THE UNWRITTEN RULESnear the base, rather than on it, to avoid an incoming slide. This is also known as the hantom tag.�The umpire only rules an out when the toss is on target, the ball is caught cleanly, and the lder foot is in the vicinity of the bag. This is not what the rulebook says (rule 7.08 says the lder must touch the bag or make the tag), and the play is never formally acknowledged by the higher-ups in baseball. There is a reason for this unwritten rule that is intensely practical. istorians say the rough-and-tumble play of the 1930s led to the hantom tag�call. Following the letter of the law resulted in too many collisions, hts and injuries,�wrote Kirk Arnott in an article on the neighborhood play in the Columbus Dispatch early in the 1992 baseball season. n these days of fragile millionaires, can you imagine how swollen the disabled list would be if the phantom tag wasn called There already are more than 90 guys on the disabled list, and it only April.�3.2.0. Umpires Don Fight or Complain; They PunishUmpires have been known to change the strike zone for pitchers who have embarrassed them and to make bad calls to retaliate for a player dissatisfaction with a particular call at the plate.119
