Defensive huddles after warm-up pitches and half-innings

[wadeintothem]

Originally Posted by Skahtboi

There is no rule to prevent a huddle on the mound after the warm up pitches are thrown, provided that the team is still within their one minute allotted time between innings. The emphasis that you are talking about from two or so years ago, was to prevent teams from huddling outside of their dugouts between innings while teams were warming up. (It was deemed a safety issue)

I am a firm believer in teams sticking to the one minute rule, which incidentally begins with the third out of the previous half innining. However, don't be overly officious when enforcing this. If you notice that a team huddles after warm-up pitches have been thrown, then reduce the number of pitches they throw the next time by informing the catcher on the third(or even second or first) warm up pitch that it is time for balls in and the warm-ups to cease.

Exactly what I do. I'm not going to baby sit huddles, its a common thing for the players.

I will say "catcher take it down on 3" or whatever if time is used up.

This comes to the point to remember though, the game is the girls game, not our game. I'm all talk and little action here in most cases. There have been rare occasions where I have been pushed to the "Ball" point.. I'm not going to do it without good cause. Generally, a 10-15 second huddle is not it. That's where they walk the line and get away with it in terms of a punitive punishment.