The Law of the Headhunter

Depending on your point of view, one of the more celebrated or ignominious parts of the game of baseball is the headhunter, perhaps most recently embodied in the person of Vicente Padilla. There have been others, though. Armando Benitez was, in his day, notorious for throwing chin music — and sometimes more than that.

Throwing a pitch at a batter intentionally is a violation of Major League Baseball Rule 6.02(c)(9) (Rule 8.02(d)). The comment to that Rule states that “[t]o pitch at a batter’s head is unsportsmanlike and highly dangerous. It should be — and is — condemned by everybody. Umpires should act without hesitation in enforcement of this rule.” Despite that strong language, headhunting is not a violation of baseball’s unwritten rules. Therefore, it keeps happening.

Whatever virtues one might find in the practice, it’s nevertheless obvious that headhunting can be really dangerous. Former Cleveland shortstop Ray Chapman notably died after being struck in the head. Tony Conigliaro’s career — and life — was altered dramatically by a beaning in his age-22 season. Even throwing at a batter unintentionally can have devastating consequences, as we saw with Giancarlo Stanton after he was hit by Mike Fiers.

But the presence of headhunting in the game raises an interesting question — namely, what legal recourse, if any, does a batter have against a pitcher who throws at him intentionally?

Let’s start with some basic definitions to help us out here. Today we’ll be talking about “assault” and “battery,” two terms that get thrown around a lot in popular culture but actually have pretty specific legal meanings.

Most people think assault and battery are the same thing, but they’re actually very different. (For our purposes, there’s not much difference between the criminal and civil versions of the two charges — either for assault or battery). Battery is a (1) harmful bodily contact, (2) with intent to cause that bodily contact, and (3) without consent. Assault is apprehension of that intentional harmful bodily contact. In other words, actual physical contact isn’t necessary for an assault charge, whereas it is necessary to qualify as battery. Some people just call assault “attempted battery,” but that’s not exactly right; it’s a little more complicated than that. Assault and battery vary a bit from state to state, and are creatures of state law like this one.

How does this apply to baseball? Let’s consider a hypothetical scenario, one in which Cole Hamels is on the mound and Bryce Harper at bat. Hamels decides to intentionally hit Harper. Maybe Hamels didn’t like Harper’s hair that day. Maybe his cologne annoyed him. Maybe Harper pimped a home-run trot earlier. It doesn’t really matter; the point is, we have Hamels and Harper facing off, and Hamels has decided to throw a fastball at him. As the fastball approaches Harper, Hamels is assaulting him — Harper is now in apprehension of an imminent harmful bodily contact. And then, when the ball makes contact with Harper, the battery is complete. Harper sues Hamels, wins money, end of story.

Right?

Well, not so much. Previously, in the context of netting and baseball, we discussed the doctrine of “assumption of the risk.” As a quick refresher, “assumption of the risk” is a doctrine in Chapter 17A of the Restatement (Second) of Torts that says that when an individual engages in an act with knowledge of a danger, they assume the risk of that danger. As it turns out, assumption of the risk shows up in lots of different baseball contexts, and not just protective netting. In this case, assumption of the risk means that, when a player steps into the batter’s box, that player assumes the risk that a pitcher might throw at him, even intentionally.

The Supreme Court of California is responsible for that rule, the result of a case called Avila v. Citrus Community College District. The Avila Court said that “[b]eing intentionally hit is likewise an inherent risk of the sport, . . . Pitchers intentionally throw at batters to disrupt a batter’s timing or back him away from home plate, to retaliate after a teammate has been hit, or to punish a batter for having hit a home run.” In other words, the Avila court provided as its list of reasons why intentionally throwing at a batter should be legal all of the unwritten rules of beanballs. So, from a legal perspective, throwing at someone’s head is “condemned by everybody” except the California Supreme Court.

*It’s therefore not correct anymore, I suppose, to say they are unwritten rules. They’re written in Avila, which means that they may not be in the Rulebook, but they are enshrined in case law. Make of that what you will.

