Interesting ABS situation here. 3-2, runner goes, ball 4 is called and he pulls up into 2B. Catcher challenges… and now you start to wonder what would happen if it’s overturned. Are the announcers right, would this become a double play? Or would the umpires send the runner back... to first since the original call influenced the play?show more

Runner goes back to the previous base on on a steal attempt during a challenge

Unintended consequences of tinkering too much with something that was fine for over 150 years

So let’s say the practice is to send the runner back on an overturned ABS call. Now imagine it’s a 9th inning, one-run game with a successful stolen base. Will teams begin to use the challenge system as a way to negate the stole base and send the runner back to first? You obviously have to be correct in your challenge, but that still feels like an unintended advantage.

They’d send him back to first. Seems like an easy one.

Only way to do it is runner can’t slow up. Have to train yourself for that possibility and run hard.

Not sure of rule, but runner should play it out as if everything in play until Ruling

I’d say catcher cannot challenge. Rules clearly state a challenge has to be the first move a player makes. They’ve already set a precedent with batters on this. If the catchers throws down, he cannot challenge, as the throw would be his first move negating the challenge.

All the scenarios of this blow! Wont it end up with Catchers will just throw it down and try and get the runner at 2nd? And runners will no longer pull up on any ball 4 with runners on. Doesn’t the same thing apply with runners on 1st and 2nd? This sucks!

Should the catcher be able to challenge the pitch AFTER he continued baseball play to make the throw to second?

My guess is that you can't get out because an ump made an incorrect call and they would send him back if ABS showed strike 3. I wouldn't be surprised if I was wrong on that though.

I think that NO MATTER WHAT you gotta leg it out play it as if it was live. You cannot pull up like that. The equivalent to football of play through the whistle. If it’s overturned then I believe the runner should be out.

Don't hold up...double play

It is still a stolen base. The runner went on 3-2. Call didn’t influence anything.

Love the original question, but feel dumber for reading through some these clueless replies.

Players need to act like it’s a live steal attempt at all times. Doesn’t really make sense to send the runner back to the previous bag because of a missed call at home. If they steal the bag, they steal the bag. Simple. This is assuming ABS is activated in this situation.

So this would be similar to if an umpire gets a call wrong on a hit by pitch. Let’s say a ball barely grazes or misses a players jersey and the catcher is able to catch and attempt to throw out the runner, then it gets overturned on review. However they handled that I guess they would handle this similarly.

That is an interesting question. I think if the call was overturned and called a strike they would have to put the runner back on first because the runner was influenced by the call.

Or how about the runner and fielders don’t make any assumptions and just finish the play, just like running a hard 90 despite believing the fielder caught a line drive. This is what is beautiful about baseball. It legislates mental toughness.

I don’t see this being any different than if, on a 3-2 pitch, R1 steals and the batter checks his swing which is ruled no swing by the plate umpire but the wing umpire rules it a swing on appeal. In that case if R1 slowed down and is tagged because he thought the batter walked, he would be out.

You can't do any other action before challenging. So once he goes to throw, he lost his chance to challenge.

Since it was called a ball, id assume he would not be called out

We have already seen a force at the plate reversed to the run scoring since the ump at 2nd missed a tag out & the catcher didn’t apply the tag. Runners have to keep running and fielders have to defend against both possibilities, force & tag, sometimes.

You can see where the umpire tells them that the runner would have gone back to first base

My perspective is you either don’t have ABS (the way it’s been forever) OR you have automatic ball strike and there is no challenge.

I think you would have to send the runner back to first in this situation if the pitch was overturned.

When PU calls this a ball, runner slows because he is no longer at risk to be put out. If the call is a overturned, you can't penalize the runner for the umpire's mistake. Umpire discretion - he goes back to first, because it's not clear if he would have made 2nd.

Hypothetically, could batters then notice a runner getting a bad jump on a steal and automatically challenge the pitch regardless of where it was to save the runner?

Easy solution, ABS exists now, don’t let up

It’s addressed in the rule. Umps may send runners back or allow the play to stand based on whether the call impacted the play. There’s also provision that if a third strike is initially ruled a ball and dropped by the catcher, no throw to 1st is required for the out.

Umpires convene and decide if the overturned call resulted in the runner being out. Judgement call by the crew on the field, no reviewable by replay review. Teams are instructing runners to run hard and not pull up if they see ball four.

The runner was talking with the ump at 2nd and it appeared the umpire gestured he woulda gone back to 1st

I don't think a player can advance a base during an ABS challenge so he'd likely be sent back to first base. (I don't know the official rule)

The most burning question of this video is why are both teams wearing their blue jerseys?

What’s more interesting to me is if a guy gets thrown out stealing on a 3-2 backwards K, it gets overturned to a BB, does the out count?

Completely unrelated, but what a horrible uniform combo