Hit Batman

Please create a new topic rather than adding unrelated questions to a different topic. It helps people find them later on and makes it more clear what someone is responding to.

If you judged that the batter made an attempt to hit the ball, but the ball hits him, it is a dead ball and a strike. Doesn't matter if it's a bunt or a swing.

Just squaring to bunt is not an attempt to hit the ball. Neither is moving the bat up or down in the strike zone. On a bunt, you'd want to see the batter push the bat at the ball or stab at it. The stabbing usually happens at balls outside the zone.

What if you see the batter using the bat to shield himself from the ball that eventually hits him?  I had this is a game last week.   Batter squares to bunt.  Pitch is at least 18 inches off the plate, inside, and the batter may have attempted to hit the ball, or maybe he was just trying to protect himself.    I declared "hit batter" under the theory that I'm not going to help the pitcher if he throws a ball so far off the plate.

On a bunt, you have three things that can happen. The batter can pull the bat back. The batter can place the bat in the path of the ball and let the ball hit it. The batter can attempt to hit the ball with the bat.

In the first two, I have no attempt and no strike. On the third, that's an attempt and a strike.

When you say he tried to shield himself, it sounds like he made an attempt to make contact with the ball. If so, that's a strike.

Now, try and recognize the difference between a bat moving toward a ball because the batter is trying to hit it and a bat moving toward a ball as the natural result of a player contorting himself to get out of the way. A player trying to get out of the way of a pitch probably isn't also trying to hit it.

Thanks Adam,   no one complained when I sent the batter to first base (except a few parents in the peanut gallery.)