Unwritten Rules in LL?

Saw it many times, never had my players do it. Tends to go away as the kids get older.

I never complained. Rather, I used it as a good opportunity for the pitcher to learn to focus on his pitch. Work with your pitchers. Help them learn once they have reached the point in their pitching motion that they are committed to the pitch, to then lock their eyes on their aim point.

Texan,
As soon as I saw it. I called time and went out to the muond and told the 10 yr to "look past it and focus on the catcher". Like I said it didn't seem to affect out pitchers too much. But it just amazes what coaches are either teching these kids or allowing these kids to do. Good point though. May be better not to report it.

This behavior may seem bush but it is not illegal

I am with Texan---say nothing --use it to help your own team


Bush gets worse as the players get older---last fall we were in an event playinga consolation game and we mercies the opponent--one problem--we had one more arm to throw for scouts ---he would have been our next pitcher in if we had not mercied them-we asked the other team to bat one more time so he could throw-- we got a very terse "no freakin way" and they left. Heck we werent batting so we were not looking to score more runs--just get the arm seen

Now that is bush !!

Pat H --it is just beginning

The only thing wrong with the bat modulation is the bunter didn't bunt the ball.

Other than that, kids have being modulating the bats on bunt attempts even when I played as a youngster and I'm now a senior citizen.

Let it go and teach your players to ignore the other teams antics.

If you feel it is causing an unnecessary distraction you can bring it to the attention of the umpire and ask him to request of the opponent coach to tell his players to refrain from doing it. But you will probably open a can of worms if I know 10-12 yr/olders.
JMO

quote:

If you feel it is causing an unnecessary distraction you can bring it to the attention of the umpire and ask him to request of the opponent coach to tell his players to refrain from doing it.

Unfortunately.....there is no rule against it.....We can not ask them to stop..........

Now, does all that bat waving make it more difficult to me to judge an offer attempt?..........yes it can........

quote:

The next batter squares to bunt and starts "wiggling" the bat.

The pitcher knows the hitter is taking. He should thank the hitter for the big target in the strike zone. Just throw to the bat.

quote:

Originally posted by TRhit:
This behavior may seem bush but it is not illegal

I am with Texan---say nothing --use it to help your own team


Bush gets worse as the players get older---last fall we were in an event playinga consolation game and we mercies the opponent--one problem--we had one more arm to throw for scouts ---he would have been our next pitcher in if we had not mercied them-we asked the other team to bat one more time so he could throw-- we got a very terse "no freakin way" and they left. Heck we werent batting so we were not looking to score more runs--just get the arm seen

Now that is bush !!

Pat H --it is just beginning

TR:
Quite honestly, I dont see your situation as being bush league. A team shouldn't be expected to continue a game after regulation (mercy or otherwise) so the other team can showcase a kid. If the kid needs showcasing, the kid needs to get into the regulation game period...or let him, throw a side session for the scout.

I think it was stupid and classless of the coach opposing TR's teams.

Even being selfish, that coach could have had the opportunity for his hitters to be in front of a scout.

I would certainly honor a request from an opposing coach such as TR made.

Can be hard to predict run rules...

Pat,
On the bat wiggling. It goes away once the kids start throwing harder. A lot of pitchers get irritated when batters do this and throw it high and tight. If they are going to walk a kid anyway they might as well send a message. I have seen many kids walk after getting knocked down 3-0. The following batters don't wiggle for some reason.

Hated that 'tactic' back in the day, Pat. Texan's quite right; use it as a concentration tool.

Apparently some coaches find begging for a walk easier than teaching their players to hit.

And when I was behind the plate, all that bat waggling (he was careful to take the time to teach them to pull back, piaa; amazing what he found time for), made it 'difficult' for me to concentrate on the strike zone, which grew strangely larger.

