Completion of AB after 4th ball or batter reaches base resulting from walk?

I have been tasked to use ISCORE for our Fall/Spring 12U B team this coming season, so I was practicing while watching my other DDs 14U Non comp team play this weekend. I assume USSA rules, but it is just a local league here in Colorado.

Runner on 3B. 2 outs. Batter has full count on her. My daughter pitching throws a wild one that gets past the catcher, obvious 4th Ball.

Batter starts to jog down to first base, but does not touch it because of what happens next...

3B Runner tries to steal home, but catcher recovers ball, throws it to pitcher covering home (my daughter), Pitcher tags runner out for 3rd out.

Teams switch and normal play resumes until 3rd out and we are back on the field playing defense. Same batter as before, the one that took 4 balls, comes up to bat again. I don't actually realize it at first until after she gets a hit and is now on base and I go walking over to talk to the Coach. Coach calls time and asks why the same batter as the one that ended the inning is batting. Umpire states since the batter did not touch first base on her walk, her AB was not complete??

The only reason I bring up ISCORE is that of course that got all messed up because now the batters were messed up from a half inning previous and at the time did not know how to bring the same batter up again. But besides that, is this correct?? I would have thought as soon as the batter received her 4th ball, no matter where she walks to, her AB is complete.


Thanks

When the batter received ball four, she became a batter-runner. That completes her at-bat. Touching, or not touching, first base doesn't have anything to do with it.

Had the EXACT situation happen in a game a couple of years ago. When the play was over I went to the home plate umpire and asked him to remember the last batter walked making sure he remembered the pitch call. I got a funny look from him at the time.

When the same girl came up to bat to lead off the inning and got a hit I approached the umpire with the BOO. The umpire removed the girl from the base, called the correct batter out bringing up the next hitter. The coach on the other team was livid. He tried using the "Not touched 1st" argument with the umpire. The ump was having none of it.

I believe the thing that made is easier for the umpire was I made sure he knew the last batter walked and then the 3rd out was made at home on the subsequent play.

12U ball will definitely keep you on your toes with iScore, just because a lot tends to happen each inning.

How did you correct the batter? Did you use a substitution? I probably would have deleted everything back to the original "non-walk" and recorded the last out after ball three. This is incorrect of course, which would have bugged me, but the umpire basically ruled that the batter did not walk.

It is worth it to keep a paper book along with iScore. It takes a little bit of practice to get the hang of keeping two books, but the paper back-up is definitely worth it when you have to go back and correct iScore. You can continue to keep score on paper, and then get iScore caught back up again in between innings. Some tournaments have a rule about the official score: The official score is the home PAPER book. If the home team doesn't have a paper book and the visiting team does, then the visiting paper book is official. Paper is also nice if there is an issue with the score - it is easy and fast to compare paper to paper and to quickly find where the scoring discrepancy lies.

Indiana said:

12U ball will definitely keep you on your toes with iScore, just because a lot tends to happen each inning.

How did you correct the batter? Did you use a substitution? I probably would have deleted everything back to the original "non-walk" and recorded the last out after ball three. This is incorrect of course, which would have bugged me, but the umpire basically ruled that the batter did not walk.

It is worth it to keep a paper book along with iScore. It takes a little bit of practice to get the hang of keeping two books, but the paper back-up is definitely worth it when you have to go back and correct iScore. You can continue to keep score on paper, and then get iScore caught back up again in between innings. Some tournaments have a rule about the official score: The official score is the home PAPER book. If the home team doesn't have a paper book and the visiting team does, then the visiting paper book is official. Paper is also nice if there is an issue with the score - it is easy and fast to compare paper to paper and to quickly find where the scoring discrepancy lies.

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As an umpire, if there is a question about batting out of order or some other problem with the lineup I want to see a paper book. Electronic is good for all the stats it keeps and can be shown, but it is next to impossible to see the overall way things have transpired. Not to mention, paper score books dont have batteries that die, programming that locks up etc. Any team my daughter has played on always kept both a paper and electronic book.

Comp said:

As an umpire, if there is a question about batting out of order or some other problem with the lineup I want to see a paper book. Electronic is good for all the stats it keeps and can be shown, but it is next to impossible to see the overall way things have transpired. Not to mention, paper score books dont have batteries that die, programming that locks up etc. Any team my daughter has played on always kept both a paper and electronic book.

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The only question about the order is resolved with the line-up card I have in my bag/pocket.

I understand that its gonna take a looooong time for most people to get used to a “non-traditional” scoresheet. But even traditional scoresheets don’t do a great job of showing exactly what took place, which is a big reason why they aren’t used by ML scorers.

When I wrote my scoring program, rather than stick with what people were used to, I converted to Project Scoresheet, and I couldn’t be happier. Here’s an example of one of our games.

http://www.infosports.com/scorekeeper/images/0507Sheldon.pdf

As you can see, it looks complicated, but the things it shows knock your socks off. I see the pitcher, the batting position of the batter, if he scored, got an RBI, or was left on base, where the runners were when his at bat was completed, how many pitches he saw, how many PO throws and fakes there were on him as a runner, how much time there was between pitches, whether the pitch was a ball, what kind of strike, or a ball in play, what took place before the ball was put in play and what pitch it happened on, the play, where the balls was hit, what its trajectory was, who fielded it, and what happened after the play or as a result of the play.

But I have to admit, even though I have a “redo” button that allows me to go back as many batters as I want, or to just pitch where I want to go, an umpire making that kind of mistake would probably screw things up for me too. I don’t worry about it though. When I get home, I just go in and make the necessary corrections before I run any stats. It’s a PITA, but I’ve had that kind of thing come up so often doing HS ball with re-entry and players being switched all over the place without the umpire saying anything. 

Sorry for the long absence but to answer a couple questions...

We also use paper book for the official book. IScore is just so much easier when compiling stats and to have them instantaneous, as well as to keep tabs on the other teams during the season.

If this would have happened again, I would have used the "skip batter" option to go all the way around the line up to bring her back up again.

I have been using IScore for a few weeks now and it really is pretty handy, yes, using paper is easier for making corrections, but the info it keeps for you is indispensable.

Dale

I use both iScore and GameChanger. GC is by far the easier of the 2 to use, and it generates all of the same basic stats as well as nearly all of the same advanced stats.

Plus it keeps a running "book" that looks just like the paper book that you can show to the old grouches who aren't up to speed on these new fangled computer contraptions.

GC is free, but it costs money to follow the games live and see the advanced stats if you're not the team owner or a family member of a player. iScore costs up front, but the back end is free. IMO the ease of use of GC paired with the pace of a 12U game makes it a clear choice over iScore - until you need to fix a mistake from 2 innings ago, then iScore is the way to go.

My rec league this season decided that the 12U girls would start with an 0-1 count. GC cannot be set up to do that, so you either have to manually add a strike to each batter (takes too long), or pitch a first strike for each at bat, which scrwes up your pitching stats something fierce. iScore can be set up to start each batter with a specific count, so we used iScore this season, but I would have preferred to use GC.

BuckeyeGuy said:

My rec league this season decided that the 12U girls would start with an 0-1 count.

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Really?? Why?