The Atlantic League Utilizes the No-Shift Rule for the First Time
One of the most popular idioms in the English language is “guinea pig.” It’s simple — we’ve probably all used it — and yet it means so much. To be a “guinea pig” is to be the subject of something new or different. It can be as simple as being the first to try a new toothbrush, and range to something as weighty as testing a new drug.
In baseball terms, the Atlantic League is serving as Major League Baseball’s guinea pig this season. In a deal struck in early-March, the two organizations agreed to change certain rules for the Atlantic League’s 2019 championship season as a way to test said modifications before MLB considers implementing them itself.
One of the more contentious rule changes was the prohibition of the infield shift. The rule itself, as explained in the press release, was simply the requirement of “two infielders to be on each side of second base when a pitch is released.” If the rule is broken, “the ball is dead and the umpire shall call a ball.”
Well, last Thursday, the Atlantic League’s Opening Day, the anti-shift rule was utilized in a game between the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs and the Sugar Land Skeeters. Former big leaguer James Loney (remember him?) was at the plate in the bottom of the fourth inning. On the first pitch from Blue Crabs righty Daryl Thompson, Loney hit a soft ground ball to second baseman Angelys Nina, who easily threw him out at first to begin the inning.
If my description was not quite satisfactory, let’s take a look at the play in GIF form:
As you can see, it’s your pretty standard 4-3. There’s not much to it. But then, confusion hits. The umpires gather behind the pitcher’s mound to discuss the previous play, and the game takes a pause in the action. Blue Crabs manager Stan Cliburn asks for an explanation, and rightfully so:
When the umpires reach their conclusion, they award Loney first base. As you can see in this next screenshot, there is a chalked line drawn behind second base as a way to help enforce this rule:
In their decision, the umpires concluded that, prior to the play, there were not two infielders on both sides of second base. If we take a second look at this, I’m not entirely sure where the violation occurred. Clearly, shortstop Edwin Garcia is on the left side of that line, as shown in the screenshot here:
What I think happened is that because Nina was in shallow right field, the umpires decided that he did not “count” as a second infielder on the right side. That looks like the only reasonable explanation. You can see Nina in shallow right field in this screenshot here:
The broadcast booth joked about how to score that play, which is a fair question, and it appears that in the game log, an error was charged to Nina. A better conclusion, in my opinion, would have been to treat this as if it was a catcher’s interference (that’s what the broadcasters suggested). That way, Loney’s on-base percentage wouldn’t be penalized for a rule violation, as it wouldn’t have counted as an at-bat. In actuality, though, he got an 0-for-1 for the play.
But, as I have since realized, I don’t think that play was scored correctly at all. It shouldn’t have been an error. In fact, it shouldn’t have been the end of the at-bat at all. As you can see in the upper portion of this piece, the rule states that if there is a violation, “the ball is dead and the umpire shall call a ball.”
So, while the violation itself seems a bit iffy, the conclusion doesn’t seem right, either. The umpires should have asked Loney to go back into the batter’s box, and his count should have gone from 2-1 to 3-1. The whole “should this be treated as at-bat?” question would thus go away, and Loney would then have completed the plate appearance as usual.
This works in all counts. Even if a violation occurs on a 3-1 count, the batter would just be awarded ball four and, along with that, a walk. No official scorer confusion is necessary at all, if the violation is indeed enforced correctly.
Granted, the umpires deserve some leeway here. It was only Opening Day, after all. And if the rationale behind this call was that Nina was not in the infield, and therefore only one infielder was on the right side of second, I can understand that. But, what doesn’t make sense to me is how this was ultimately enforced, and I think that’s something the league should look into before this becomes a common occurrence.
I suppose I should mention that I am not a fan of this rule. I am interested, though, in the rule’s effects, and as the Atlantic League serves as a guinea pig this season, it’s clear that so does MLB. The rules just need to be enforced correctly to understand the true impact.
Devan Fink is a Contributor at FanGraphs. You can follow him on Twitter @DevanFink.
What’s a SS called if he’s on the grass?
