Baseball Rules/Stats Question

[DTCromer]

2 things:

I'm watching the Cubs game and I'll give you the situation. Runners on 1st and 2nd and 0 outs. Astros player hits a fly ball to CF and the runner on 2nd advances to 3rd but runner on 1st stays.

The announcer said it doesn't count as a sacrifice. Is he wrong and if not, then why isn't it a sacrifice?

Also, if a player reaches base on an error, I'm assuming that his OBP goes up, right?

[Griffey012]

A fly ball only counts as a sacrifice if a runner scores on the play, not sure why but I think it has something to do with a sacrifice fly scoring a run is a positive event (hence getting credited with the RBI) but is not necessarily an intentional sacrifice. Where as sacrifice bunting the runners over is intentionally done and I believe that is why a fly ball that moves the runners over is not counted as a sacrifice.

Sorry if that isn't clear, I tried to make an attempt to explain it.

I also do not believe reaching on an error raises one's obp because without the error the player would not have reached base, I think OBP is scored similarly to BA when it comes to errors.

[DTCromer]

That's what I was thinking, but I was wanting clarification.

Plus, it's good for some people to expand their useless baseball knowledge.

[BigJohn]

In baseball, a batted ball is considered a sacrifice fly if the following four criteria are met:

* There are fewer than two outs when the ball is hit.
* The ball is hit to the outfield.
* The batter is out because an outfielder or an infielder running in the outfield catches the ball (or would have been out if not for an error).
* A runner who is already on base scores on the play.

As addressed within Rule 10.09(e) of the Official Baseball Rules[1], a sacrifice fly is not counted as a turn at bat for the batter, though the batter is credited with a run batted in.

The purpose of not counting a sacrifice fly as an at bat is to avoid penalizing hitters for a successful tactical maneuver. The sacrifice fly is one of two instances in baseball where a batter is not charged with a time at bat after putting a ball in play; the other is the sacrifice hit. However, a sacrifice fly still reduces a player's on base percentage, and a player on a hitting streak will have the hit streak end if he has no official at-bats but he has a sacrifice fly.

The sacrifice fly is credited even if another runner is put out on appeal for failing to tag up, so long as a run scores prior to the third out. In the case of a fly ball dropped for an error, the sacrifice fly is only credited if the official scorer believes the run would have scored had the ball been caught.

[BigJohn]

In baseball statistics, on-base percentage (OBP) (sometimes referred to as on-base average [OBA], as the statistic is rarely presented as a true percentage) is a measure of how often a batter reaches base for any reason other than a fielding error, fielder's choice, dropped/uncaught third strike, fielder's obstruction, or catcher's interference (the latter two are ignored as either times-on-base (TOB) or plate appearances in calculating OBP). OBP is added to slugging average to determine on-base plus slugging (OPS). It first became an official MLB statistic in 1984.

[Jack Burton]

Gil Renard: What we need now is a sacrifice. A winning team has to know how to manufacture runs. Coop taught me that. He used to say the most beautiful play in the game is a sacrifice fly, and you know why?

Richie Renard: 'Cause you give yourself up for the team?

Gil Renard: And it doesn't even count against your average. That's why baseball's better than life - it's fair.

Last line is classic.

[Eric_the_Red]

^ Good line, terrible flick.