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I'm wondering what is considered a pick off attempt in softball and why you need to try to record them. Since there is no leading off until the ball is pitched the most common pick off attempt is for the catcher to throw to first or third base to try to catch a runner who is trying to get back to the base after the pitch. Is that the only pick off attempt there is? What about when the catcher throws quickly back to the pitcher and the pitcher throws to a base? Or on a sacrifice bunt and the batter is thrown out at first but there is a snap throw down to second to try to get the lead runner rounding the bag too far there? What if a ball is grounded to right field and a runner rounding third decides not to try for home but the right fielder throws it in to second who throws to third trying to get the runner coming back to third? Are these all pick off attempts too? Or do the only pick off attempts in softball just involve the catcher? If so why just the catcher?

A pickoff attempt can loosely be defined as an attempt to get a runner out when a ball has not been put into play on the pitch.

If the ball has been put into play, and there are attempted outs on the field, these would not be pickoff attempts, just attempts to get outs.

That's what I was thinking (so I've been trying to record pick off attempts in all the above situations) but was told it only applied to catchers in softball. It doesn't count as a fielding chance and it only shows for the fielder that is initiating the attempt as a Pick off attempt (why does it ask for both fielders when you record it with iscore?), so why bother recording them.

The only reason to record them in iScore would be for the pitch by pitch and iScorecasts to be a more complete picture of the game.

I record them for analysis purposes. Through trending analysis we have been able to see the number of bases taken, by lead runners, on hits to the outfield go down the more pickoff attempts we execute - helps keep runners closer to the bag. You also need to record the pickoff if the catcher or fielder commits an error that permits the runner to advance. Otherwise the error makes no sense.