The Common Law Origins of the Infield Fly Rule
"The Common Law Origins of the Infield Fly Rule" is the title of an article by William S. Stevens published in 1975 in the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. The brief eight-page article has vastly surpassed its modest original context, having been cited in federal and state judicial opinions and more than 100 works of legal literature. It has been included in a number of anthologies of baseball law, and prompted copycat and parody articles. The New York Times called the article "one of the most celebrated and imitated analyses in American legal history."
University of Pennsylvania Law School, Philadelphia
The New York Knickerbockers Baseball Club, ca. 1847
In a 2014 Major League Baseball game an umpire points to the sky while shouting "infield fly" to notify the New York Yankees's shortstop, Derek Jeter (L), the second baseman (R), and the other team's baserunners -- both verbally and by gesture -- that he has invoked the infield fly rule
Baseball law refers to the various civil statutes, local ordinances, and court decisions pertaining to the game of baseball and its institutions, as distinguished from the Rules of Baseball, which are a private codification of rules governing the internal workings of baseball games.
John Montgomery Ward
Kenesaw Mountain Landis
Branch Rickey