In the 8th inning of last night’s ALCS Game 6, Chone Figgins was on second base with one out and first base open. Torii Hunter hit a sharp grounder up the middle, but because Yankees second baseman Robinson Cano was playing toward the middle due to the runner there, he was able to field the ball. His momentum carried him to the shortstop side of the bag, where he turned and threw Hunter out at first.
Meanwhile, Figgins was only a couple steps off second and was able to easily retreat back to his base. After he did so, he then ducked to avoid being in the way of Cano’s throw. I started wondering about that, so I looked up the runner interference rule:
(bolding mine.)
The way I read that is, though he was not allowed to actively attempt to block the throw, neither was he under any obligation to avoid blocking it. If he were standing straight up on second, minding his own business; and either the throw hit him, or Cano had to adjust his angle to avoid hitting him and didn’t make the throw in time; seems to me that would just have been a tough break for the Yanks.
So:
– Am I interpreting the rule incorrectly, and Figgins would have been liable for interference if hit by a throw while standing safely on a base?
– Was he just instinctively trying to save himself the possiblilty of getting hit by the ball, because it would have hurt? With the pennant on the line, I would have called that the very definition of “taking one for the team.”
– Is there some unwritten proffesional courtesy/etiquette at play that says you just don’t do that?
– Something else I’m not thinking of?
(For the record, I’m quite certain Cano would have made the play to first anyway, and this incident ultimately had no bearing on the game, but I still found Figgins’ ducking to be curious, and would like to hear what others think.)
