NotThatGuy posted:Situation: 1-0 game, batting team in lead, 0 outs, bases loaded, pop-up (at least 25' in air) drops at feet of SS, 2B and P behind mound. No call of "Batter Out - Infield fly" by either official. Runner at 3rd breaks to home. SS throws to C at home to force runner. Runner at 2nd goes back to 2nd where runner from 1st is standing. Runner at 2nd does not touch occupied 2nd but is caught in rundown between SS and 3B and reaches 3rd safely without being tagged nor was bag tagged on a "force". Batter is at 1st, runner previously at 1st is now at 2nd and runner from 2nd is at 3rd.
Umpires confer, call runner from 3rd out on force at home, call runner from 2nd out on force despite his successful avoidance of tag and no force tag at 3rd.
Question: Is this a correctable error and if so, would run scored by runner at 3rd count? Field official informed batting team's coach that he "blew the call"; plate ump deemed the pop-up uncatchable!!
Batting team won ball game 1-0, but this play could have made the result different.
When you ask if "this" is a correctable error, what are you referring to?
The non-call of infield fly? The umpire judged the ball not catchable by ordinary effort from players at that level, and subsequent events confirmed his judgment. Hard to see how that non-call is an umpire error of any type.
Calling out the runner from second on a force when the base was not tagged? That's a judgment call. It's reversible if the umpire who made it decides to change it based on reconsidering what he saw or information he receives from his partner. It's not protestable as a misapplication of the rules because the force was in effect.
Infield fly calls are reversible when the umpire calls infield fly in a situation in which the rule does not apply, such as runners on first and third but not on second. In situations like this, players are expected to know it doesn't apply and execute their responsibilities accordingly. The batter-runner should keep running in case the ball is dropped to prevent a double play.
If an umpire doesn't call an infield fly when he should and the ball is intentionally dropped (doesn't have to be touched, unlike other intentionally dropped batted balls), it's a dead ball, the batter is out, and the runners return.
If an umpire doesn't call an infield fly when he should and the ball is unintentionally dropped, you get the chaos the rule was designed to prevent, and everyone has to live with it. You can't go back and retroactively make an infield fly call because the ball remains live after an infield fly, so you can't pretend the subsequent live action didn't happen.
Does this help?