OFFICIAL BASEBALL RULES

IMPORTANT NOTES(1) The Playing Rules Committee, at its December 2014 meeting, voted toreorganize and recodify the Official Baseball Rules into a more logicaland organized manner. No wording or language was changed (otherthan the 2015 amendments); only the order and placement of the ruleswere modified. Throughout the text of this 2015 edition, each rulenumber and Comment is followed by, in parentheses, the corresponding2014 rule number from which the “new” rule originated.In this edition Comments to the Rules are highlighted in a shaded boxrather than being printed in smaller typeface as has been the case inpast years. In addition, at the end of this book (pages 158-160) is across-reference table that shows each 2015 rule and the correspondingrule number from the 2014 edition (and vice versa).(2) The Playing Rules Committee, at its December 1977 meeting, voted toincorporate the Notes/Case Book/Comments section directly into theOfficial Baseball Rules at the appropriate places. Basically, the CaseBook interprets or elaborates on the basic rules and in essence have thesame effect as rules when applied to particular sections for which theyare intended.This arrangement is designed to give quicker access to any written languagepertaining to an Official Rule and does not require a reader torefer to different sections of the Official Baseball Rules book in consideringthe application of a particular rule.Case Book material in this edition is in shaded boxes and is labeled asComment.v