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Monday, January 24, 2011
Fourth Out
You would think that more baserunners would try to score in lineout situations like this:
Dodger outfielders Juan Pierre and Andre Ethier were on second and third bases, respectively. With one out, Dodger pitcher Randy Wolf lined out to his Diamondback counterpart, Dan Haren. Haren then threw behind Pierre, who had broken for third on contact. Arizona’s second baseman, Felipe Lopez, casually applied the tag to Pierre to record the third out and end the inning with no runs scoring.
Or so he thought.
Lopez’s lackadaisical tag gave Ethier enough time to cross home plate. After the Diamondbacks left the field, and on advice from Dodgers bench coach Bob Schaefer, Torre walked out and appealed to the umpire crew for Ethier’s run to count. The umpires allowed the run, which they should have done in the first place, and left us with a narrow miss of a so-called “fourth out.”
Torre relayed Schaefer’s heads-up call after the game, “When it happened, Bob Schaefer said, ‘That’s the four-out play.’” Schaefer was referring to a passage under rule 7.10, that reads as follows,
Appeal plays may require an umpire to recognize an apparent “fourth out.”
Had the Diamondbacks noticed the run scoring while they turned the double play, they could have appealed at third base. In their defense, the umpire should have been clear and indicated that a run scored. Unfortunately, they missed the call, and that’s why Torre had to appeal to get the run and not the defense appealing the runner leaving third early.
Had the umpires properly indicated a run scored right away, the defense could have appealed and touched third base with the ball. Umpires would have had to call Ethier out since he was running on contact and did not tag up after Harden caught the ball in the air. Since the Diamondbacks had already turned the double play and ended the inning with three outs, Ethier’s out on appeal would look like a fourth out.
But, MLB rules have that covered. The passage in rule 7.10 goes on to say:
If the third out is made during a play in which an appeal play is sustained on another runner, the appeal play decision takes precedence in determining the out.
So, an appeal by the Diamondbacks still would have held the batter to be out, but Ethier would have been the one doubled off third instead of Pierre being doubled off second.
That seems to be as close as we can get to a fourth out in an inning. In addition to the rulebook simply attributing the third out to a different runner to keep the number of outs as three, circumstances for a defensive appeal on a time play so specific as to qualify for this little exercise just don’t come around very often.
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