Infield Fly rule.
That was definitely a bunk call (on both the call and the implementation of the rule)
Yeah, we’re going to need a definition of “infielder” for this rule to work. I don’t like the rule, but I also don’t see a violation on this play.
exactly, and the rules committee or whoever came up with this proposal should have had enough foresight to see this as an issue. This should have been defined before the rule was ever brought to the table.
When teams submit their line-up cards, they designate what position each person is playing, right? The second-baseman is an infielder, wherever he fields the ball. Unless there is a longer description of this rule, I think they inferred an additional limitation that wasn’t apparent to anyone before.
I wonder if “infielder” is actually defined or it is just a label we have attached to those players who traditionally play on the dirt. If infielder has never been assigned a definition then you can’t just create a rule that dictates where an undefined player must play.
“An INFIELDER is a field who occupies a position in the infield.”
Now, there isn’t a definition of infield in the same chapter…
Also, just a few rows down is a commnet “… could have been handled by an infielder – not by some arbitrary limitation such as the grass, or the baselines….”
The thing that stands out to me about the infield fly rule is this part:
“The pitcher, catcher and any outfielder who stations himself in the infield on the play shall be considered infielders for the purpose of this rule.”
So, a right-fielder playing so shallow that he is positioned where a second-basemen might play is treated as an infielder for this particular rule, but he’s still an outfielder for other purposes? Similarly, it would seem that a shortstop playing so deep that he is located where a left-fielder might play is still an infielder.
“What’s a SS called if he’s on the grass?”
Tim Lincecum?
Do you get to swap infield/outfield designations if you’re playing on turf?
As if we needed more proof that the umpires are unequipped to process everything happening on the field.
Everything about this is stupid.
Just so we’re clear, on the FIRST day we had both a botched penalty and an unintended consequence. I mean … good for them for trying this out in a minor league setting, but good googily moogily
Nope, don’t like that
The end result was incorrect but if the call was correct it opens another avenue.
The league felt that the rule was important enough to draw a line behind second base but not one for what is classed as infield and outfield. I am assuming they used the difference between grass and sand but that non uniform across stadiums.
Surely then, there now has to be a line behind the bases that is the difference between the two. What distance should this be? 10ft behind, 20ft?
The edge where the infield dirt meets the outfield grass is supposed to be a 95′ radius from the center of the pitcher’s rubber. This appears to be a recommended dimension, not a hard rule, so it would be interesting to see how many parks strictly adhere to it. If such a dimension gets folded into a rule like this one, this would need to be directed league-wide.
For the record, I hate this rule. The pitcher starts on the rubber, the catcher is in the catcher’s box. The other seven guys stand wherever they want to.
The Atlantic League has now outlawed infielders playing deep. I suspect this was not the intent of the rule.
It’s also unintentionally outlawed the 4-deep OF defensive alignment that comes up once in a while – can’t have two IF on each side if there aren’t 4 IF total. I guess the late-game 5-infielder defense will still be legal though?
I can actually see the reasoning behind ruling that the 2B was not playing IF, so he didn’t count. The basic designation of positions in the IF is to assign the position name to the base they are supposed to cover (SS excepted). If the second baseman is standing 100 feet from second base, he’s not really playing second base – not a crazy thing, maybe? If you are going to force defenders into certain positions, limiting the depth of IF is a pretty natural extension of this totally unnecessary rule change.
All infielders should just be tethered to their bases with 45 foot cables. The SS can be pegged halfway between 2&3 with a modified version of that big metal stake I use to tie my dog up in the backyard. We can also set up an electric fence to make sure IFs don’t drift backwards onto the grass. It will automatically turned off with the release of the pitch (hopefully).
It will be absurd and stupid, but my image of baseball has two IFs playing on each side of the keystone, and I’ll be damned if I let anyone mess with that!
I actually believe the wording was specifically chosen so that there has to be 4 infielders. As the next step teams might have taken was to move the infielder into the outfield and be a 4th OF but kept them on the “correct” side of the bag.
