History of the hidden ball trick

It all depends on who you ask. It’s a bush league move on a player’s part that goes against every meaning of sportsmanship. Or, it’s a smart move to take advantage of an opponent’s wrong step or a lapse in judgment.

It’s been used from the diamonds of the Major Leagues, to high school games, to wiffleball contests on the sandlot. Oh, and at the Major League level it’s about as rare as a no-hitter. It’s the hidden ball trick. Since the inception of the National League in 1876, there have been 263 no-no’s thrown in baseball history. Only 232 times has the hidden ball trick been verified to work during a game

So what is the hidden ball trick? There are many variations of trying to trick a runner off base: faking a throw back to the pitcher, pretending to miss the cutoff throw, and various other ways that usually involve theatrics and trickery on the part of the fielder. A true hidden ball trick typically has the fielder hide the ball, often in his mitt, and attempt to convince the runner through his body language that the pitcher has the ball. Because of this, the pitcher has to be in on the trick too. When the runner takes his lead off of the base, the fielder tags the confused (and embarrassed) runner and shows the ball to the umpire, much to the delight and amusement of everyone (except the runner...and probably his manager…)

The hidden ball trick has been a part of the game since the beginning. As mentioned above, there have been very few successful attempts of the trick recorded, but it’s been attempted throughout baseball history. Bill Coughlin even pulled the trick in the first inning of Game 2 of the 1907 World Series against the Cubs’ Jimmy Slagle. It’s still the only instance of the hidden ball trick working in the World Series. Coughlin gets the crown as king of the trick, have reputedly pulled it seven times successfully. On the more dubious side, Ozzie Guillen and Jack Martin (info on him here) are the only players to have been caught napping on the basepaths three times in their careers. (Also of note, Orlando Cepeda and Fred “Boner” Merkle alone can claim to have both fallen for the trick and pulled it successfully on someone else.)

It became much harder to trick the runners when the modern balk rules were put in place. The pitcher now cannot go near the rubber without the ball:

“Rule 8.05: If there is a runner, or runners, it is a balk when - (i) the pitcher, without having the ball, stands on or astride the pitchers plate or while off the plate, he feigns a pitch.”

This is mainly what makes the trick so rare; if a runner waits to lead off until the pitcher gets on the mound, the hidden ball trick is impossible. Thus, the trick is only feasible though both the craftiness and acting ability of the fielder and pitcher, and the laziness and inattentiveness of the runner.

The last time the trick worked? August 10, 2005. Mike Lowell of the Florida Marlins pulled it successfully for the second time in less than a year, this time against the Diamondback’s Luis Terrero. Here’s the account from the game recap:

"I looked to first to see if Tony Clark was going to advance, then I looked at third base," Lowell said. "Both guys had their heads down so I just held onto the ball to see what would happen."

Despite the absence of any signal from Lowell, (Todd) Jones -- who said he hadn't seen the play since 1986, when he was in high school - understood what his teammate was up to.

"When I didn't get the ball, I figured it out by the process of elimination," Jones said. "I just walked around and tried to stall. I was running out of things to do. I was going to touch my toes."

Just as Jones was getting ready to give up the charade, Terrero took his lead off third base. Lowell sauntered over and tagged the stunned baserunner, who was immediately called out by third base umpire Ed Rapuano, drawing a roar of approval from the crowd of 20,443.

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Why is 100 pitches now the "magic number?"

Tim Kurkjian wrote a fantastic article for ESPN the Magazine a few days ago that deals with the evolution of the pitch count. It talks about the history behind pitch counts, why we've become so obsessed with them, why they've become important, and how 100 pitches came to be the magic number starters should throw.

Click here to read the article: Baseball's Magic Number: 100

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