In what has become something of an annual tradition, I present the latest update of a tournament rules cheat sheet I've been maintaining, updated for 2005 Little League tournament play. The chart is in Acrobat PDF format; to download it, rightclick on the link below and choose "Save Target As..."

<a href="http://www.pureneve.com/2005LLTournamentRulesChart.pdf">2005 Little League Tournament Rules Chart</a>

Please feel free to distribute the file to anyone who may have a use for it.

Dave Hensley

P.S. My apologies to those forum participants who loathe anything related to Little League.

Now that explains everything. :rolleyes:

Peace

From the article: "No elgible subs - Opposing manager selects player to substitute."

I don't get it. Does LL allow playing with 8? I guess they must. So if a runner gets hurt, the opposing manager can select the slowest player to come in and run for him?

You have 9 players on the field and 2 players on the bench that are ineligible for some reason (they've already been in, their sub hasn't met minimum play reqs, whatever). One of your players on the field gets hurt and leaves you with only 8 eligible players on the field and the two guys on the bench.

Little League rules allow you to re-enter one of your ineligible subs, but the opposing manager gets to decide which one gets to re-enter.

Dave, that's a great chart. I stepped into the vacant UIC position for my kids little league earlier this year, and I'll be handing this to all my umps.

Another rule you may want to call out because it's significantly different than the regular season rule is maximum pitchers per game. In the regular season you can only use 5 pitchers (or a 6th if your 5th gets hurt). In tournament play there is no maximum number of pitchers.

One thing that drives me nuts about LL is the fact that they have a whole separate set of rules and elegibility requirements for tournaments. This is yet more evidence that the entire LL experience is designed around the tournament season. I'd rather see one set of rules used all year, tweaking only things that must be changed to account for the tightly compressed schedules of most tournaments.

Hey, Peace Boy, kiss my ***.

I'll be happy to compare baseball resumes with you anytime.

Here is the big difference with you and me. You care about what your baseball resume looks like. I umpire baseball to get ready for the fall and spring. Compare away if you like.

As I said before, this thread explains everything I need to know. Thank you for the clarification. ;)

Someone told me recently, "If you have to tell everyone your resume, you really have not accomplished much of anything."

Peace

[QUOTE]Originally posted by JRutledge

Quote:

Someone told me recently, "If you have to tell everyone your resume, you really have not accomplished much of anything." Peace

The irony is rich when you say something like that, in a post with a sig that essentially contains your resume.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Dave Hensley

Quote:

Originally posted by JRutledge Quote: Someone told me recently, "If you have to tell everyone your resume, you really have not accomplished much of anything." Peace The irony is rich when you say something like that, in a post with a sig that essentially contains your resume.

My signature gives websites to organizations that I play apart of. That is not my resume. My resume would include playoff assignments, years of experience, levels I work and conferences. When I attend camps, they do not care that I sit on a committee. They do care if I have worked certain levels. My signature tells very little about my officiating and umpiring background. As I said before, if you want to compare baseball resumes, go right ahead. Just remember you are the one posting LL rules differences. :eek:

Peace

[QUOTE]Originally posted by JRutledge

Quote:

blah blah blah

Like I said originally, kiss my ***.

I'm done with you.

If you cannot take the heat.......
 

You know the rest.

Peace

Anyone who would take the time to rip Dave for putting together a useful chart is the one with a problem.

There are a lot of good HS and college umpires who work the LL Tournaments. This chart is helpful to me and the umpires I will be working with this year.

--Rich

I was not ripping Dave because he is a LL Umpire.
 

If you are so confident in working LL, then why are all you guys spending so much time trying to justify it?

Of course HS and college umpires are going to work games when their season is over or when they do not have a HS or college game. Just like I do not work hardly any summer baseball, it is a personal choice.

Peace

Jeff:

There is a world of difference between little league umpires and umpires who work little league.


GB

Oh Boy,
 

Here comes Rut again . . .

I do here by declare that the statement above is the smartest...correction, only smart thing, that Rut has posted over the years of his long, wind bagged, "I don't care" mumbo jumbo.

Congrats. Is this nirvana?

:D

I admit, I only opened this thread to see what in the He11 Tee was doing posting on a thread about LL Tourney Rules. Decoy'd here by Rut, he was.

Yes, I know: you [Rut] don't care, your BB season is over, you have nothing to prove, it doesn't mean anything, you post only so people can contact the many organizations you are affiliated with ................. WAYYY too much time on your hands.

Hey, Dave: thanks for the crib sheet.

