Throwing Bats

“What is the penalty if a player throws his/her bat?”

I get asked this question a lot – it surprises me that I haven’t written about it here before now.

We’ve all seen it happen – little Johnny or Janey takes a mighty swing, and the bat goes flying. If we’re lucky, it heads off in the direction of the chain link. If we’re unlucky, it comes back and hits the catcher. Or worse, us. So what do we do?

First, let’s dispose of one uncommon case. If a player lets go of his/her bat as part of hitting the ball, and the bat goes out into fair territory and interferes with a fielder who’s trying to make a play, the batter is guilty of interference. Similarly, if a wild pitch goes past the catcher, and the batter lets go of the bat, raps the catcher across the shins, and you judge that this interfered with the catcher’s ability to make a play, the batter is guilty of interference. This one’s in the book:

6.05(g) Approved Ruling: If a bat is thrown into fair or foul territory and interferes with a defensive player attempting to make a play, interference shall be called, whether intentional or not.

The penalty for offensive interference by the batter is that the batter is called out, and all runners return to the base they occupied at the time of the interference, which probably is the one they were on at the time of the pitch. The general principle is that the batter is responsible for his/her bat through the swing and thereafter, which includes insuring that the bat does not interfere with the fielders as the batter disposes of it. (Side note: MLB, and thus Little League, has an interpretation in which if a bat breaks and a piece of it goes into the field and interferes, the batter is not guilty of interference. The theory is that the batter can’t anticipate that his/her bat will break, and can’t control where broken pieces might go. But in the modern day of aluminum and composite bats in Little League, this rarely happens.)

But this isn’t the case that I’m generally being asked about. Instead, what people are usually asking about is the bat that goes sailing but doesn’t actually hit anything, or the one that comes back and makes the catcher’s or umpire’s life difficult without actually interfering with a play.

I was at a Little League clinic at which Andy Konyar, who was then the Umpire-In-Chief for all of Little League, was asked this question. Here’s what he said:

1. Since this topic isn’t explicitly covered by the rulebook, it falls within the boundaries of Rule 9.01(c) – the “the umpire gets to rule” rule.
2. That being said, umpires don’t get to “make up” reasons to call a batter out, even under 9.01(c). The reasons why a batter may be called out are listed in the book, and this isn’t one of them. So calling the batter out for throwing a bat isn’t allowed.
3. At the same time, this is behavior that we want to discourage. In an extreme case, a batter could seriously hurt someone if he/she is careless with the bat.
4. Thus, this is what he recommended:
   1. The first time a particular batter lets a bat go flying, warn the batter.
   2. If the same batter repeats the offense, go to the coach, and give the coach two options: the coach can either bench the player for the remainder of the game, or else you will eject the player.

An ejection, he pointed out, will carry a mandatory one-game suspension, so most coaches would be willing to go along with the “benching.” Either way, the player won’t be throwing the bat a third time during the game, and will be getting a strong message that he/she should change his/her ways in the future. But this is a per-player thing – if Billy gets warned, you don’t then take Richie out of the game the first time he throws a bat – Richie gets his own warning.

I’ve always figured that if it was good enough for the Umpire-In-Chief of all of Little League, it’s good enough for me, so this is what I’ve told anyone who’s asked.

My own approach is also to be a bit creative about the warning. Once the play in which we had an errant projectile is over, I collect the bat (instead of letting one of the batter’s teammates get it), walk down toward the batter (who’s usually standing on first base), hold it up in front of him and say, “You threw your bat on that play. That’s dangerous – we don’t want to get anybody hurt. Try not to do it again, OK?” I do this in a very calm, quiet, non-threatening manner, since I’m not trying to scare the kid, just get my point across. The player always says “OK,” at which point I smile, say “Good,” hand the bat off to the base coach and head back to the plate. The coach almost always follows this up by telling the player that if he does it again he’ll probably be ejected, but nobody has heard me actually utter that threat. My voice is low enough that only the player, the coach and maybe the first baseman can hear what I’m saying – I’m certainly not going to yell at a child – but the fact that I take the bat there pretty much tells everybody else in and around the field what’s being discussed.

The vast, vast majority of the time, when I do that, I don’t see another thrown bat in the entire game – for either team. Have I had to take the next step and ask the coach to remove a player? Yes, but I can probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that’s happened in the 10+ years since Andy was asked that question.

So that’s my approach to this particular issue. Maybe it will work for you as well.