Now, it seems odd at first glance that a court would say that there is an inherent risk in being intentionally hit by a baseball when it’s against the rules. But the Avila court acknowledged that: “It is true that intentionally throwing at a batter is forbidden by the rules of baseball.” However, the Avila court was concerned that imposing legal liability for hitting batters intentionally would change the game of baseball, including in its decision the following passage:

“Even when a participant’s conduct violates a rule of the game and may subject the violator to internal sanctions prescribed by the sport itself, imposition of legal liability for such conduct might well alter fundamentally the nature of the sport by deterring participants from vigorously engaging in activity that falls close to, but on the permissible side of, a prescribed rule.”

Ultimately, the result is that the Avila court has insulated headhunters from legal liability. And the Avila decision is now the majority rule in the United States.

Now, interestingly, that same Supreme Court of California ruled the very next year in a case called Shin v. Ahn that a person can be held liable for recklessly hitting somebody with a golf ball, even if it’s not intentional. So the current state of the law is that getting hit with a golf ball unintentionally (albeit recklessly) can give rise to liability, but being hit intentionally by a baseball can’t. And that’s why Bryce Harper can’t sue Cole Hamels in our hypothetical.

One last thing: these rules don’t necessarily apply to brawls. More on that in a later post.





Sheryl Ring is a litigation attorney and General Counsel at Open Communities, a non-profit legal aid agency in the Chicago suburbs. You can reach her on twitter at @Ring_Sheryl. The opinions expressed here are solely the author's. This post is intended for informational purposes only and is not intended as legal advice.

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tb.25
6 years ago

Why the difference between golf ball and baseball? Is it purely the assumed risk of the batter/pitcher confrontation versus the lack of perceived risk of golfing?

OddBall Herrera
6 years ago
Reply to  tb.25

I haven’t read the case, but the argument I’d make is that there’s a standard of care. For example, if it’s a par 3 and the people in front of you are still on the green, it’s reckless to tee off knowing that you’re liable to hit someone, and the people in front of you have a reasonable expectation that you’re going to wait.

vmx
6 years ago
Reply to  tb.25

In Avila, the defendant was following the rules of the game. In Shin, the defendant was not. The author doesn’t tell you that, though, because she wants to imply that it’s the difference in type of sports that was dispositive.

vmx
6 years ago
Reply to  Sheryl Ring

Are you being intentionally obtuse? You know very well, and in fact say so in your article, that we are talking about the unwritten rules and expectations of the game as well as written rules.

Maggie25
6 years ago
Reply to  vmx

What exactly are you implying when you say that “she wants to imply that it’s the difference in type of sports that was dispositive.”?

Also, if you don’t specify the unwritten part, when you say rules it just sounds like you’re talking about the actual rules.

tb.25
6 years ago
Reply to  vmx

Sounds like you’re the obtuse one… straight from the article AND rulebook:

Throwing a pitch at a batter intentionally is a violation of Major League Baseball Rule 6.02(c)(9) (Rule 8.02(d)).

So no, it isn’t an unwritten rule. It’s a written rule not to throw intentionally at someone. So in Avila, the rules were broken.

davemascera
6 years ago
Reply to  Sheryl Ring

There are so many problems with making the comparison of these two cases in my opinion:

1. The rules say that you can’t throw at a batter’s head intentionally, but it is impossible to prove that someone did something intentionally unless they admit it (obviously). The court case doesn’t even dwell in these waters as far as I can tell because they stick with what would happen if the pitch was presumed intentional.

2. “vigorously engaging in activity that falls close to, but on the permissible side of, a prescribed rule,” is a very important part of the reasoning behind the Avila case. What if a pitcher wants to pitch up and in, but not “bean” the batter and instead they end up missing their spot and hitting the head? From the batter’s perspective in this accidental scenario, they could very well argue both negligence and intentionality, and the pitcher would not be able to prove otherwise, which SURELY does prevent “vigorous engage[ment].” The court simply wants to make sure that a pitcher is not AFRAID to hit the batter the head even by accident for fear of legal consequences because as mentioned, intentionality is impossible to prove.

