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Admin
Softball Umpires
Tom - Iceblue
Metro, Minnesota
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 Editorials |
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What Has Become of the ASA Rules Change Process?
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This is written as a complete outsider. I have only limited knowledge of how the ASA process to make changes in the playing rules works. But based on the actual output of that process for the 2007 rule changes, it seems something is amiss.
ITEM: The pulsating batters box.
The change of the slow pitch batters box from 3x7 to 4x7 was enacted. The ink was hardly dry on the first printing of the rule books before an emergency ballot was circulated. What could possibly have been the emergency here? I dont know, but it was apparently driven by strong opposition from the players. This begs the question: how did a rule such as this get all the way through the process with such strong opposition from the players? It would seem that someone is very much out of touch, at least. So, now we are back to a 3x7 batters box with a 4x7 egg on ASAs face.
ITEM: The "legalization" of dodge ball rules.
The change to remove intent from most of the interference rules that previously required intent is almost breathtaking at first reading. Now, for example, if a runner is hit with a thrown ball, intent on the part of the runner is no longer required for there to be an interference ruling. Supposedly, this was done to make the playing rules more consistent with the definition of interference in Rule 1. Well, did anyone stop to consider revising the definition instead? Here, I offer this free of charge. Add this to the end of the last sentence of the Rule 1 INTERFERENCE: , but intent sometimes is. So the rule would now read,
INTERFERENCE: The act of an offensive player or team member, umpire or spectator that impedes, hinders, or confuses a defensive player attempting to execute a play. Contact is not necessary, but intent sometimes is.
I have read the views of the NUS that this is not really a change, and that all that was intended (use of that word is ironic, dont you think?) was to not require the umpire to think he had to get inside the players head. Phooey. Somebody just got a bug up their butt about the lack of intent in the definition.
Now, instead, what we will have is a season of poor calls by umpires who now believe that ASA has become the ADA (Amateur Dodgeball Association) calling runners out because of some imagined interference. Not to mention all the discussions with coaches who will now want to argue with an umpire who makes the proper call that Ya gotta call that, Blue, intent is not required. So, this is an improvement?
What were you people drinking at the convention, anyway?
Perhaps the entire process is too susceptible to foolish hobby-horse ideas coming from people who can gather alliances or can otherwise carry the day before more rational people have a chance to mull over the proposal and weigh into the discussion with some sensible, considered, rational, in-touch-with-reality views.
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Editorial - Obstruction and Blocking Bases 3/18/05
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IMO, the biggest problem with this change is the blanket statement in the POE that says "If a defensive person is blocking the base or base path without the ball, this is impeding the progress of the runner and this is obstruction."
Well, to put it bluntly, no, it isn't.
Blocking home without the ball while the runner is advancing between 2nd and 3rd is not obstruction!
OK - extreme and silly example, but those umpires who are calling any and all blocking of the base without the ball as obstruction regardless of where the runner is, what the runner's path to the base is, and whether or not the runner deviates from that path due to the fielder, are not applying the rule correctly in my view.
Blocking the base per se is not illegal.
Blocking the base without the ball per se is not illegal.
Impeding the progress of the runner by blocking the base (or base path) without the ball is obstruction.
The major softball bodies (speaking primarily about ASA and NFHS) need to correct the ideas they are putting into umpires' heads on what constitutes obstruction. The emphasis needs to remain on impeding the progress of the runner, not on blocking the base. Blocking the base or base path is only one way the runner's progress may be impeded, and unless the runner's progress is impeded, there is no obstruction.
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Editorial on the Face Guard Rule for Youth Softball.
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Face guards on batter's helmets have been allowed in all organized softball forever (well, at least a long time). Yet, the majority of youth players, leagues, and teams did not use them.
There was a hue and cry for them to be legislated. This came from the usual busybodies who are always wanting to control other people's lives, but it also came from timid parents who did not have the capacity, it seems, to require their own child to use a face guard unless "everybody else" is also using one.
As an aside, there are a number of parents and teams that have been requiring the use of face guards for several years. Good for them, but now they have to deal with the fallout of the busybodies' and timid parents' insistence that this be required by ASA, AFA, NFHS, etc.
And that fallout is this: your existing face guards are most likely no longer legal.
And, what did you expect?
Did you really expect a large organization to require a piece of safety equipment without setting "approved" and "not approved" standards? Surely, you did not expect that the face guard made by Uncle Red Green out of old bed springs and held on with duct tape to be legal, did you? OK, an exaggeration, but still, without some indicating mark, how would a requirement such as this be stated in the rules and enforced?
To all of you who have previously purchased face guards that are now no longer legal, you have the satisfaction of knowing you protected your daughters from injury (which was the intent, wasn't it?). Now, you have to spend more money. I hope you also send a "thank you" note to your favorite busybody "activist."
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