JUPITER, Fla. — In one other season, it will’ve been the proper play. A very good one, too.
Joey Wendle, holding on the Nationals’ Ildemaro Vargas at second base Thursday, prevented a pickoff attempt from bouncing into the outfield and kept Vargas from advancing within the second inning.
As an alternative, Wendle was called for obstruction, something that didn’t surprise him.
He’d observed a number of the calls since MLB pushed umpires to watch obstruction more this season, a development The Athletic reported in February, and his right knee had blocked the basepath.
An umpire awarded Vargas third base, and the Washington shortstop eventually scored on an infield single.
It’s not a recent rule. Not just like the pitch clock or the removal of shifts. Rule 6.01(h), in keeping with The Athletic, had at all times labeled obstruction as “the act of a fielder who, while not in possession of the ball and never within the act of fielding the ball, impedes the progress of any runner.”
Nevertheless it’s still something the Mets “must be more conscious of,” Wendle said.
“I don’t just like the rule, but when it comes to that specific call, I wasn’t upset with the umpire or anything like that,” Wendle told The Post before the Mets defeated the Marlins 3-1 on Friday. “I feel like he was just enforcing what that they had told him to do.”
The Mets’ middle infielders have tried to account for the obstruction scrutiny by sharpening their tags, Wendle said.
Sometimes, they’ll draw lines within the dirt to reflect running lanes — after which attempt to avoid them.
Prior to now, he added, infielders could intentionally plant their foot and directly block a baserunner when applying a pickoff tag.
Other times, similar scenarios would unfold by accident, where the ball and the angle of the throw and momentum would just take the infielders — like Wendle — to whatever location ended with it staying in front of them.
So it’s a challenge. An adjustment.
“It’s like, ‘I would as well just not even try,’ ” Wendle said jokingly, but even in cases like Thursday, when he claimed he wasn’t attempting to block the bag, the intent didn’t stop Vargas from getting third and Wendle getting an error.
For without delay, within the context of spring training, it simply resembles an innocuous sequence.
The ramifications weren’t significant.
But manager Carlos Mendoza said that adjustments will stretch beyond just the center infielders and will apply to back-picks from catchers to first and third base, too.
If the obstruction call happens on a back-pick to 3rd, Mendoza added, that’ also would result in a run.
“You continue to gotta play the sport,” Mendoza said. “Again, it’s recent, but we’ve to embrace it, we’ve to work on it and we gotta recuperate.”
