Baseball rules dictate which plays can be reviewed

Q. I am confused over which umpiring calls are reviewable in Major League Baseball. In Sunday’s marathon between the Cardinals and Mets, Tommy Pham initially was called safe at first in the seventh before a review found that the Mets’ Lucas Duda had tagged him out. Then, in the 18th, the Mets’ Eric Campbell was called safe on his suicide squeeze before replays found that Kolten Wong had his foot on first with the ball in his glove before Campbell crossed. But in the July 7 game against Chicago, the Cubs’ Addison Russell barely managed to make contact with a ball that looked like it hit foul a few feet from the plate before the ball hopped over first base and again landed in foul territory. Yet the first-base umpire called it fair, and his decision apparently could not be reviewed. Can you explain why and just what calls can be reviewed?

A. You would think in this day and age when TV can show every play from a gazillion angles, no umpire’s call could possibly escape the scrutiny of one of the host of prying cameras filling every stadium. I mean, just look at pro tennis, in which animated replays almost instantly can show a ball hitting a millimeter out of bounds, whether it’s the service line, baseline or sideline.

That is not the case in baseball. As the legalistic four-page replay review regulations show, there is one line of demarcation that cannot be crossed yet. In the case of your question about the July 7 incident, it boils down to this: Under Part V, Section C, rulings of whether a ball is fair and foul can be reviewed “but only with respect to balls that first land at or beyond the set positions of the first and third base umpires.” Because the ball on July 7 initially landed in front of first-base umpire Pat Hoberg, he had the final say that could not be challenged. So even though Russell didn’t even start running toward first and the Redbird infielders, assuming it would go foul, made no attempt to make a play, Hoberg’s ruling of fair stood as the Cubs scored three runs in the inning en route to a 5-3 win. (By the way, the same rule apparently holds for questionable catches of infield line drives.)

For their part, umpires say that, unlike my tennis example, cameras cannot cover every square inch of a baseball field. After the Chicago game, even Cardinal Manager Mike Matheny said that there’s no camera shooting straight down the first- or third-base line that can accurately show exactly when or how a ball crosses the bag to determine whether it is fair or foul. As a result, such calls are left to the umpire — although even Matheny said such plays could be reviewed just to see if perhaps a camera had gathered incontrovertible proof that might overturn a bad decision.

On the other hand, under Part V, Section D, managers can request reviews of calls involving a fielder’s attempt to put out a runner by either tagging the runner or touching a base. That’s why the two calls in Sunday’s game were legitimately reversed.

Most of the other seven types of reviewable calls are equally clear-cut. In condensed form, they are:

▪  A home run call can be reviewed to see whether the ball actually left the field, whether it was fair or foul, whether a fan interfered with it, etc.

▪  Rulings over balls bouncing into the stands, striking ballpark obstacles or being caught by fielders diving into the stands also can be reviewed.

▪  Reviews are permitted for calls of whether an outfielder has made a legitimate catch of a fly ball or line drive. However, as mentioned before, fly balls or line drives caught in the infield are not eligible for review and outfielders who station themselves in the infield are considered infielders. Conversely, fly balls caught by infielders playing in the outfield “behind the original positioning of the nearest infielder” can be reviewed. (As you see, this can get complicated, and the decision of the umpires over this “positioning” is final).

▪  On the bases, calls can be reviewed to determine whether a base runner has passed a preceding runner, whether a runner scored before the third out is made and whether a runner touched (or re-touched, if necessary) a base.

▪  Here’s another one that drives some fans crazy: Calls determining whether a pitch struck the batter or his bat can be reviewed. However, in the case of a hit batsman, “whether the ball was in the strike zone when it touched the batter, and whether the batter made any attempt to avoid being touched by the ball, shall not be reviewable.”

▪  With concussions increasingly on the minds of players and officials, any call that involves the violation of Official Baseball Rule 6.01(i) _ collisions at home plate _ is reviewable.

▪  Finally, calls involving runners tagging up after the catch of a fair or foul ball also are reviewable.

For the complete text, go to www.mlb.com and, under “Official Information” at the bottom of the page, click on “Official Rules.” There you can study the complete set of replay review regulations as well as the updated 2015 set of rules they reference.

Today’s trivia

During Hollywood’s Golden Age, RKO was one of the Big Five movie studios, turning out such classics as “King Kong” and “Citizen Kane.” What does RKO stand for?

Answer to Tuesday’s trivia: If you’ve ever wondered how to build the best campfire to make those s’mores in the woods, physicist Adrian Bejan, of Duke University, has figured it out. In a mind-numbingly detailed article in the June 8 Scientific Reports, he says he proved that wood piled in cone or pyramid-shaped structures about as tall as they are wide produce the hottest flames. If the fire is taller or shorter than it is wide, heat is lost and thus wasted.

This story was originally published July 21, 2015 at 8:35 AM with the headline "Baseball rules dictate which plays can be reviewed."