"at this level" ? 10-12 majors?
LOL almost anything you can get away with, any imagined rule you can snow the other coach and the 13 yo "volunteered" ump with is the norm in a lot of youth baseball. I have been at allstar tourneys where coachs routinely "squeeze" runners on 3b and 2b with the 2b runner taking, shall we say, on "imaginative" path to home. All great fun, gives a lot to moan and groan about later. The old spirit of baseball is still actively practiced in a lot of rural areas. There is a reason, usually nefarious, for all of those seemingly strange rules in that little book

Edit: by the time my third son went thru a lot of this was obvious. ITs 10 and 12 year olds. They are playing. Who cares? What difference does it make 10 minutes after the last pitch? Spend the time at the "board meeting" worrying less about controlling the things that dont matter and do something truly useful, like arranging more and better fields, or figuring out a way to have it so ALL the dads in the neighborhood have easy access to a hitting cage and an L screen so the kid that cant hit and waves the bat can learn how to use the stick.

Actually, there is a rule against this tactic. Follow the link and check out rule #5.

Bat waving rule


I found a way to solve the bat waving one time. It was when I was managing my 9 yr old all-star team. We played this team that bat waved, chanted, climbed the dugout fence and screamed as the pitcher was starting to pitch. They were one of the best teams on the all-star circuit so this behavior surprised me. Well, we faced them in the championship game in one tournament and after we beat them I decided to take action.

Both teams went up into the clubhouse for the trophy presentations. The losing teams manager was called up first and he did the usual thing. He congratulated us and called up his kids to get their trophies. I went next but before I congratulated them I said, "Being a manager, I find myself talking to other managers at different tournaments. One of the things we talk about is the teams we have played and what they are like. When we talk about you guys, I hear the same thing over and over, excellent team but no class. You guys are way too good to be wasting your time with that useless stuff. Keep practicing and beat us with better baseball. You guys should want to be feared, not hated. But, that aside, I do want to congratulate everyone of you for your great tournament and solid baseball. I respect you guys a lot. You guys are loaded with talent."

I then handed out the trophies to my kids.

It was great. The coaches, players and parents all stood there with jaws dropped as I scolded them.

I didn't see the manager of that team until next years all star season. I saw him at the managers meeting of a tournament we both entered. He came right up to me and told me that his team had stopped doing all the extra stuff and thanked me for doing what I did. He said that hearing it from the manager of one of the best teams had a huge effect on everyone, including the kids. Mission accomplished.

No, not a rule. Here is how that webpage begins:

"The following items are not published anywhere, but were stated to me to be official at the Western Region Little League Umpire School:"

So it is apparently not even a written interp.

Sorry Just but I have to disagree. IMO, letting or teaching kids to do this is not teachnig them baseball. It has absolutely nothing to do with laying down a bunt and everything to do with disrupting a young pitcher trying his best to throw strikes. But as other's have stated and pointed out it did provide me with the opportunity to teach a couple of pitchers to learn from it.
I guess this could be considered the same as chanting in the middle of a wind up.

Dear Old Dad: Wow! Good for you! I'll bet not one of those kids, on either team, will EVER do silly things like what you mentioned. Kudos.

If I was pitching and I saw someone wiggling the bat like that, I would probably hit the batter (not at the head). I would then see if the next guy would want to wiggle his bat!

quote:

Originally posted by play baseball:
Dear Old Dad: Wow! Good for you! I'll bet not one of those kids, on either team, will EVER do silly things like what you mentioned. Kudos.

I agree. During the trophy presentation to 9 year olds is not the time to comment on that. That should have been said in private to the manager, not in front of everyone, especially the boys on both teams.

throw a strike and the wiggling will stop. the same thing happened when I was a kid(dont ask when) nobody complained. On a similar note when my son was playing little league I attended a game where he was up bases loaded and a 3-2 count. took one right down the middle. On the way home I mentined the situation sayng it was a pretty good pitch. He said the coach told him to take it.

I guess it's not about complaining about it, rather than making it known that coaches are either letting this happen or teaching it. Either way, there's no benefit at all to doing it. So why let it happen?

When my son was 14, we ran into a team where every player was a bunt/bat wiggler. What finally stopped it was someone in the stands (not me!) shouting that the kids did that because they couldn't hit. Amazingly, the bat wiggling stopped right after that.

Last year there was a kid on my son's team that would wiggle the bat (16U). All it took was getting a good fastball blown by him for that to stop.