I guarantee you know a lot more about me than I will ever want to know about you. And it proves it by this attempt to try to quote me. Before your little rant on the NF Board, I did not even know you existed. Then again I guess we all need a hobby. ;)

Peace

<i> Originally posted by Dave Hensley </i>

<b> In what has become something of an annual tradition, I present the latest update of a tournament rules cheat sheet I've been maintaining, updated for 2005 Little League tournament play. The chart is in Acrobat PDF format; to download it, rightclick on the link below and choose "Save Target As..."

<a href="http://www.pureneve.com/2005LLTournamentRulesChart.pdf">2005 Little League Tournament Rules Chart</a>

Please feel free to distribute the file to anyone who may have a use for it.
Dave Hensley </b>

Dave as usual Thanks.

My Commentary:

The aforementioned is a very good tool for those of us who are just finishing up the HS or Collegaite season and worked mostly FED / NCAA ball during the months of March thru the end of May.

I do not umpire the regular season LL games as I once did, but one of my mentors is still heavily involved in the LL Program and asks me to help out during tournament time.

I do not keep-up with the LL rules as I once did, so for anyone who gives some of their time to help out with the tournament, Dave's Chart comes in mighty handy.

To this day whatever one says or feels about LL, there are plenty of GLM or GLW (Good looking Women) which makes the tournamnet all worth while.


Pete Booth

What is the difference?

If you are worried about what someone thinks of you because you work a baseball game, you have too much time on your hands. I have worked little league for years and then I stopped. The games stopped being about the kids and became about the parents and what they wanted their kids to do. If someone wants to subject themselves to that kind of drama be my quest. I am surely not going to get in their way.

Night and day.

What the heck is that suppose to mean? Night and day how?

IMO, "Little League Umpires" are into the political power trip. They only work LL, they are active on the board, they don't attend clinics, but they show up on the field and aggressively take control of the dugouts, stands and ballfield...unfortunately in that order. They are in charge of that piece (the game) of the organization for two hours a pop, and per LL rule book, even the president is under his control (somewhat). Power trip. Then they trade "war stories" with the coaches in the parking lot after the game.

Umpires who work LL don't care about the politics of the league. They work the game to the best of their ability, and leave. They don't go shaking coaches hands after the game, and they don't hang out next to the dugout or stands chit chatting. They don't go into the dugout looking for trouble. They don't worry about what is going on on the next field. I had a guy I was working with leave my field, run over to the stands of the next field, and yell at the coach and catcher, that catcher had to have mask on to take infield. Yes that is a rule, but geez, OOO on a power trip to do what this guy did. That, in a nutshell, is the difference.

I must do not know any LL umpires. I have never known of an umpire that was involved in the board. I did work with a couple of the assignors that worked a lot more baseball than LL and assigned other leagues or types of baseball. If that is the definition I have never met a so-called LL umpire.

PS2,
You are lucky, and by your posts I didn't take you to be a "LL Umpire". Trust me, they exist, especially when you have a politically strong district with a large volunteer umpire crew. "LL umpires" aren't the majority, but the few of them that exist are so over the top, yet basically clueless, that they give the whole group a bad reputation by association.

Garth, I believe this is the point you were making.

I was not taking offense to what you said. I was just asking what you meant by that term. I just consider myself an umpire. I do not classify myself to a specific league or level. I work what I am asked to do and what I am available to work. I guess I do not concern myself with the labels.

Me too. Other than I don't have the desire to go above HS, because for me it becomes a job at that point.

Ah BUT,
 

See my upcoming article on the paid portion of this site.

"Working with Smitty, the Little League guy wearing his ball bags on the bases."

Heheheheeeeee...
 

"Film at 11"

Re: Ah BUT,
 

Tim,

I have seen guys working high school varsity game wearing a ball bag on the bases. This is not something that is special to Little League.

Well,
 

Just read my article and feel free to write an op/ed piece in return.

BTW, I have NEVER WORKED with a high school umpire wearing a ball bag on the bases. You must work in an area with highly trained umpires.

Re: Well,
 

I had a partner just this year that used a ball bag on the bases. I worked with this guy twice. The second time I worked with him he wore his shin protectors on the outside of his pants. According to him he had heart surgery and his legs were swollen from the surgery and having some veins being taken from his leg (bypass surgery I think). The guy was a really nice guy, but that he gets games from this particular assignor.

It is not about training, it is about what is required to work a simple game. Now a guy like this might get a game, but he might not get respect from coaches and he will likely not work any playoff games. The reality is there are not many umpires for the amount of games that are out there. Guys work games they probably would not be "qualified" for in other areas. Baseball is not a major sport where I live, so you see many guys doing things that would standout in other sports.

