Thoughts of officals on the A11 offense.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by Bob M.

So I have absolutely NO idea to what extent states can adopt their own playing rules.

It's really simple -- it depends on whether they want to stay members of the Federation in that sport.

The Federation works for specific sports by democratic centralism. There are official channels that funnel feedback upward to where the decisions are made, and then those decisions are binding downward to the participants. You're allowed to play by Fed rules without being a member of Fed or being a member of a state high school ***'n, or even being of HS age or being in North America, and you're allowed to modify them to your heart's content. A state HS ***'n to be affiliated with Fed in a particular sport has to sanction its own members' games only if played strictly by the current Fed rules.

It works the same way within states. When I was in school, the NYSHSAA played Fed rules for football, but my school wasn't a member of the state ***'n, and we didn't play by Fed football rules. We sometimes played schools that were in the state ***'n for football, and I guess the rules for that game were a matter of advance negotiation. Maybe now some state ***'ns are a closed loop that forbid out-of-***'n play.

Robert