couldn't run towards 3rd (legally) anyway? That base was effectively occupied by Ethier, and Pierre hadn't tagged up at 2nd yet.

That's true of baseball fans in a lot of places, not just Cincy

SI

I'm sure you're right, but after hearing last season how Freel should play more, Keppinger should be the everyday SS, and Dunn was worthless I really question the collective IQ of Reds fans.

I agree with you on Freel, but Keppinger was hitting like .300 when people were calling for that... he got exposed as time wore on. Though he is off to a 5-9 start for the Astros.

I may miss Dunn's 40 home runs a year, but I'm not going to miss the 50 times he got called out on strikes every year, or the 15 misplays in left field either.

Kepp has a decent bat, but he has the range of Stephen Hawking at SS. He's fine as a utility guy, but he's simply not a major league SS. We disagree on Dunn. He's a black hole in LF, but his bat more than makes up for that.

Isn't that just an overly complicated way of saying that Ethier's run counted because he scored before Lopez tagged Pierre for the final out of the inning?

Except he didn't tag up.

right...

Except that he did, in effect, tag up because the defense failed to appeal the play.

The stupid part of it is they had to appeal the run instead of the umpires getting it "right" in the first place.

I don't understand why tagging a runner changes the rules as opposed to tagging a base.

No, the stupid part was initiating the run down at all and not simply stepping on second base.

Sure the umps should have gotten it right, but that's also why there is a rule in place for appealing a play. Whether that rule should be reworded to allow a challenge after you've left the field is a different discussion, but really, a better awareness by Lopez of the situation would have saved a lot of headache.

Tagging the base ends the play immediately. What caused all this was the time involved to chase down the runner (between second and third) and apply the tag while the runner who started on third (who didn't tag up after the catch by the pitcher) made it home.

If he steps on second then Ethier doesn't cross home plate in time creating a moot point on whether or not he tagged up. Because Lopez chased down Pierre, it gave Ethier time to touch home plate before the third out was recorded. Then you get into the dynamics about how to challenge a play and because the defensive team left the field, they were then unable to challenge the fact that Ethier hadn't tagged up on the play.

See Travis' explanation just before this post. He pretty much nails it.

I totally understand all that. It's the same process if it was a normal ground ball in a non-force situation, where the runner could cross the plate before a tag is made, making the run count. I just don't see how realistically you could award a run when a 3rd out is made on a force play (for Pierre not tagging up). (edit: Yep, this is probably my mistake. It was not technically a force play because there's a tag.)

Also, I didn't see the play. The writer's choice of words of "Because Lopez, the player with the ball, moved to tag a runner and not the base itself, he more or less put Pierre in a rundown" made me think that Lopez crossed over 2nd and tagged Pierre as he tried returning to the base. If it was a true rundown like you would normally see, I would think the writer wouldn't have said "more or less." WTF is the difference between standing on 2nd base or tagging a guy as he slides back into it?

My problem is obviously with the rule, not that it was called (correctly).

Not really. Travis seems to be saying that the run would not have counted because the runner wouldn't have crossed the plate before the base was tagged. That's not the case. The run would not count if he tagged the base, because that would make it a "force out" which overrides any runs that would score. 3 guys on base could cross the plate before the force out was made, but as long as someone tags the base to get the out before the defense leaves the field, none of the runs count. By tagging the runner instead, that is considered a non force-out... so it is treated just like any other out when figuring up when a run counts. For example, when a runner is caught in a rundown for the final out of the inning, if a man crosses the plate before the runner is tagged out, the run counts. Same thing here. It is treated like a rundown situation if the runner is tagged to get him out instead of the base tagged for the force out.

The problem I have with this is shouldn't the umpire have simply called the guy at the plate out automatically once the tag was applied to Pierre? Why the need to appeal at all, aside from the umpire screwing up? I know they are calling it a "four out rule", but is there really a need for that when the guy at third left early and never tagged up like he was supposed to? There's no need to even consider that guy "out", it's more like he never left the base to begin with.

Not if he crosses the plate first. If you are a runner at first with nobody out, you can theoretically leave your base prior to the pitch, and run all the way around and score on a caught fly ball in the outfield, and your run counts if they never throw back to the bag and double you up.

Well, the thing is, because he chased him down, Pierre doesn't technically have to return straight to the base, hence the pseudo run down situation. It's not a true run down because eventually he'll just run him out of room, but it does prolong the play which allowed Ethier to cross home before the out was recorded. In that sense the play was actually called correctly. As bad as it is for the umps to have missed the call on the tag up it was still a very poor choice on the part of Lopez given that he introduces all sorts of (unlikely) variables into the play (he could drop the ball while chasing/tagging Pierre, etc).

