Earlier this year, MLB‘s competition committee overwhelmingly approved two revisions to the on-field rules that will take effect this season.

The first is a change to the shift regulations that were put in place before the 2023 season. According to those regulations, before a pitch is thrown, the defensive team must have no more than two infielders on either side of second base. Every infielder must also remain in the infield; this means they cannot shift into the short outfield.

In the past, the batting team could accept the outcome of the play or have the hitter given an automatic ball if an infielder was caught breaking the rule, such as when a shortstop was on the second base side of the bag, putting three infielders on the right side of the bag before the pitch was delivered.

The new regulations allow the batting team to accept the outcome of the play or, in the event that a player violates the rules and was the first to touch the ball in play, to award the batter a free base, which allows any other runners to advance one base.

In this case, no at-bat would be recorded for the hitter and the offending player would be charged with an error.

The uncommon practice of running through a base other than first base on a force play is the subject of the second rule modification. For instance, if a ball is hit on the ground and there are runners on first and third with two outs, the runner heading to second base can decide to dash through the bag instead of sliding in the hopes of reaching the bag sooner and beating the throw.

A rundown would probably catch that runner and tag him out if he beat the throw and overran the bag. But before the third out was recorded, it would allow the runner from third to score on the play.

In the past, the umpires would have to disregard the fact that the runner overran the base and put him on second if he was called out at second in this situation and a replay official later determined that he had actually beat the throw before going over the bag.

Even if the trail runner beats the throw, the rule change allows umpires to call him out for abandoning second base. As soon as both feet touch the other side of the base, he is said to have abandoned the bag.

If that is the case, the runner at third will score or not based on whether he reached home plate before to or following the second runner’s decision to abandon second base.