Two issues here....
First of all, any FP softball above 8U should never be a single umpire. There is too much going on for one umpire to watch. Teams should refuse to play in leagues and/or tournaments that use only a single umpire. Yes, It could increase the cost to play, but it should produce...
My point was to address this statement:
"Once the umpires call the end of the game and leave the field, the game is over. Period."
There is nothing magical or supported by rule to allow the Umpire's call of "Ball Game" to end the game. The game ends after 7 innings (or more if needed), or run...
Nothing in any rule book supports this.
Would this hold true if the umpires decided at the end of the second inning that the game was over, declared such, and walked off the field?
Similar story...in 2008, TEAM USA was touring the country on the "Bound for Beijing" tour and played an exhibition game in my neighborhood. The other team was a mixture of local players, college, former college and a couple of HS players.....
Late in the game, with Team USA ahead by a...
The question is not where the batter's elbow was, the question should be where the ball was.
If the pitched ball is not completely within the batter's box, the batter is still required to make some attempt to avoid being hit by the pitch before being awarded first base.
If the batter is hit...
The way I read this is that the play started with R1 on second base.
BR pops up to F3, fly ball is caught for the out, then the now retired BR bumps F3, possibly hindering F3's attempt to play on R1 who took a short lead on the popup and may be a bit slow getting back to second base to tag up...
Sounds like a textbook case of obstruction to me.
This situation is one that I bring up when talking to umpires about obstruction. With a runner on first, I have seen teams that will have F4 positioned directly in the baseline between first and second base. The intent is to force the stealing...
It's not garbage, it's the rule.
When the runner slows down due to the position of the defensive player without the ball, that is the textbook definition of obstruction.
This situation is covered under a different part of the interference rule...I can't give you a cite right now as I do not have the book handy. USA SB rules say that a runner that interferes with a fielder attempting to catch a fly ball (fair or foul) that can be caught easily can result in two...
First of all, the judgement of whether or not F6 could get to the ball is absolutely relevant. If the umpire judgement is that F6 has no chance of getting to the ball, you have obstruction on F6 on this play.
Watching the video, I would have interference on the runner. Dead ball, runner is...
Going strictly by your description of the result of the contact between the two players, C is not an option.
I envision "2B misplays the ball, and it gets by her" as the ball now rolling into right field well past F4. If this is the case, I have Obstruction in all rule sets. More than likely...
Outside of NCAA rules, there are TWO things that have to happen in order to have obstruction.
1. The defensive player does not have the ball
2. The base runner is impeded or hindered by the defensive player
Basically, this means that the defensive player can set up anywhere she wants to...
The other option here is that perhaps the player emerging from the dugout deflected the thrown ball that was going to go into the dugout. If that was the case, a ruling of dead ball would have been correct. If that was the ruling, any base runners would be awarded two bases from their position...