3. The golf circumstances prevent no such limiting factor on the competitiveness of the game like the baseball one does. There is no such circumstance where someone should be driving with someone else on the fairway, especially after allegedly making eye contact with the person. There is no such circumstance where this limits the ability of the person driving to play the game as it is intended. If you can think of how it does, please let me know (I mean this non-sarcastically, I simply can’t think of a scenario where it would matter)

Pitching up and in, intentionally and in the sport of baseball, is totally legal within the sport (not the law). Pitching up and in, intentionally as to hit a player’s head, is not legal within the sport (not the law).

From the observer’s perspective, however, the difference between these two occurrences is totally indistinguishable. Furthermore, forcing the pitcher to take this into account from an actionable standpoint FUNDAMENTALLY alters the game even within its rules (because the pitcher would have to be afraid of not being able to prove he didn’t break the law with each pitch he or she makes, which would alter the pitcher’s decision-making process). Forcing people not to drive a golf ball while others are on the fairway does not fundamentally alter the sport of golf within its rules. That’s why the coexistence of these two cases isn’t particularly interesting.

Let me know if there’s something I’m missing though, that’s just my take after skimming over both the cases.

timprov
6 years ago
Reply to  davemascera

Dave, I think that’s a cogent way of putting it. But I’m somewhat interested in a more meta-issue: that the court feels it appropriate to prioritize the fundamental rules of baseball over people not getting hit in the head with projectiles. Society has an established interest in the latter under the Anglo-American system, but I’m not sure on what grounds it values the former at all, much less makes it superior.

davemascera
6 years ago
Reply to  timprov

At what point can you tell people what they are and aren’t allowed to do though? Should it have been illegal for Madison Bumgarner to try and do a dangerous jump on that dirtbike? How about most sports in the Winter Olympics, in which one misstep or de-railed bobsled can end a life? How about for that Austrian dude to do the Red Bull skydive from space with the Go-Pro for some cash?

The point is that when we establish liability on a pitcher based upon intention (and furthermore, potentially negligence if not intention), when a pitcher only has control of where the ball ends up to a certain point (and not very precise one at that according to Mr. Sarris), and there is still yet no way to prove what a person does or does not intend to do, the game becomes fundamentally unplayable without serious legal risk for a pitcher. If the game turns into “well, don’t even RISK hitting the batter,” then every hitter will turn into a super-Rizzo, and the de-facto strike zone will be around the size of a loaf of bread.

To a point, the hitter knows the risk they are taking and chooses to take it.

timprov
6 years ago
Reply to  vmx

Yeah, it’s not that being intentionally hit by a baseball is legal, it’s that being intentionally hit by a baseball while standing in the batters box is legal. If Hamels negligently threw a ball 90MPH in the dugout and hit someone, he’d probably be liable. If he did the Bull Durham thing and threw at somebody outside a bar, he definitely would be.

Dave T
6 years ago
Reply to  timprov

The California Supreme Court makes that exact point in Avila. Quoting from footnote 11 (which is a footnote to the sentence that “For better or worse, being intentionally thrown at is a fundamental part and inherent risk of the sport of baseball.”):

“The conclusion that being intentionally hit by a pitch is an inherent risk of baseball extends only to situations such as that alleged here, where the hit batter is at the plate. Allegations that a pitcher intentionally hit a batter who was still in the on-deck circle, or elsewhere, would present an entirely different scenario.”

Shane Tourtellotte
6 years ago
Reply to  tb.25

Consider it this way. There is no requirement in golf for you to hit the ball close to somebody. There is a requirement in baseball for you to throw the ball close to a competitor: either explicitly, when pitching, or implicitly, when throwing a fielded ball to attempt a play at a base, where the throw might go into the runner.

It springs from the different natures of the games. Golf is essentially individual, because you don’t have to play against anybody except whoever decided par for the course. Baseball is essentially a team sport, and you do have to compete against somebody. The differing legal opinions appear to spring from those different natures.

Jetsy Extrano
6 years ago

Right, the Avila decision as quoted was not just about traditional rules violations, it referred to rules-compliant play that shades near the violations. The court didn’t want to chill legal pitching high and inside.

It’s not clear to me what the court would have said if these facts were split — if beanballs were traditional rulebreaking but not adjacent to any significant rules-compliant play.