Thursday March 28th, 2024
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2018 Conference Convention meeting Questions and Answers

 

Q & A session at the 2018 Conference meeting at the USSSA Convention:

Each year I take questions that Conference sponsors, manager, and players have that come up during the season and ask them at the Convention:

Q) Teams wanted to revisit using the safety bag where available?
A) Half of the room was in favor of the safety bag.  Half was not.  We decided to table the discussion until the Hall of Fame Classic Managers meeting when more teams were represented.

Q) Teams asked if there could be a rule preventing players from sliding through the bag or to the side of the bag resulting in contact, if that could be called an out?
A) Doc the UIC said that the rule will be like the Major League Baseball rule that you have to be within reach of the bag.

Q) Teams wanted to revisit giving Home team automatically to the higher seed at the Major?
A) No input was given from those in attendance except the Conference Director Strojan Kennison and Andy Purcell said that the teams earned the home team advantage and it would continue.

Q) Are all World Tournament Entry Fees paid for by the Conference fee?
A) Yes.  If you are an 'A' team for example and you want to play 'A', 'AA', and Major Worlds, those entry fees are all payed for in the Conference fee.

Q) Who makes the decisions on rainouts?  We had a situation this year where players playing in games were consulted in Cincinnati about whether to call the games on account of rain?
A) It is the Director and UIC's decision and they consult with the park owner and players.

Q) Can players drop two classification levels?
A) Yes but only with NCC (National Classification Committee) sign off.

Q) Are there any new ideas on how to stop tampering?
A) One idea to slow the amount of tampering during the season is to have the player leaving a team sit out for x number of days before being able to join another Conference team.  The recommended amount of days was 30 days.  This idea will be discussed in the offseason.

Q) Can we have at least 1-2 conference events back on the west coast?
A) They added Portland

Q) Can a rule be put in place for Conference teams to bat 12 if they want at Conference events?
A) The room was unanimous in saying they did not want this.

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