Time for one of my pet-peeve rants
First one of the season, I believe. Anyway, I don't believe there is an official scorer left in the LEAGUE who has the guts to make a non-sacrifice call. In the bottom of the first inning today, with Felipe Lopez on second, D-Backs CF Chris Young dropped a push bunt up the first-base line, and he was actually a step into his stride toward first when the ball hit his bat (he WAS still in the batter's box, though). The ball went directly up the 1B line, and Randy Wolf had to make a perfect play to get Young, who is a fast runner and was going at full speed. But Young was out (by a step), and Lopez made it safely to third. So what was the call? Sacrifice, of course. Even though this was clearly NOT A SACRIFICE, because Young was clearly BUNTING FOR A BASE HIT, sacrifice was the call, because sacrifice is ALWAYS the call in that situation. Drives me nuts.
Tony, an explanation on why the Dodgers were given a run would be nice. Thanks.
Moreover, how on earth did the Dodgers get away with that run in the top of the second. Was it because Lopez tagged out Pierre as opposed to touching the bag? What an ambiguous rule! Nevertheless, the Dodgers benefited from it.
Ok, my brother just explained it to me. The 2nd base ump called Pierre out before he was really out. The ump thought he stepped on second, so he called Pierre out, so Pierre didn't try to avoid a tag. Thus, the Dodges were given a run, because the defender wasn;t smart enough to step on 2nd, and because the ump made a mistake.
Wow,
I'm glad your brother had a rule book handy. Either that or he's an encyclopedic freek.
Apparently he was wrong, oh well, sounded good to me.
Tony, this is like arguing that a sacrifice fly shouldn't be ruled a sacrifice fly if it looks like a guy was just trying to slap a base hit or go all out for a home run. Regardless of the intent, that's how the play ended up, and it's scored appropriately.
All that aside, keep up the great work on reporting on all the little updates that game summaries and box scores can never convey.
Why does it have to be a mutually exclusive decision for the scorer? If you're called to sacrifice a runner to second base with a bunt, it would be foolish to give up entirely (at least before there's one strike). What drives ME nuts is when there's no intent to actually get on base as well (especially if it is a guy who can bunt and run). Why not try to get on too? The end result is the same whether you beat it out or not -- the runner reached second. If you're really going to question intent, you have to ask, would Chris Young have tried a drag bunt if there was no one on base? The answer is probably not -- therefore, he DID sacrifice himself (in the process of trying to get a base hit).