Peace

Re: Re: Ah BUT,
 

See- prior discussion re: difference between umpires working LL games and "LL Umpires".
Similar difference between "Varsity Umpires" and umpires working varsity games.
Sometimes "LL Umpires" are to be found working in Varsity games. Where I work, it is not at all uncommon [once HS season is over] to see Varsity umpires working LL games.

Jeff,
 

I would have the balls to tell the guy "no ball bag or no game."

OF course that is the way it works around here.

Re: Well,
 

A few days ago, I witnessed an egregious misapplication of a rule (batter interference) in a varsity high school playoff game being umpired by the biggest of big dogs in both our local high school and college associations.

A couple of weeks ago, there were reports all over the Internet boards of an NCAA-D1 crew butchering a rule (can't remember specifically, though it might have been batter interference again) in a nationally televised game.

Recently, a fellow umpire on my private list described witnessing a MLB umpire signalling a full count by banging his closed fists together.

A little while ago, Rut's favorite Little League umpire posted a balk interpretation from an authoritative source that fully supported the LL umpire's position on the play in question, and repudiated the "no balk" position that had been taken by a number of this forum's regulars, most of whom are, presumably, umpires at levels more advanced than Little League.

Stereotyping is the crutch of the lazy man, who wants an explanation for the way things are but isn't willing or able to do the hard work required to discover the truth. And the truth is rarely, if ever, as neat and tidy as the stereotypes would have you believe.

Re: Jeff,
 

I am glad you feel the need to tell grown *** adults what to do. I on the other hand would tell you to go screw yourself if you tried to tell me what to wear or not wear. There are procedures in place if an official does not wear the proper uniform. Saying something to a long time veteran who knows it all is not going to change what he wears on the field. His credibility is in the tank, not mine.

Peace

<B>Stereotyping is the crutch of the lazy man, who wants an explanation for the way things are but isn't willing or able to do the hard work required to discover the truth. And the truth is rarely, if ever, as neat and tidy as the stereotypes would have you believe.
</b>

Again, I don't believe one can write off comments simply by calling them sterotypes. We all have different experiences. Your and Fronheisers are vastly different from mine. You have seen good umpires work LL games. I have only seen Little League umpires who were wearing their gear on the outside of their jeans and tee-shirts, couldn't stay set calls, flinched on every pitch, stopped after making calls and whipped rule books out of their pockets to check their calls, divided the diamond at second base for all calls, ruled tags on dropped balls because "he had the ball when the initial tag was applied", ruled foul-tips as foul balls, said infield flys meant the ball had to be treated as if caught when it wasn't, and much more similar behavior.

These aren't sterotypes. These are people I see. They are very real. They not only represent LL umpires where I live, they ARE the LL umpires where I live.

I understand that there are some good umpires who work little league. Like I said, they are different than little league umpires. And while I am not surprised that you see ML umpires and D-1 umpires and Varsity umpires make mistakes, I doubt that they are the majority of umpires working those levels. The LL umpires I reference are not only the majority of those working LL here, they are the only LL umpires here.

Sterotype? Nope. The real McCoys.

Thanks Dave!
 

Got invite to call the IMA-European Junior Boys Baseball Championships in Aviano, Italy. They use LL Tournament Rules. I will make sure the other officials get a copy of this.

What purpose does it serve for any of us here to argue about LL umpiring? I'm willing to bet that everyone here at one time in their lives umpired at that level when they first suited up. One does not join the army and start off as a general, so I'm guessing that people here started off in LL somehow. Even many of our MLB brothers were at one time LL umpires. I know my friends up there were.

I for one do not look down on LL umpires, for I realized that I was there once before. I go out of my way to help umpires at that level, even if I don't know them, simply because I like to think that my abilities and experience can in some way help them improve. I learned from many good umpires in my life, from MLB and minor league guys at school, to veteran amateurs, and it's paid off. I love to do the same for current LL and similar lower-level umpires. I believe that DH's posting of the tourney rules is in someway similar.

I personally feel there is no place in umpiring for any of us higher-level umpires to ever be condescending to those who either work lower levels or who are involved in lower levels in other capacities.

Just my heartfelt but humble 2 cents.

[Edited by UMP25 on Jun 6th, 2005 at 04:09 PM]

Re: Re: Well,
 

Has he ever heard of McDavid or Under Armour ankle-length undergarments that would do the job just as well? I have hairy legs, and this is but one reason I wear those when I strap on my shin guards.