Game 5 of the 1972 World Series ended with Joe Morgan catching a ball in foul territory and throwing out pinch runner Blue Moon Odom (Odom, a pitcher, was often used as a pinch runner). The only video I see is the second half of the game and it occurs around minute 56. Morgan was pretty close to first base. So far as I know, it has always been legal to advance on a caught foul ball. A runner can even advance on an infield fly if he wants, but the fielder can’t throw out a non advancing runner if the umpire “invokes the infield fly rule” as announcers call it.
IIRC, baserunners can advance pretty much any time they want, with some very limited exceptions, like not being able to advance on a foul ball, and having to tag up after the catch before advancing on a fly out.
But they don’t, most of the time, because they’d be sitting ducks. For instance, if the pitcher’s standing on the mound with the ball between pitches, the baserunners can run if they want, but it generally wouldn’t work out very well for them.
After a fly ball in foul territory is caught, the runners are free to run because the play on the foul ball ended with the catch, and we’re back into the normal situation where the runners are free to run.
I am not precisely sure what your last sentence means, but if what you’re driving at is that a runner can’t be forced out once the infield fly rule is called, well, yeah. The whole point of the infield fly rule is there isn’t a force. An infield fly call makes the batter instantly out, thereby eliminating any force play. The runners are free to do whatever they please (but if they leave before the ball is caught they can still be picked off if the fielder catches the ball.)
Nitpick, the batter is not instantly out. The proper call for the umpire is along the lines of “Infield fly if fair.” If an infielder lets the ball drop, and it then rolls foul (before passing first or third), the batter is not out; it is merely a foul ball.
Here’s the Wiki article you apparently forgot to credit:
Right, since Abner Doubleday deemed it so.
And I can’t imagine a scenario where you would want to let a foul ball drop if it would be out #2 with runners on 1st and 2nd. The correct play in that situation is absolutely make the out even if the runners advance. You have to give yourself a chnace to get the next out and get out of the inning.
Definitely making the out is the default choice.
It’s all sensible, a ball isn’t foul until it lands in foul territory. If it’s caught it’s not foul, the runners can tag up and advance. Otherwise umps would have to call foul balls while they were still in the air, terrible things would ensue if the ball ends up landing in fair territory on miniature bat day. (Do they still have that? Or did it go the way of 10 cent beer day?)
JD Drew could save the Pope and he’d get criticized for it.
Ol’ Abner never had anything to do with baseball.
Though it’s Cartwright who codified the rules, I suspect the origins of this rule probably go back further.
[QUOTE=Oldguy]
Nitpick, the batter is not instantly out. The proper call for the umpire is along the lines of “Infield fly if fair.”
[/QUOTE]
As has been pointed out, this is what the umpire should say if it’s near the line.
However, the principle of the rule remains the same; the batter is instantly out *because he hit an infield fly. * It is the act of hitting an infield fly that makes the batter out, not any subsequent act. (If it’s subsequently a foul ball, it was never an infield fly in the first place. Infield flies are, by definition, only on fair balls.) This is an important principle in explaining this oft-misunderstood rule; it’s why there cannot be a force play, and why an infielder need not catch it, or even necessarily even TRY to catch it.
This is not true. As soon as the fielder catches the ball, the umpire must call it foul or fair. They do not call it while it is in the air, but as soon as a fielder touches the ball, whether he catches it or not.
Also, in the play described in the OP, the first baseman juggled the ball before he secured the catch. It first fell out of his glove, and then he caught it before it landed. The runners tagged up as soon as the ball touched his glove. The Astros claimed that the runners tagged up too soon as they tagged up before the ball was caught. But the rule is that a runner can tag up as soon as the ball is touched. This is particularly true in softball else the fielder can juggle the ball all the way in to the infield. Not so easy with a glove. BTW, many years ago I took advantage of that rule in a softball game.
Also, as others have noted, whether the ball is foul or fair is not determined by where the fielder’s feet are, but where the ball is when he makes contact with it.
Yes, but my point remains, if you can catch the ball for an out the ball would logically remain in play.
A ball that lands in foul territory is not necessarily a foul ball. Take a look at this improbable one.
That is not unusual. What was unusual is how much the ball was foul before it rolled fair prior to crossing the bag. I
I didn’t say it is unusual, I just offered an improbable example. It has been mentioned a couple of times in this thread that a ball is foul when it lands in foul territory, and I wanted to show that this is not always the case.
“Landing in foul territory” implies that it is a ball hit in the air and landing beyond the first base bag or the third base bag. Ground balls are not usually referred to as “landing”.
A ball hit in the air is determined foul where it lands or where it is caught, or where it crosses the fence or wall surrounding the outfield; however, a groundball is determined fair or foul where it crosses the bag and not where it lands after crossing the bag.
An ‘infield fly if fair’ near the foul line sounds kinda like Schrodinger’s Cat: the batter may have been instantly out (at the moment he hit the ball? or the moment the umpire invoked the infield fly rule? either way…), but we don’t know whether or not he was instantly out until it’s clear which side of the foul line the ball will land/be caught on.
An infielder can’t make a double play if the ball is foul. If it’s fair, infield fly applies and there’s no force on the runner.
What I was trying to get at is something different. In an infield fly rule situation, if the ball is foul, the batter is not out instantly: he’s out if and when the ball is caught before it lands. But if the ball is fair, the batter is out instantly. So if the ball’s close to the foul line, you don’t know whether or not the batter’s already been out the whole time the ball’s been in the air until you know whether the ball’s fair or foul.
I’m not sure what you’re saying about the double play, though. An infielder can’t make a force-out DP in an infield fly situation regardless of if it’s fair or foul. But it would be a DP if the runner tries to advance after the catch in foul ground and is thrown out.