What, a Tee in Minors?

[brandda]

Your league is set up a little different than ours if you are lumping everyone 7 and above into the same division. In our league, we have the following divisions:

5-6 T-Ball
7-8 Machine Pitch
9-10 Minors
11-12 Varsity and Majors
13-14 Junior
15-17 Senior

By the time they are nine, there should be a few who can find enough of the plate that you can have a real game. You might want to consider breaking your groups up a little more.

Also, myself and most other umpires I know who drop down to call minors' games expand their strike zone dramatically. In my case, it is high chest to low knees (or sometimes just not in the dirt) and a full ball off the plate. That seems to help a lot also. At that level, parents are still pretty low key and as long as you keep it huge the whole game, no one seems to mind.