By Staff
Coaching Management, 8.7, October 2002, http://www.momentummedia.com/articles/cm/cm0807/bbrules.htm
The confusion and arguments over bat legality in high school softball should last only one more year. Following the 2001 season, grandfathered bats are being eliminated from high school play. After that, all bats must carry a permanent certification mark from the Amateur Softball Association (ASA).
In the meantime, bats without the certification mark may be used again this season, providing they have been certified by the ASA as meeting the bat performance standards. A temporary sticker can be affixed to such bats, indicating they meet the standard, but the bat will only be legal for play if the manufacturer’s name and model number are legible.
A list of approved bats is available at the ASA’s Web site . Since this list is updated each time additional bats are tested and certified, bats that were illegal when one coach printed out a copy of the list may be legal based on a later list obtained by another coach or umpire. Once a bat is on the approved list, though, it will remain, at least until the permanent certification marks are required beginning on January 1, 2002.
“It certainly has been problematic, but only because we’re in a time of transition,” says Mary Struckhoff, Assistant Director of the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS). “We’re trying to create a balance where we give a transition time with the grandfather clause, and those bats can be used without the permanent mark. But there has to be a definitive end to that, otherwise we would keep looking at a Web site to find out what bats are legal and relying on people’s memories, which we don’t want to do.”
Although the grandfathered bats will be allowed for the 2001 season, coaches should keep in mind that in the 2002 season only bats with the permanent certification mark will be allowed. “The first thing coaches should be doing is advising their athletes,” Struckhoff says. “Kids and parents sometimes buy their own bats and they aren’t necessarily as informed as a coach about what’s legal and what’s not. So coaches need to tell their student-athletes that if they’re going to purchase their own bat, they need to make sure it’s a legal piece of equipment.
“The next thing is to be diligent about making sure their inventory is legal and getting rid of those bats that aren’t legal,” Struckhoff continues. “It serves no purpose to take them out for one game and put them back in during the next game just to see if someone is checking.”
The ASA added an additional way for a bat to be legally used in its games, a rule the NFHS did not adopt. The new ASA rule allows an umpire to permit a bat to be used if, in his or her judgment, the bat was manufactured prior to 1995, and, if tested, would comply with the ASA performance standards.
“We don’t want our officials to be in a position to judge how old a bat is and if it appears to meet a testing standard,” Struckhoff says. “We think the standard is a good standard and we believe in the testing the ASA is doing.”
While the full effect of the bat performance changes may not be felt for another year, several changes to the playing rules will have an immediate impact on the game. The most notable rule change returns the appeal play to high school softball after an extended absence.
Back in the mid-1980s, the appeal play was removed from high school baseball and softball, which resulted in any runner missing a base or leaving one too soon being automatically called out. “Part of the rationale at the time was that in no other high school sport did we have officials not making a call they obviously observed,” Struckhoff says. “But nobody else went that direction in the softball world. ASA and college softball stuck with the appeal play, and actually refined it to make it easier to implement. Our rules committee came back this year and said, ‘An appeal play is a good thing for softball. It’s part of the sound tradition of the game, and we’d like to see it back.’ There was a lot of discussion and it was eventually voted back.”
Under the new rule, an appeal can be made in either a live-ball or dead-ball situation and requires little more than a player saying, “This runner missed that base.” It does not require that the ball be thrown to the base or for the pitcher to be on, or off, the rubber.
Another change addresses the awarding of bases following an obstruction call. The new rule awards the runner with the base she would have achieved had the obstruction not occurred. The previous rule called for the runner to receive an additional base, which created enforcement issues. For example, a runner rounding first after a hit and obviously returning to first, would, under the old rule, be entitled to second if the first baseman obstructed her return to first. The case book had instructed umpires to ignore that type of obstruction, and the rule was changed this year to remove any ambiguity.
In addition, if an obstructed runner is subsequently tagged out, the ball will be called dead and the award for obstruction given. This eliminates situations where the obstructed runner would be tagged out and the defense would go on to record another out.
While most rule changes are traditionally designed to protect student-athletes, one of this year’s changes is intended to protect coaches and umpires. Players are no longer allowed to throw or hit balls in live ball territory, either fair or foul, during the pregame conference. Players are allowed out of the dugout to stretch or run, however.
A full list of rule changes and major editorial revisions are available at the NFHS Web site www.nfhs.org/rules-softball.htm.
For a history of the parallel debate over baseball bat standards, go to www.athleticsearch.com and enter "bat standards" into the "articles" search engine.