When does a hard slide become a dirty slide?

From Hal McCrae and Pete Rose to Matt Holliday and Brett Lawrie, hard takeout slides have been part of baseball for decades. But today, with player health paramount and new rules aimed at protecting infielders, they're slowly being phased out of the game.

But what, exactly, makes a hard slide too hard? Ask former Gold Glove-winning shortstop Jimmy Rollins, who spoke about the topic with Ron Darling on the Unwritten podcast.

“You can slide hard, you can try to come get me, but you have to hit the dirt,” Rollins said. “No one wants to see a play where the game doesn’t mean anything and [the runner] takes someone out.”

But there are situations, he added, where infielders should expect a hard slide.

“You have to do what is necessary,” Rollins said. “If there’s a big play in the game as I’m coming into second base, my job is to disrupt the shortstop or second baseman from making a good accurate throw to the first baseman to break up the double play.”

The pair talked specifically about perhaps the most famous takeout slide of all time -- Chase Utley’s slide that broke Ruben Tejada’s leg during the 2015 National League Division Series. Rollins, who was in the Dodgers' dugout when the slide took place, broke down the play from his vantage point.

“I see Chase coming down and I'm like, this is perfect because Chase is going to bust this up,” Rollins said. “There's no way in the world they're turning this double play. But the defensive side of me said, ‘I'm stepping on the bag, knowing who's coming down and using that bag as a trampoline and getting out the way and we're just not turning the double play.’ The feed led to a point where I'm vulnerable.”

Darling, who played in the Majors during the late 1980s and early 1990s, when slides like Utley’s were much more common, said the game’s big stakes called for a hard slide -- despite its unfortunate ending.

“I thought it was late, but I didn’t think it was dirty because of the situation,” Darling said. “… Sliding is one of those parts of the game where there’s an actual rule in the book, but also unwritten rules.”

Rollins and Darling also discuss the “Utley Rule” that came about from his famous slide, and name the most intimidating players on the basepaths from their own careers. This is the third episode of Unwritten, with new episodes released every Wednesday. Listen and subscribe now on Audacy, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.