baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...

, a

catcher Catcher is a position in baseball and softball. When a batter takes their turn to hit, the catcher crouches behind home plate, in front of the (home) umpire, and receives the ball from the pitcher. In addition to this primary duty, the catcher ...

is charged with a passed ball when he fails to hold or control a legally pitched ball that, with ordinary effort, should have been maintained under his control, and, as a result of this loss of control, the batter or a runner on base advances. A runner who advances due to a passed ball is not credited with a stolen base unless he breaks for the base before the pitcher begins his delivery.

History

A passed ball may be scored when a base runner reaches the next base on a bobble or missed catch by the catcher, or when the batter–runner reaches first base on an uncaught strike three (''see also'' Strikeout). A closely related statistic is the wild pitch. As with many baseball statistics, whether a pitch that gets away from a catcher is a passed ball or wild pitch is at the discretion of the official scorer. Typically, pitches that are deemed to be ordinarily catchable by the catcher, but are not, are ruled passed balls; pitches that get by the catcher that are thought to have required extraordinary effort by the catcher in order to stop them are wild pitches. If the pitch was so low as to touch the ground, or so high that the catcher has to rise out of his crouched position to get to it, or so wide that the catcher has to lunge for it, it is usually then considered a wild pitch and not a passed ball. A run scored due to a passed ball is not recorded as an

earned run In baseball, an earned run is any run that was fully enabled by the offensive team's production in the face of competent play from the defensive team. Conversely, an unearned run is a run that would not have been scored without the aid of an err ...

. However, a run scored due to a wild pitch is recorded as an earned run. Passed balls and wild pitches are considered to be part of the act of pitching rather than fielding. Thus they are kept as separate statistics and are not recorded as

error An error (from the Latin ''error'', meaning "wandering") is an action which is inaccurate or incorrect. In some usages, an error is synonymous with a mistake. The etymology derives from the Latin term 'errare', meaning 'to stray'. In statistic ...

s. There tends to be a higher incidence of passed balls when a

knuckleball A knuckleball or knuckler is a baseball pitch thrown to minimize the spin of the ball in flight, causing an erratic, unpredictable motion. The air flow over a seam of the ball causes the ball to change from laminar to turbulent flow. This ch ...

er is pitching. The physics that make a knuckleball so difficult to hit make it similarly difficult to catch. While teams with a knuckleballer on their pitching staff often employ a special "knuckleball catcher" who is equipped with a knuckleball mitt, similar to a first baseman's glove, it is still extremely difficult to catch.

Records

The MLB career record for passed balls allowed is 763 by Pop Snyder, while Rudy Kemmler set the single season record of 114 in 1883. The single season record in the modern era is 35, set by Geno Petralli in 1987. The record for passed balls in a single game, six, was set by Rube Vickers in 1902 and later tied by Petralli in 1987 and Jerry Goff in 1996. The record for passed balls in a single inning is four, and is jointly held by Petralli, Ray Katt, and Ryan Lavarnway, all three of whom were catching knuckleball pitchers.

References

External links

Baseball Rules
See section 10.13

at the Encyclopedia of Baseball Catchers {{Baseball statistics Catching statistics Baseball terminology

History

Records

See also

References

External links