I could see them intending to prohibit the 4-OF alignment that the Astros have used (though I remain philosophically opposed to it) – but if they’re going to apply the rule when there are two infielders on each side of second base but one of them is on the outfield grass, then they’ve said that a player on the outfield grass doesn’t count as an “infielder”. So you want your third baseman to guard the line 40′ behind the third base bag? Too bad – he’s not an “infielder” any more.
So is the take away that MLB’s penchant for overlooking seemingly predictable “issues” that result from simple rule changes continues to rear its head? or is the take away that MLB has identified its own blind spots enough to think “hey, let’s test this elsewhere first”?
Both. It’s definitely both.
To overlook something, you need to have looked to begin with.
And there is a whole lot bigger mess waiting. As the rule reads (at least as quoted in this blog post), if Loney had hit the ball 475 feet over the center field wall, the correct ruling would be that the ball is dead, there is no home run, and Loney keeps hitting with a 3-1 count, just the same as if he grounded out.
Wait until someone goes apesh*t when that happens.
They probably go to the NFL model of accepting or rejecting a penalty based upon the best outcome.
That already exists in baseball with catchers interference.
https://www.umpirebible.com/index.php/rules-interference/defensive-catcher-s-interference
I know the Atlantic League doesn’t have the best camera angles, but I’d like to see where the 2B was set up before the pitch was delivered.
It’s also not clear from thing angle whether or not the shortstop was standing on the grass either. That would be an alternative call under this interpretation (which I don’t think is the natural one).
I love baseball. This rule seems so idiotic to me that I would have a hard time watching a game. I already hated seeing the slide tackle and home plate collisions disappear, but I at least understood a need for it given all of the possibility for injury. I guess this rule prevents injury to the egos of hitters who won’t just bunt down the third base line.
I hope absurdities like this continue and MLB realizes the lunacy in trying to mandate where fielders have to stand.
Just wait til they move the mound
Awarding a ball doesn’t make sense, to me. Suppose Loney hit a HR instead of a groundout? Does he get called back to hit again in that event?
If it was treated like catcher’s interference, the manager could elect to take the HR. Seems like that would make sense.
Stupidest rule ever if they actually do this. Hitters need to adapt and just beat the shift. The better hitters do just that. The 1-dimensional sluggers who constantly beat the ball into the shift deserve their fate…..lots of ground ball outs.
You know what is funny about this? I am certain that this is a better defensive alignment than 3 infielders on one side. I would bet anything that keeping the third man up the middle would yield more outs and turn more double plays.
Considering the fact that there was no one on 1st base, I think it’s unlikely that this alignment would result in any double plays ever.
Potentially fair point – I don’t actually know where 1B is. I saw the line in the middle of the field and declared that a good idea. Hard to imagine nobody being able to cover 1st – if this was actually a well thought out idea (not likely), then the pitcher could cover 1st. That is something that they actually work on theoretically.
To the next batter, I would have put my second baseman out on the grass, and started beaning the hitters all day. Then argue that it should just be a ball, not a HBP!
I hate the shift, I won’t pretend I don’t. But trying to outlaw it like this is so much worse lol
Makes you wonder what would happen if you had a batter, with a well-known propensity for the long ball, hit a home-run. Would the manager risk a ball and have the infielder move out of position for that one pitch?
If you don’t want to pitch to the guy, just hold up four fingers. I’m not seeing any advantage to having an infielder out of position so that any pitch is a ball, and then having your pitcher throw a pitch. Yeah, it might be a homerun, but it also might be a strike, and you have no way to know till after the pitcher delivers.
I’m glad this happened. It will hopefully be evidence to prevent this dumbass rule gaining any traction.
I think banning the shift is dumb. I honestly love both shifts and openers!
So if the first basemen fields and throws to the SS crossing second while the second basemen is backing up the play, it seems like the rule could be violated depending on where the first basemen throws the ball. If he is behind first it could force an infraction.
The rule applies when a pitch is released. After that, the infielders can move wherever they want to in order to field the ball and cover the bases. The rule is stupid, but not that stupid.