Botched infield fly call

Question
QUESTION: Hi Mark:

I am interested in your opinion on the bizarre situation we encountered at a tourney this weekend. Runners on 2 and 3, one out, batter hits a high popup just behind first. Ump calls "Infield fly, batter out if fair", the ball is not caught, lands fair just behind first, and rolls foul. Everyone was confused (needless to say!), runners did not advance, batter went to the bench and sat down. We immediately questioned the ump, who admitted he was wrong to call the infield fly, but ruled the batter was out because she did not run to first. Our position was that she was under no obligation to do so since he had already called her out. The other team was willing to accept a ruling of "no pitch" and replay the situation, but the ump would not reverse the out call. What would you have done?

ANSWER: Hi Mike,

What would you have done?  You mean before or after I shoot myself?

You mention this is during a tournie, if it was an ASA tournie there's a tournament umpire-in-chief and you should have protested to him (her). They might not have changed the outcome but it one of the reasons we are there. You can't protest whether a batted ball was an infield fly or not but I believe the intent of that rule is only on true infield fly situations and the judgement call by the umpire if the ball can be caught w/ ordinary effort by an infielder.  You can protest a misinterpretation of the playing rules (2nd and 3rd is not an infield fly)and I think that's how you'd get to the UIC.

I've never had to deal with this situation. I thought about this over my lunch today (as we don't have a rule that says "when an umpire screws up on an infield fly...")

As a tournie uic I would rule in favor of the protest, that the umpire misinterpretated the playing rules putting the b-r at risk and we go back and replay from the point the incorrect decision was made.

It's the same as your do-over no pitch but as an umpire we have to get there another way.

Mark


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thanks for your quick response. Not to beat this to death, but could the umpire have changed his call and replayed the situation or was he somehow locked in?

Answer
Hi Mike,

Sure the umpire could have said I screwed up, I put the b-r at risk because of my mistake, let's go back and replay from the point of my mistake.  He wasn't locked in to anything.  

Now he might have been using the rule that a batter who fails to advance to 1st and enters the team area is out on a fair batted ball.  But I'm going to cut some slack on that because I'm the one who called the infield fly.

We encourage our umpires in the pre-tournament meetings to get w/ the partners and settle any protest on the field and only call in the uic or td if they can't.

The over-riding thing I've heard ever since I was an umpire pup and now tell my umpires is...Let's get the call right.

IMO this is the right and the fair call.

mark

Mark