AN UMPIRE’S FIRST BOOK OF OBSTRUCTION
By Carl Childress
In my lifetime I have listened to the moaners and the groaners who claim that
amateur organizations and their rule changes are destroying the national pastime
of the United States.
We surely all recall the hue and cry when the National Federation abolished baserunning
appeals in 1981. "That’s terrible!" the purists sobbed. I could
never figure out what their objection was. We still call out runners who miss
bases, and the unintended consequence was that baserunning techniques improved.
I always grin when I hear some amateur umpire whine that now the runner had better
miss the base a l–o–n–g way: "I’m not going to call him
out unless everybody in the park saw him miss it." Does that imply that in
those games where appeals are still required, the runner can barely miss the base,
and on appeal our intrepid arbiter will fearlessly bang him out? If the umpire
intends to call out a runner, what difference does it make if he calls him out
on appeal from the defense or on appeal from his own eyes?
"Purists" again armed themselves with muskets and rallied to Paul Revere’s
"one if by land" after the National Federation decreed in 1985 that
the ball would be immediately dead when the pitcher balked. "How sad!"
they sobbed. "High school has junked yet another tradition." They cleverly
neglected to remind us the "tradition" was only 31 years old, for prior
to 1954, the professional rules (OBR) also dictated a dead ball and a mandatory
one-base award following a balk. I particularly remember the change from dead
ball to delayed dead ball, for it was new the first year I umpired.
Some he-men (he-persons? s/he-persons?) even rail against safety rules. Recently
on one of the Internet boards the issue was: Should we allow a Little League runner
to lower a shoulder and crash the catcher? One dim bulb saw nothing wrong with
that: "We’re raising a generation of wimps," he wrote, though he
used a far more offensive and sexist term. It was blockheads like him who also
bellyached that only cowards use gloves, and real men don’t wear batting
helmets.
Lost in all the hubbub was the 1994 NCAA Approved Ruling that effectively redefined
obstruction. If contact occurs between a runner and a fielder, the rules committee
decreed, the umpire will call obstruction unless the fielder is in the "immediate
act of catching the ball." I consider that the most significant departure
from traditional baseball to occur in my lifetime.
This piece has three parts: (1) a table illustrating obstruction rules; (2) a
brief discussion of deflections; and (3) an explanation of "making a play."
I won’t include specific rule citations. All those numbers interfere with
the flow of the prose. More importantly, most people familiar with me and my work
trust me to get it right. Skeptical readers, though, may email me to receive full
details.
Fed Obstructing Rules
 Obstruction Table
Deflections
Making a Play
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