Buster Posey is behind the plate. Base runner on first attempts to steal second. Posey makes a throw, but there is no one covering second base. Ball goes to the out field, runner gets to third base.
Posey gets an error. Obviously he shouldn’t have thrown the ball. But, did he have time to ascertain if there was someone covering the position? Posey is a fine ball player.
The TV announcer apologized for the players not covering second base by saying, “They didn’t think there would be a attempt at a stolen base because Oh, the pitcher, was batting.” But, they should have seen the runner coming, no?
It is a bummer that Posey gets the error. I guess they don’t give errors for not covering a base.
How does this scenario work out for you folks? Anyway the error could have been handled better?
Yes he certainly had time to see if someone was covering. Except those few circus-like maneuvers when the shortstop or second baseman flips to the other one after a stop behind second (or possibly for a pitcher making a pickoff) baseball players should always have their target in sight. In fact it’s not uncommon to see a player start to throw to one base and stop when no one is ready. This is particularly true on bunts.
From time to time there is discussion of something called a “team error” usually in the context when two or more players let a catchable fly drop untouched as they all back off.
If you mean “any way the error could have been scored differently,” no. The error has to go to Posey.
The rulebook quite specifically states (rule 9.12) that “mental mistakes” are not to be scored as errors, unless there’s a rule that specifically says otherwise. Posey made a physical error (throwing the ball away) and one or the other of the middle infielders made a mental error. The former is scored as an error, the latter is not.
It becomes very quickly apparent, after watching a lot of baseball, that the “error” statistic doesn’t actually do a great job of counting or assigning fielding mistakes.
As to whether the fielders should have been covering second; yes, they should have. That is an inexcusable mistake for a major league baseball team.
The way I see it, the catcher had no correct decision available to him. Given the fielders’ dereliction of duty, the best he could have hoped for was to allow the steal.
On a steal, catchers often throw to the base before the fielder has actually gotten there. They throw the ball as soon as they get it. If they don’t they have no chance of getting the runner out. I haven’t seen the play mentioned in the OP, but if either of the middle infielders was moving toward second base at all it’s not unreasonable for Posey to assume that the fielder will take the throw. Even if they’re not moving he doesn’t have time to think about it. His job is to make the throw if the game situation calls for a throw.
Not quite. I agree that they can’t wait for the fielder to GET to the base they are considering throwing to, but they have to see a fielder at east MOVING TOWARDS covering the base.
The error on Posey was properly assigned to him. Baseball has always ruled that way.
Then it would be defensive indifference. Although, maybe not if the first baseman was holding the runner on. DI is pretty much up to the official scorer.
I’m not saying that the scorer’s ruling is incorrect. I’m saying that Posey made the throw because the game situation called for a throw.
The OP doesn’t give enough detail to know the actual game situation, but let’s assume no outs and a runner on first. No other runners. The coaches have already decided whether or not to try to throw the runner out if he steals (based on factors such as the pitch which will be thrown, the runner’s speed, how many outs there are, the score, who is at bat, etc.), and they have communicated this decision to Posey and the middle infielders. The middle infielders have (or should have) agreed among themselves which one of them will take the throw on a steal. This stuff is done before the pitch. Every fielder is supposed to know what he is going to do in any given scenario.
When the pitch is thrown Posey doesn’t have much time to look to see if the infielders are doing their jobs. He’s busy catching a 90+ MPH pitch. If the runner goes Posey has to catch the ball and throw it immediately. Again, I’m not saying that he shouldn’t be charged with an error, but his job in that game situation was to throw the ball to second base.
I looked for a video but didn’t find one. I’d bet that it would show the shortstop running toward second base at some point after the runner took off. He would be too late, but it would negate the “Posey shouldn’t have thrown because the infielders weren’t moving toward the bag” argument.
When they got back to the dugout after the inning, who do you think said “That was my fault”? Posey or the infielder who was supposed to be there? I’d bet it was the infielder.
Here’s a video, of what I assume the OP is talking about. Clearly a throwing error - even if the shortstop had gotten to 2nd base in time, it was way over his head. Amusingly, Tim McCarver was saying “It’s really not a bad play to try to steal right here” just before the pitch.
I’m reminded of a scene in The Bad News Bears. The Bears are in the field. The other team hits the ball and the fielders are so bad it winds up with 5 or 6 of them just to pick up the ball and throw it while the runner is heading for third, with predictable results.
OGILVY: Was that an error?
BUTTERMAKER: It’s an error on the throw, but no error on the infielder 'cause he wasn’t there.
Looking at the video it seems that the throw was towards the running shortstop. It appears to go almost right over the jumping shortstop’s glove but too high for him to catch. This is clearly an error on the catcher. But even had it been lower and directly over second, arriving there before the shortstop did, it is still an error on the catcher. It take much less time than the amount required to transfer the ball from glove to throwing hand and step towards the base than it does to assess if someone is covering the base or not.
It’s not usually called defensive indifference unless it’s a situation where the defensive team literally doesn’t care whether the runner advances. You sometimes see this late in a blowout where they don’t bother holding a runner on (e.g. home team is leading seven to nothing with two out in the top of the ninth, and there’s a runner on first). Another situation is in a close game where the run represented by a baserunner can’t possibly have an effect on the outcome of the game (e.g. bottom of the ninth with the score tied and runners at first and third - the runner at third represents the winning run, so the visiting team won’t bother to try to prevent the runner at first from advancing to second).
Here are the official rules regarding defensive indifference:
We can’t see it on the video, but I think we can assume that since the shortstop reaches second base about the same time the throw gets there that the shortstop was running toward second base when Posey started his throw. Otherwise the argument would have to be that the shortstop saw the runner go and didn’t move until he saw Posey start to make the throw. That seems unlikely. So it’s very likely that the shortstop was running to second before the ball reached the plate, in which case Posey wasn’t throwing to an unattended bag.
I wonder if the reason that Posey overthrew the bag was that he saw the shortstop going to the base, leapt up to throw, and then realized that the shortstop had gotten a late jump and wouldn’t be able to field the throw. Maybe Posey tried to hold himself back but was too late and threw it away. No matter what happened, it’s Posey’s error.
Like I said, pretty much up to the scorer. I haven’t seen the play the OP described and I don’t know what the game situation was. Seems clear that the play, as it happened, was scored correctly. But if nobody covered and no throw was attempted, an argument for DI might hold water.
The play in the video is a throwing error all the way. There is, however, Rule 9.12(a)(8.) It wouldn’t apply in the video, because the ball wasn’t thrown accurately. Funny thing is, I have never seen this rule invoked.
9.12 Errors
(a) The official scorer shall charge an error against any fielder:
(8) whose failure to stop, or try to stop, an accurately thrown
ball permits a runner to advance, so long as there was
occasion for the throw. If such throw was made to second
base, the official scorer shall determine whether it was
the duty of the second baseman or the shortstop to stop
the ball and shall charge an error to the negligent fielder.
As an aside, is baseball the only sport that has official rules for things like this, that have no effect on the outcome of the game? Regardless of how we assign credit or blame, the relevant fact is that the runner reached third base, and play from that point forward won’t care how he got there.