Ah, that's the part of the rules missing from all this, that crossing the plate on a fly catch is a special case.

BTW, Beckett got suspended 6 games.

I think he deserved to miss a start for it.

And after reading this umpires forum/blog I think I'm in agreement with a poster there who points out that this isn't a force play at second at all (if Lopez had stepped on the bag), it's actually a de facto appeal play.

Okay, I browsed through that link and have to run to a meeting, but wouldn't the touching of second by Lopez be the appeal? I'm not seeing how the play could have extended past that moment (with Ethier not having crossed home by this time). Whatever it's technically called, the out would have been called at the time Lopez stepped on second and the play would have been over.

Right, it would have been if he had touched second instead of going brain dead & chasing down the runner. Instead by failing to do so, and then by the defense leaving the field without appealing Ethier leaving third, they allowed the run to score.

Sorry, was reading your previous post in the sense that had Lopez touched second that it wasn't a force play but an appeal, not that it became a de facto appeal play because he didn't take the force.

Misinterpretation, just in keeping with the theme of the event, heh.

Yep. "Perry Barber"'s explanation is the best I've read so far.

Nope. The umpire's job is generally to serve as an arbitrator when a play is made. That's why he calls balls and strikes and fair and foul balls.

In order to call safe or out, there needs to be a play, which requires either a fly ball and a defensive player, or an offensive player, a defensive player, and the ball. Without all three of those elements, you have no play, and thus, no need for a ruling from the umpire.

The exception is if an appeal is made on a rules basis, as Arizona ought to have done here. There was no play at the plate, and thus no safe/out call necessary from the home plate umpire, but there was, potentially, a rules violation. Had Arizona appealed to the umpiring crew for a ruling, then the umpire's arbitrator role comes into play - yes, he broke the rule, he's out. No, he didn't break the rule, he's safe.

About the only rules I can think of where the umpire is supposed to actively assert control are the balk rule and the ball being touched by a spectator while in play. In virtually every other scenario, the umpire is merely the arbitrator. He's safe, he's out. It's a ball, it's a strike. The ball is foul, the ball is fair.

Because no appeal for arbitration was made on Ethier and he scored before Pierre was tagged out, the run is valid.

They did get it right, it's the manager that didn't call it. It's not like they are going to tell the team that they need to appeal or something. If a runner doesn't tag up, the only way he's out is if you throw the ball to the base he left.

For comparison's sake (in defining an umpire's involvement in a play), consider this something like missing a base (including home) when running the bases. If a player is on second when a hit occurs and scores on the play (but doesn't physically touch third base on the way), the run counts unless the defensive team appeals the play. The ump "knows" (or should) that the runner didn't touch third, but can only make the call once the appeal has been made.

Whether the system/rules should be that way, again, a different discussion, but the way the rules are written now, that's how it's enforced during play.

Oh, by the way, the Nationals did officially sell out opening day. Just for those that were lamenting the availability of seats.

Listening to sports radio here you'd think its 1994 and Griffey is a MVP candidate. Its nice to see how much this area loves him, but they are really out of touch with where he is as a player at this point in his career.

On a side note, just picked up some lower level seats to the Mariners/Red Sox game on the 15th of next month. Taking the boy to the first MLB game he'll actually remember.

cool!

I am going to the game on Saturday

the broadcasters aren't doing anything to temper the enthusiasm during Griffeys first AB

Jesse Litsch on the 15 day DL for the Jays. Apparently won't so much as pick up a baseball for two weeks so he's likely to miss at least a month if not two.

Given that the Jays are 6-2 to start the season (tied late in the game tonight) and 80% of your rotation is Purcey/Romero/Richmond/Tallet, does the front office get the green light to go shopping for a starter? I'm assuming it'd be somebody in the last year of their contract and it's not exactly the best time of year for it, but really, why not get a bit aggressive at this point, reward the offense for coming out hot and see if they can't get something rolling. Then later in the season if Litsch and any of the other currently injured pitchers are able to come back and bolster the staff, great, if not and you're still in contention then maybe try and pick up another rental.

Going to be really sad if nothing is done and that when the offense invariably levels off a bit the pitching isn't able to step it up enough to compensate due to the youth/inexperience.

Dola, was pretty sweet seeing Romero work his way out of a bases loaded, nobody out jam without allowing a run. Kid has shown some pretty good composure tonight along with a pretty sweet pitching arsenal. Here's hoping he can keep this up for a majority of the season.

Purcey didn't have a great game the other night but he still got a bunch of K's and looks really strong.

SI

Nice rings! They gave away realistic looking replicas to all of us tonight!

Does it come with all the diamonds? ;)

SI

I doubt they keep it up but the Mariners are a really fun team to watch right now.