Oakland Park Baseball

i just saw something that's confusing the hell outta me. i always thought that defensive indifference was only called when a runner takes a base that does not matter, like when there are guys on first and third in a tie game, and the guy on first takes second. that makes sense. what i just saw though, does not.

in the bottom of the ninth (2 outs) in a one run game (away team is ahead), the runner goes from second to third with no throw. to me, this is a steal. that run is the tying run. it's a double steal, so the guy going to second is the go ahead run. if this is defensive indifference, the defense (ramon hernandez) is pretty dumb. giving up 90 ft. in the bottom of the ninth in a one run game is certainly not insignificant. i don't understand the call. maybe someone else does?

btw, matsui just struck out to end the game, so it didn't cost them, but it could have. woulda looked really bad if they scored on a slow roller, or a wild pitch.

whether or not the stolen base is hypothetically relevent (which is a matter of opinion anyway) has no effect. Essentially, if a baserunner steals a base and the catcher makes no attempt to throw him out, then it should be scored defensive indifference. This is somewhat of a judgement call though, as there may be situations where the catcher decides not to throw the ball because he doesn't have an opportunity to record an out. From the way you described the yankees play it seems like the defense didn't care if the runner took the base (even if they should've) so i'd guess that it was scored correctly.

so, if the defense makes no effort (because they don't care, or because "they" happens to be ramon hernandez, who, while he's a darn good all 'round catcher, is dumb as a doorknob), then it's indifference? if the catcher braces to throw, but doesn't, as he doesn't think he has a chance, then it's a SB. in other words, an attempt doesn't require the throwing of the ball?

correct.

There was a case in the Giants game tonight where the Giants made no effort at all to throw out a runner. The reason? The pitch nearly hit the batter. That, to me, is a stolen base.

As I understand it, the only time that indifferance should be called is if the back runner steals a base that is meaningless, i.e. in a tie game, and the home team is batting in the 9th.

i agree that it should be that way, and that's mostly how they call it. i've seen plenty of times where the no effort was really made earlier in a game, and it wasn't called indifference. i think it's just another case of the actual rule not being entirely consistant with what is called.

Its a dumb rule anyway.