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smokeum99ta

Addicted to Softballfans
While at a tournament our score keeper noticed that the other team batted 11 instead of 10. But turned in a score card with 10 batters before the game started. Our score keeper told the ump about the mistake while #11 was at bat. Only one out at the time and two runners on base. The ump told him to get with the other coach to get stuff straight meanwhile making the game continue. #11 gets a hit scoring both runners. Leadoff forces out the 11th batter and then the arguing between teams gets out of control about what should've happened. Our coach pulls us off the field until the tournament director makes the call.

His final verdict was that since we played on that the 11th spot in the lineup is now a out every time around and the inning we were in was to continue with 2 outs and whoever was on base is still there. The two runs still counted that the 11th batter hit in that is gonna be an out from here on.

Was this handled right? Or the right call?
 
IrishBlue

IrishBlue

Addicted to Softballfans
contemplated this

I read and re-read this post and started a couple of responses before deciding to sleep on it.

I think the umpire missed a great and easy opportunity to put this right as soon as it was brought to him. He could have ruled an unreported substitute and been done with it. At a stretch he could have even gone to batting out of order.

Making the 11th batter an auto out seems to have been pulled out of thin air.

I don't think this was the right call, nor was it handled right.
 
MaverickAH

MaverickAH

Well-Known Member
Did the umpire not receive a copy of both teams lineups at the pre-game meeting?

Since there was no official scorekeeper, the umpire should receive the lineups of both teams & be the arbiter of any illegal batters. Since it seems that wasn't done, it will usually fall to the home team's scorebook to be the standard.

Under normal circumstances, this should have been easy to resolve. In any case, the game shouldn't have continued until there was a resolution. The 11th batter is either legal or illegal. If legal, he is allowed to bat. If illegal, he is sent back to the bench & the #1 batter is up & assumes the count, if any. If he is declared illegal after the completion of the at bat, he should've been declared out & any runners returned to their positions prior to the AB. The out would be recorded in the #1 position & the game resumed with #2 coming to bat.

Submitting lineups to the umpire or official scorekeeper (if there is one) prevents these types of problems. If neither of these were done, here's how I would've handled it:
  • If each team received the other team's lineup via lineup card, I would judge said lineup card to be official. If the was no 11th batter on the card, I would not allow it.
  • If each team received the other team's lineup via copying it out of the other's scorebook, I would judge each teams scorebook of their own lineup to be official & that there was an error made in copying. The 11th batter is legal.

Not perfect, but effective in getting some sort of resolution before allowing the game to continue w/o getting the LD involved.


FTR........ I do not agree with the resolution that the LD came up with. he totally pulled that out of a hat! :wtf2:
 
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