Originally Posted by RPD:
…But when the top dog in the organization makes a ruling that will likely affect all future rulings like this, wouldn't it be helpful to the baseball community if he would explain his rationale?
I also understand that there are lots of scorekeeping appeals that we never hear about -- and no explanation is ever given. It just seems like this is one of real significance and that scorekeepers (and fans) deserve to know what factors are to be used in making that judgement call. A little transparency would go a long ways here.
Yes, it would be nice if MLB generated a memo of explanation and made it public, but that’s not the way they operate. At most what they’ll do, is send every organization a memo that tells them how MLB wants them to interpret and apply the rule. The rest of the baseball world is pretty much left on its own to fend for itself. 
A few years back I was given a copy of the rule change sent to ML organizations that added the definition of Ordinary Effort. It had the rule change, the way ML wanted it interpreted, and explanations. But here’s the deal. Any organization that generates it own rule book, which is every organization other than MLB, could ask MLB for the explanation, then put it in their rule book. Problem is, few will do it, and of those that will, it will take them years to update their rules.