By Staff
Coaching Management, 8.7, October 2000, http://www.momentummedia.com/articles/cm/cm0807/bbbat.htm
The NCAA will become the latest governing body to require softball bats to meet performance standards if recent proposals from the NCAA Softball Rules Committee meet with approval. The committee recommended a series of rules changes during its June meeting. These rules must be approved by the championships committees in each of the NCAA’s three divisions before taking effect.
The Rules Committee recommended adopting the bat standard currently being using by the Amateur Softball Association (ASA). If the new rule is approved, all bats used in NCAA play beginning with the 2002 season would have to be approved by the ASA’s certification process.
“We were concerned about the integrity of the game and wanted performances to reflect the talent of the player, rather than the nature of the equipment being used,” says Sharon Drysdale, Head Softball Coach at Northwestern University and Chair of the Softball Rules Committee. “It was difficult to arrive at a standard. It’s also difficult and expensive to test the bats. So we decided to not reinvent the wheel, but instead, go with the ASA program that has already been established. Our rules for many years were the ASA rules, so there is a strong history there, and that certainly was a factor.”
The current bat rules, which only require that a bat be smooth and round and less than 38 ounces in weight and 34 inches in length, will still apply for the 2001 season. These bats will not be grandfathered for the 2002 season.
The 2002 season will also mark the implementation of a new ball compression standard. “We decided to set a ball-compression standard beginning in 2002 and put off any other changes in the ball until we saw what effect that had on the game,” Drysdale says. “We’re doing the same thing with the bats. We’ll see how that impacts the game, along with the compression standard, and go from there.”
The task of establishing bat performance standards was made difficult by the historical battle between offense and defense in softball. When bat standards were being developed for baseball, there was consensus that offense needed to be curtailed and returned to previous levels. Softball, meanwhile, has been trying to find the correct balance between offense and defense for years.
“We’ve done a number of things over the past few years to encourage more offense—like changing the color of the ball and the color of the seams and moving the pitcher back to 43 feet from 40,” Drysdale says. “All that has helped, as has the increase in bat technology. I don’t think we’re at the point yet where we have too many home runs or our scores are 15-13. But we couldn’t say, like baseball could, that we want the game to be like it was in 1994. So for us, it has been a little more difficult to determine what we want as a standard.”
Most of the other proposed rules changes are isolated and narrow in focus. Corrections to incorrect lineups, removal of field lines by the defense, intentional removal of a helmet, and the penalties for excessive defensive conferences are among the subjects addressed.
“I’d like to think the rule book is in pretty good shape right now,” Drysdale says. “We’re trying to not make any more changes than necessary to clarify situations that have come up or to correct errors or oversights in terms of past action. In previous years, we significantly changed the pitching rule, the look-back rule, and some other things that were more significant than the changes we made this year.”
One new area of concern for the Rules Committee is the use of electronic equipment, including cameras and computers, during games. As a result, the committee made proposals that would clarify what is and is not permitted. If approved, the new rules would allow videotaping from the dugout, but ban the use of television monitors and replay equipment during a contest. Entering statistical information into a computer would also be allowed, but accessing that information during the game would not. And any scouting information involving a current opponent obtained from outside the dugout could not be relayed to coaches, players, or team personnel during the game.
“There are tremendous costs involved in the purchase of some of this high-tech material and it could be a tremendous advantage to one team over another if it were allowed to be used in a game,” Drysdale says. “Again, we want to make sure the outcome of the game is determined by the skill of the kids and not by the financial ability of the institution to afford high-tech instruments.”
A complete list of the proposed rule changes can be found in the July 17, 2000, issue of the NCAA News through its Web site at www.ncaa.org/news/20000717/.