roothog66 posted:
The call would not depend on the particular right fielder, but rather if an ordinary effort from an average fielder at the particular level of play would have resulted in an out. On fly balls, unless it's shallow, you are always going to give the benefit of the doubt to the batter. I have never seen, even at the mlb level, where a scorer would assume ordinary effort would result in an out at the plate on a fly ball to the outfield.
EXACTLY! Many people and well as many scorers take into account their fielders rather than the “average” and it causes problems. I had the privilege of watching both Roberto Clement and Rocky Colavito play right field in their prime and can tell you that even with two of the best arms who ever played right field, many times runners were able to score on them.
Sometimes people forget that there’s much more to it than being able to throw the ball over the distance in time to get a runner. If the runner is even a tick faster than average it’s harder to get the ball in in time. If the ball is thrown even just a few degrees off, it isn’t going to be where the catcher can get it an put on the tag. In short, no matter who’s in RF on a play like that and who’s running, if the ball is more than 250’ away when caught, it’s gonna take a great throw to get a runner tagging up at 3rd.