Rules Of Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball game played by two teams, and each team plays nine innings attempting to score maximum runs. The visiting team always bats first in the top of innings, and home team bats second in the bottom of innings. In each inning, the batting team sends batter or hitter to bat until three hitters get out. The pair of turns, one at the field and one at the bat by each team constitutes the inning, and a single game consists of nine innings.


Each team has only nine players playing in the field at any given time, but team actually is made of 25 players. The substitute players can be brought in the game in case of fatigue, injury or tactical reasons of current players, but once the player has been replaced, he cannot return to the game. These rules are available online, and are also published as a book by Sporting News. The rules of official baseball have not changed much during modern era, and most baseball fans, players and administrators consider the traditions and rules as nearly sacrosanct.


The designated hitter rule was first introduced almost 30 years ago, but is still debatable and is accepted only is two major American and one or two Japanese leagues. To play the game, pitcher stands on the mound and throws ball to the hitter standing on the home plate. The hitter must hit the ball inside the foul lines, and then run to the first base where he can either stop, or continue to next base. The defense wears softball gloves fitting in the hand in order to catch the ball which is almost three inches in diameter and offense uses the wooden bat to hit it.


All the statistics including putouts, total chances, assists and fielding average collectively are called situational statistics. The pitcher stands in the middle of the mound, and begins the action by throwing the ball towards home plate. Wins, losses, innings pitches, saves, earned run average and winning percentage are the basic pitching statistics. The fields for playing baseball can significantly vary in shape and size.


Umpires usually work in the team of four, and take turns to become the home plate umpire. Each team must stick to the bating order throughout the game. In the game of baseball, the skill of fielding is as important as the hitting skills of the player. Batter gets the hit when he is able to reach the base without getting out, and runs are scored when the player completes the entire diamond.