What is a Passed Ball? Definition and Examples
A passed ball is a pitch that the catcher should have caught or controlled with ordinary effort but fails to, allowing a baserunner to advance — charged to the catcher, not the pitcher.
What is a Passed Ball?
A passed ball is a charged miscue against the catcher: a legally pitched ball that the catcher fails to hold or control when, in the official scorer's judgment, ordinary effort would have stopped it — and as a result, a baserunner advances or the batter reaches base. The key distinction is fault. A passed ball is the catcher's mistake. Its close cousin, the wild pitch, is the pitcher's mistake. Both let runners advance on a ball that gets away from the catcher; the difference is who the official scorer blames.
How a Passed Ball is Scored
A passed ball is not an official error and does not appear in a team's error column, but it is tracked as its own statistic (PB) charged to the catcher. The scoring rules require two things to be true:
- A runner advances (or the batter-runner reaches base on an uncaught third strike) as a direct result.
- The catcher could have caught or controlled the pitch with ordinary effort.
If no runner advances, no passed ball is charged even if the catcher whiffs on the pitch. The "ordinary effort" test is the crux: a pitch in the dirt that handcuffs the catcher is usually a wild pitch, while a routine waist-high pitch that clanks off the mitt is a passed ball. Because it is a judgment call, the official scorer decides, and the same uncaught pitch can be ruled either way depending on location and difficulty.
Worked Example
Suppose there is a runner on second base with one out. The pitcher delivers a clean fastball over the plate, the catcher drops it, and the runner advances to third. That is a passed ball charged to the catcher. Now change the pitch to a curveball that bounces a foot in front of the plate and skips to the backstop — that is a wild pitch charged to the pitcher, even if the catcher had a chance. Catchers who block well, such as elite defenders praised for low passed-ball totals, often allow only 3-6 passed balls across a full season catching 1,000-plus innings, while a struggling defender behind a knuckleballer can rack up double digits.
Why a Passed Ball Matters
Passed balls feed directly into catcher defensive evaluation alongside blocking metrics and pop time. A catcher who limits passed balls and wild pitches saves bases — and bases prevent runs. Front offices weigh blocking ability when valuing defense-first catchers, especially those paired with pitchers who throw heavy sinkers, splitters, or knuckleballs in the dirt. For fantasy and real evaluation, low passed-ball rates correlate with the receiving skills that also drive catcher framing value.
Limitations and Common Misconceptions
The most common confusion is passed ball versus wild pitch — they are mutually exclusive on a given play, and the scorer assigns fault to exactly one party. A passed ball is also not a fielding error and never counts against fielding percentage. It says nothing about pitch quality; a nasty breaking ball that fools the catcher is far likelier to be ruled a wild pitch. And because it depends on a runner actually advancing, it undercounts pure receiving failures — a dropped pitch with the bases empty leaves no statistical trace.
Related Terms
- What is a wild pitch?
- What is catcher framing?
- What is pop time?
- What is fielding percentage?
- What is a fielder's choice?
In Legends Deck: catcher cards carry a "blocking" rating derived from passed-ball and wild-pitch suppression. A high-blocking catcher reduces simulated runner advancement on balls in the dirt, quietly saving bases for your defense across a season of simulated games.