Well, they have to move to crews of three for DE games, assuming they have enough umpires and that doesn't seem to be an issue.

Today was the first day of DE and they used 2-man crews and they are using 2-man crews tomorrow. Mark had 2 games on Monday and Tuesday, 3 games today, and 4 games tomorrow and his games tomorrow are 2-man crews.

MTD, Sr.

Umpires. Three ( 3 ) umpires per game shall be used for all games at National Championship Finals in Adult Fast Pitch, Men’s Class A Slow Pitch, Men's Class B Slow Pitch, Men’s 16" Slow Pitch, Men’s Modified Pitch and Girls’ ASA / USA 12-Under, 14-Under, 16-Under, 18-Under, and 16-Under Gold and 18-Under Gold Fast Pitch. All other National Championship Finals will utilize a minimum of two ( 2 ) umpires per game. In all divisions where there are pool play games, a minimum of two ( 2 ) umpires per game will be utilized.

This is Art. 310.R of the ASA Code. Sometimes I sort of wonder why they bother with the code :)

All I have to say is: Holy Moley - 180 teams. It took long enough this week to work through 32 teams at the 14 B Western Nat'l, and my knees still hurt plenty.

It was 185 teams in Chattanooga. Mark, Jr., umpired two games yesterday to bring his total for the week to17 games. He left from home this morning at 10:30am and got home at 10:35pm.

MTD, Sr.

You're whining...

...and you weren't there....

He is way too young to have bad knees.....:)

I do not need to be there to hear that high pitched whine!

The kid is a stud...he will be ok...:D

Steve:

The 2016 Rules Changes are here, and I thought you might get a good laugh at this new change:

Article 310 F 02 EXCEPTIONS: a. Junior Olympic Girls’ Class A Fast Pitch Only. No fill-in procedure if the tournament has 128 qualified teams. At no time will the fill-in procedure be used to exceed 128 teams.

Comments: Establishes a guideline for how many teams can be entered

MTD, Sr.

Yeah, right.

The National Council felt so strongly about it that they awarded Chattanooga the ASA/USA 14A for 2017. There's a punishment for you.

You know as well as I do that if more teams than 128 want in, someone is going to try to find away around that number. And if it means beating out the XYZ associations, I wouldn't doubt that there could be an executive decision of absolution.

OTOH, if they stick by that number, it will make it much easier to manage and would probably make for a much better experience for all those involved.