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The hidden ball trick is one of the oldest tricks in the baseball book. There's often no shortage of trickery in baseball, from stealing signs, to intricate playcalls and so much more. The hidden ball trick is one that so many have tried to pull off, but very few have been successful at.
The trick involves a pick-off attempt, which makes it pretty rare in today's MLB with the step-off rules and the pitch clock. When the ball goes over to the baseman, they pretend to throw the ball back to the pitcher and go about their business.
That's sort of what happened in a high school baseball game, and it ended the game for good measure.
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Most base runners and base coaches are focused enough to see through it and not step off the base without calling time, but every once in a while, someone gets fooled.
There are variations of it, but it always involves hiding the ball and pretending to throw it. This one worked wonders.
How did the hidden ball trick work in high school baseball game?
The tying run was on base, and the pitcher whirled to second and pretended to launch a pick-off attempt. The ball, according to the actions of every fielder involved in the play, screamed out to center field.
The runner got up after diving back to second, scanned briefly and took off for third. The whole time he was processing what had happened. The pitcher crept up on him and tagged him with the ball in his glove, proving that he'd hidden it and that it never went to the outfield.
Everyone, including the announcers, was fooled by it, and only knew what had happened once the pitcher pulled the ball out of his glove in celebration of the tense victory they'd just achieved with one of the most difficult plays to pull off in all of sports.
Trick plays rarely succeed in any sport, and especially baseball, where most things are by the book, and there's hardly room for trickery, but this high school team perfected it.
