Turner in the Runner's Lane

October 29, 2019, Game 6 at Minute Maid Park, the top of the seventh. Trea Turner bunted and ran to first. He and Yuli Gurriel, the first baseman, met at the bag. Home-plate umpire Sam Holbrook called Turner out for interfering while running outside the runner's lane. A run that had scored on the play was taken off the board.

Dave Martinez, the Washington manager, was ejected in the argument. The rule requires the runner to be in the lane when a throw is being made to first, and it is written more narrowly than the play looks on a broadcast. Washington won the game, 7–2, and won the series the next night.

The call followed a sentence in the book. The sentence is why the play is filed here, with the pine-tar game and the infield fly: a rule applied in October, in front of a country that had not read it, and a run removed because of where a runner's feet were.