Top Of The 7th

Top of the 7th game tied 0-0, my # 6 hitter doubled into the RCF gap, #7 hitter singled to shallow LF. i have runners at 1st and 3d, no outs. you put in a new pitcher in.. the runner at 1st turns and sprints to a position 45 feet off the baseline toward RF, turns and faces the pitcher.

Do not confuse this play with a typical, "get caught in a run down" play. the runner is 15 to 20 feet in the outfield grass..

What do you do??

 

Under the Fed rules..

"3. A runner establishes his base path as a direct line between where he is when he starts to run and the base to which he must go."

 

Bump for discussion

 

Guessing...

Dont worry abouth the runner off first.

Pitch to the batter & get an out. If the runner takes second, walk the the batter to load the bases; Work for the double play.

OR,

Move the ball into the standard base path. Throw the ball to the second baseman; standing half way between first & second. This constitutes the runner going out of the baseline to avoid a tag. The runner would automatically be out.

By keeping the ball close in the infield the runner on third will not try to advance.

Do I win a prize?

 

just pitch

 

I would just pitch to the guy, if the runner is that far in the outfield I would be more worried about my pitcher losing focus. I would tell my pitcher to just walk the batter.

 

I think most coaches think too much. Call a timeout and talk to your boys, let it play out...... and then have confidence in your bottom half of the inning.

 

First of all, as the coach defending, my first guess would be "no confidence in next batter", so we'd definately pitch to him and go for K or weak grounder or pop-up and watch squeeze. Seeing how we would more than likely not have practiced this scenario with runner damn near in right field, we'd have to hold ball, because I'm sure he wants you to chase him way out there. 1st and 3rd situations (early and delays) we can defend, but this sounds different. If you're fortunate enough to get an out with man on 2nd and 3rd, then maybe set up DP, depends on hitter and if you feel you are better off trying this. My fear here is the squeeze. If I was on offense, my fear would be umpires calling my runner out going to 2nd trying to surprise everyone. May even surprise umpire.

 

What to do?

First off let me ask this.....Do coaches actually resort to this stuff?

With that being said, my plan.......you have the 8 and 9 hitters up, they are at the bottom, odds should be in your favor. If I don't have my best available pitcher in there, he will be now. If dense guy running the bases from the outfield steals second, I have first open if I need it. Don't really care about him anyway, only run I am concerned with is lead run right now. Pitch to 8 and 9 and move infield and outfield in. With 2 outs if leadoff makes me more nervous than number 2 hitter, I walk leadoff and pitch to number 2 batter to get out of inning.

Best case scenario is a pop fly to right, runner in OF off 1st runs over RF ( i believe he is out) RF catches pop fly (batter is out) and runner on 3rd tags and RF throws him out (triple play) We come in and hit and win in bottom of 7th. Even if this is not right, it sounds good doesn't it!

 

What to do?

Double Post