Anyone got a decoder ring????
 

OK - first year fella here.... A basketball convertee, I have some questions:

1. Why all the different governing bodies for Softball? ASA, NSA, NFHS, ISA, NCAA blah blah blah....... all with different variations on the rules as I understand it - just to make things a little easier for the newbies. Can't we just have one or two?
2. What exactly is an ASA national? I've been looking around some websites and they said they have some national events. I thought that was big time, but found other sites with the same claims. Maybe I'm confused.
3. Is ASA bigger than NFHS? In Alabama I'm doing NFHS right now but I've been asked to do NSA for the local park and my HS UIC wants me to do ASA ball this Summer (so many abbreviations, it must be military related somehow). I believe ASA to be better, bigger tournaments but weekends only. The NSA can be during the week. Is this accurate?

Any help would be great......

And one other thing........

Why so many different shirts and pants??? In basketball we got black pants, striped shirt. Softball has Navy, Powder blue with blue colar, Powder blue with black colar, Red (??!!?!), Black, White and Cream from what I gather. Pants are Heather grey, Charcoal grey or Navy. Now with the different associations as mentioned in #2 above and their own patches that have to be sewn or are embroidered on them already from the manufacturer, I gotta have a closet full of clothes to call a flippin game!

AAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

NFHS is its own animal - That is high school ball. Completely separate of everything else.

ASA is the premiere Org for Junior Olympic Fast Pitch and just about all Amateur Softball.

Followed by NSA UTrip and the other alphabet soup orgs.

Each of these orgs are are individual and independent sanctioning body for Softball. This results in the uniform and rules variations. Each have their own championships and various things.

Youre going to have to decide for yourself what works best for you in terms of what you are looking for and of course, the money vs investment.

Nationals, especially ASA, you can learn about once you are working in it from UICs etc. Essentially every Late Jul/Aug are the ASA championships in many categories/age groups/regions. In addition to teams qualifying and making it, many umpires work to make it to these. So its not automatic (in ASA) there are criteria.

I'm not familiar with how NSA and them do it.

As far as the "alphabet soup" goes, some of these organizations sprung up and spun off from other organizations. For example, my understanding of the origins of USSSA was that it was a group from ASA that decided they wanted to do things their way. I suspect other organizations may have started that way as well.

Each ruling organization strives to be different enough to draw the masses to their program. They want to be different from all the rest, and the umpires reflect that in their mechanics and uniforms.

But yeah, having called USSSA for 2 years, I don't know what that whole red shirt is about. Maybe someone high up in USSSA is a Star Trek fan with a sense of humor.

The one thing about ASA, s that generally speaking, ASA will be the first to introduce new rules/mechanics into the game, with most of the other groups following along after two or three years. A perfect example of this is the Courtesy Runner rule, which they introced for JO play about five years ago, and now is pretty well all through the game. Of course, this year ASA upped the ante by putting it in for all levels of FP....

One thing about ASA that does separate them from the pack, is that they pretty much set the standards for the equipment for the whole sport.

Lucky us here in NY, our state does NOT belong to the NFHS, so in softball, we pretty much follow ASA JO rules - which makes things a heckuva lot easier for us! OUR biggest thing here is mechanics - lucky us, the NYS Rules/Mechanics interpreter is Jay Miner, who always has an...'interesting'....take on softball mechanics!

Still, I belong to:

ASA
PONY (ANOTHER group) - tournaments.
CHVBGSO/NYSSO - first is my local hs group and nyssso is the NYS hs group

with each having different uniforms!

plus I know umps who are NCAA umps, and also do local JC and college games - each with different uni specs!

I made a list of my sanctions and associations just for fun and came up with this:
Current: NFHS, NCAA, PONY, USSSA, ASA, MPSSAA, DIAA (aka DSSAA), DSUA, UUA, SUM, SUD, HARSOA, NASO
Past: DSOA, DSRA, USSF, IAABO, BBOA, NNLL
Almost: NSA (clinic - no games accepted)

Think of it this way. Why is there a Walmart, Sears, JC Penney, Kohls, Strawbridges, Macys, K Mart, Target, Sam's Club, BJs, etc. ?

Why can there not be just one store?

You forgot AFA

IFA, & NAFA also.

Our Association is doing some IFA tourneys for a Local Tourney host so I guess I will be adding IFA to my soup.

derwil, what you're finding is that the culture of softball (and also baseball) is quite different from that of basketball. This culture plays a large part in what makes the diamond sports unique.

If you think the uniform variations are bad in softball, be thankful you don't work baseball or even soccer. ;)

Also, for what it's worth, NY is a member of the NFHS but apparently, not in softball. Similar to TX and MA in football.

Wade, what level of ball is IFA? In this area, it seems youth fastpitch is soley ASA. I don't think we even have adult fastpitch anywhere local.

Isf
 

To make thing worse:
Olympic softball and all world and continental championships are run by the ISF.
In Europe we have ESF for the continent and each and every country has it's own national federation. Mostly, and regretted by the ISF, together with baseball. In France the national federation handles baseball, softball and .....
cricket!

For rule-sets; ESF uese ISF-rules. ISF-rule set is almost a copy of ASA...

I work volleyball in the fall, and NYS volleyball follows NCAA rules, not NFHS...
our softball group is meeting tonight, and I will ask the football/soccer/baseball guys if they use NFHS...I think baseball and football do, but I think soccer uses NCAA....

Working slow-pitch, I only have ASA and USSSA in my alphabet soup (thank goodness!). Each city in the metro Omaha area uses either ASA or USSSA so that's what I stick with. USSSA does have options other than the red shirt, but most use the red shirt.

Interesting. I do know football and baseball use NFHS rules (as does basketball I believe). I'm too lazy to look it up, but I would imagine NY has a seat on the NFHS rules committee for each of those sports.