passed balls leading ot earned runs..

[yanks924]

I do not understand can someone explain this to me? I am watching the yankee game and there is a guy on 1st and 3rd with 2 outs and there is a passed ball the runner scored but it is an earned run for Joba. Why? Shouldn't that be an error on the catcher and no earned run?

[yanks924]

never mind i guess it is an unearned run, sorry if you clicked on this and wasted time.

[mak1277]

Was unearned for Joba, but there was a similar situation in the Pirates game today where a run scored on a passed ball and it was earned.

In general, the key is whether or not the run would have scored if you took the passed ball (or any error, really) out of the inning. So if a guy hits a lead-off triple and then scores on a passed ball, it's going to be an earned run no matter what if the next guy hits a single.