I've watched a lot of baseball over the years. I collected baseball cards. I've read baseball history. I've memorized the stats of the great players. I've even made the pilgrimage to Cooperstown. I know a little something about baseball.
So last Saturday, Mrs. Kronicle and I were playing the biography version of Trivial Pursuit when a question came up, "What are the most strikeouts recorded by a major league pitcher in an inning?" The answer is four. How is that possible? Here is an explanation of how it has been done at Baseball Almanac:
… A batter with two strikes on him takes a swing at strike three; however, the catcher does not field the ball cleanly, and instead of tagging the runner out, the runner reaches. The strikeout is recorded, but not the out.
Of course, The trick is that four strikeouts were recorded but only three outs. The link lists the forty-seven pitchers (if I counted right) who have done it. (I believe I detect an inordinate number of knuckleballers in the list. That would help explain why catchers were having trouble with the ball.) If I'm reading it right, Chuck Finley did this three times in one game in 2000.
But now to the real question. The next day I'm watching the Royals and the Yankees on the tube out of the corner of my eye. The Yankees have a runner on first with two outs. The batter has two strikes. Now I missed the specifics of what happened on the pitch. The batter struck out, but I didn't see if he swung or the catcher caught it cleanly. The next thing I saw was the catcher firing to second. The throw was a little off, and the runner was safe, but since the strikeout was the third out, the inning was over. However, the announcer noted that had the runner been thrown out, it would have been four outs, and the next inning would have been played with two outs! I've never heard of such a thing.
I did some web searching to see what I could learn about this. Someone presented this scenario:
Two outs, runners on second and third. Batter hits a grounder to third. The third baseman tags the runner going from second to third. The home plate umpire rules the runner from third crosses home before the tag is made, therefore the run would count since the tag play is not a force out. Being the quick thinker, the third basemen notices the batter just jogging and then stopping after the tag was made, fires to the first getting the fourth out on the batter, therefore nullifying the run.
Does anyone know what might have been going on with the Royals scenario I mentioned? Is the above situation a scenario for four outs? Have you ever seen four outs happen? I'm skeptical.
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