Stumble - Ems Win Northwest Championship on Balk-Off

The Class-A Short Season Eugene Emeralds won the 2018 Northwest League Championship Series on a walk-off balk against Spokane, the team's second title since 2016.

Ems won a championship on a walk-off balk.

For the crew of HP Umpire Ray Patchen, 1B Umpire Jeff Hamann, 2B Umpire Emma Charlesworth-Seiler, and 3B: A.J. Choc, it was one of the rarest plays in baseball, and a nearly unheard of way to decide the final game of a league championship series.

The Emeralds (Cubs minor league affiliate), for the record, won the series against the Spokane Indians (Cleveland's MiLB affiliate) three games-to-none after finishing the regular season in last place, 14 games under .500.

As we discovered in August when Dodgers pitcher Dylan Floro balked in Mariners baserunner Cameron Maybin for Seattle's walk-off win at Safeco Field, the balkoff—at least at the major league level—is rarer than a perfect game: 22 balk-offs vs 23 perfect games all-time.
Related Post: Walk-Off Balk - Dodgers' Floro Does Too Much at Once (8/19/18).

As for Tuesday's Indians-Ems game to decide the Northwest League crown, the analysis is a lot simpler than in the Dodgers-Mariners game.

Eugene's mascot celebrates the win.

The Play: With two out and the bases loaded in the bottom of the 9th inning, Oregon's Emeralds already having scored a run in the frame to tie the game at two, Indians pitcher Emmanuel Clase began his delivery to Emeralds batter Nelson Velazquez, but stumbled off the pitcher's plate while failing to throw a legal pitch, immediately ruled a balk by HP Umpire Patchen.

The Rule: In a similar vein to our Salt Lake Bees pitcher who fell off a mound in 2017, the relevant rule is 6.02(a)'s "It is a balk when—The pitcher, while touching his plate, makes any motion naturally associated with his pitch and fails to make such delivery." In more practical terms, it's a balk because the pitcher stumbled off the mound.
Related Post: Balk - Pitcher Blown Off Mound, OBR Adopts Hybrid Rule (5/7/17).

Wrap: Spokane Indians vs. Eugene Emeralds (Northwest League), 9/11/18 | Video as follows:

Charlesworth-Seiler 2nd Woman Hired into GCL in 2 Yrs

Minor League Baseball hired Emma Charlesworth-Seiler to umpire Gulf Coast League games, the latest woman to enter the professional officiating ranks, and first instance that two women have been hired into pro ball in back-to-back years in Minor League history.

MiLB Ump Emma Charlesworth-Seiler.
Photo: Historic Dodgertown.

Last season, MiLB hired Jen Pawol and similarly assigned her to the rookie-level Gulf Coast League. Pawol was promoted to the Short-A New York-Penn League ahead of the 2017 season.

Unlike Pawol, who was hired into pro baseball after a noteworthy college officiating career, Charlesworth-Seiler enters the Minor Leagues at just 22 years of age, with experience that includes Little League Baseball, Australian ball, scorer for the independent-league St. Paul Saints, and several MLB/MiLB programs and camps.

Charlesworth-Seiler's credentials include service as an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) in Minnesota and affiliation with the Halsey Hall (Twin Cities of Minnesota) chapter of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR), having served on the Women in Baseball Research Committee.

The complete list of women to have umpired in the Major/Minor League baseball system includes:
Bernice Gera (1972);
Christine Wren (1975-77);
Pam Postema (1977-89);
Theresa Cox Fairlady (1989-91);
Ria Cortesio (1999-2007);
Shanna Kook (2003-04);
Jen Pawol (2016-);
Emma Charlesworth-Seiler (2017-).

The Charlesworth-Seiler hire, on the heels of Pawol's MiLB foray, suggests a potential emphasis on opening baseball's umpiring door to women, which, eventually, and in what appears to be closer to fruition, will render obsolete articles like this one.

Still, there remains an ambition gap in camp and school attendance. Charlesworth-Seiler was the only woman out of 100 participants at the MiLB Umpire Training Academy in Vero Beach, Florida, which, like Pawol, she attended on a scholarship from MLB's Umpire Camps program.

Minor League Baseball's rookie-level Gulf Coast League begins its season on June 26, 2017.