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Real name:
Dave Dowell
Location:
Sacramento, CA
Division:
Men's 70
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| May 17, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Strike zone mat I've seen/heard about plywood and fiberglass strike mats. Both are reputed to be durable and will make an obvious audible sound when the ball hits it, aiding in ball/strike calls. Hope this helps. |
| May 17, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Team Ratings The TOC is NOT an event that results in an automatic rating bump for the Champion ... Only the SSUSA World Championships in Las Vegas during September/October has that immediate rating effect for Champions ... |
| May 16, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Answers about Bat Testing Hey JohnO28 ... Call the office at (916) 326.5303 on Monday (05/20) and ask for Terry ... As the C.E.O. of our association, he was an active participant in the technical sessions in Indianapolis last month and he can walk you through it all ... He won't be in tomorrow (Friday) because he's traveling to Raleigh for a Hall of Fame induction on Saturday, but he'll be back for the day on Monday before he heads off to Reno through June 3rd ... The "verbosity index" on your inquiries is higher than what makes sense to try to detail here ... Thanks! |
| May 16, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: field assignments for reno or carson city????? Yep, it's "just you" ... We made an announcement in late April that the ONLY division playing at Centennial Park in Carson City this year is the MEN'S 55-AAA ... ALL other Divisions will play in Reno/Sparks at the Reno Softball Complex at Rancho San Rafael, Shadow Mountain Softball Complex and/or Golden Eagle Regional Park ... That thread went away because there were multiple comments by a poster that were an inappropriate expression of his dissatisfaction with that field assignment ... Hope that helps ... Good luck! |
| May 15, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Rock n Reno Field Assignments Smiles123 ... Someone is telling you tall tales! ... A couple of weeks ago we announced that everyone would be playing in Reno/Sparks facilities (Golden Eagle, Reno Softball Complex at Rancho San Rafael and/or Shadow Mountain) EXCEPT the Men's 55-AAA, who will play this year at Centennial Park in Carson City ... Schedule release will be in plenty of time for all sessions and teams ... Good luck! |
| May 15, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Raleigh weather update for WED Pitcher8 ... SSUSA does NOT cancel a tournament based on a forecast ... All "Play/No-play" decisions are made at the fields of play at game time ... You will hear, and be fully informed, as any decisions are made ... Relevant Example: In the 2022 Atlantic Coast Championships in Raleigh, a storm forecast contributed to an event withdrawal panic the week of the tournament ... Twelve teams withdrew in the last three days before a tournament that lost exactly ZERO games to weather ... The only downside we noticed for the teams is that all of them forfeited their $555 entry fee ... Let's try to avoid that happening here ... Travel safely and good luck! |
| May 12, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Baseball Fields wbaum ... Here's the temporary fencing formula for each diamond: It's 2*Pi*R/4 feet of fencing, where R = outfield fence distance from home plate ... For a 300' field, that would be a shade over 471' of fencing per field for just the foul-line-to-foul-line arc ... Additional fencing would be needed if you would like to extend that arc to the edge of the live ball area in foul territory outside the foul lines ... In Kansas City, they had enough fencing for 225' fences (just over 353' per field required, excluding foul territory coverage), but not for 300' distances ... A very real further complicating factor is present in artificial turf parks in that they generally (maybe without exception?) prohibit puncturing the playing surface to drive stakes into the ground to secure any such fencing ... That makes it unlikely SSUSA will be acquiring and shipping nearly 2,000' of temporary fencing for a four-field complex ... As rarely as the once or twice annually we encounter this circumstance, maybe your suggestion to take a week off when it happens is a sound one for those strongly opposed ... Thanks for commenting and good luck! |
| May 2, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Texas State Championship Session 2 The currently published schedule is the plan for Session #2 ... We have drafted a potential contingency plan in the event that a troublesome field (#4) from Wednesday remains unplayable beyond today ... Please note that we do not cancel based on a forecast ... All "Play/No-play" decisions are made by the on-site Directors at the fields of play at game time ... They will be your best source of timely and accurate information, much more so than calls to the SSUSA Home Office in Sacramento ... We will also post relevant information here as available ... All teams should be at the park, ready to play, 30 minutes before your scheduled game time (Rulebook §5.1 B.) ... Good luck everyone! |
| April 30, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Baseball Fields TxLeaguer ... As the SSUSA's National Schedule Consultant, I'm happy to address your initial post here because I am the person who planned and wrote the schedule ... While you my not like the end result here, this year's Texas State Championships schedule was carefully considered and logically constructed on a sound foundation ... • There were 43 teams in the initial schedule (before one team withdrew) playing 137 games in Session #2 ... That represents maximum scheduling at slightly over seven teams per playing field ... Six teams is the ideal ratio ... • There were NO open game slots in any of the three days, and in fact, we were "over" by the four Sunday evening 5:00 PM "If" games ... When a team withdrew earlier this week, it opened up one end-of-day game slot on Friday (@ 5:00 PM), one on Saturday (@ 8:00 PM) and one more on Sunday evening (@ 5:00 PM) ... • Of the six fields we are using at the Oak Grove Complex, FIVE of them are configured with 300' concentric fence distances ... The ONE field that is not (Field "H") is 320' down the lines and 375' to straight CF ... One non-standard playing field does not represent a compelling enough reason to seek out another (hopefully) nearby playing complex OR limiting the number of teams who wished to participate ... • We intentionally structured the schedule so that every division (except one) plays only one day on the "H and I" fields, and plays the other two days in the main quad on Fields #1-4 ... The three-team 50-AA plays all three days in the quad ... There is no more fair way to lay this out ... We've done it like this for several years and, more important, I envision it will be the same in the future if I'm still the schedule architect for this event ... • If you are interested in advocating for change in this scheduling philosophy, we consider rules and policy changes only once per year, at the National Rules Committee meetings during our annual convention in late November/early December ... While we respect your opinions, we respectfully and completely disagree with your last sentence ... Good luck this weekend ... |
| April 26, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box The email addresses used to get initial posting privileges here are not accessible to anyone other than the independent webmaster (Scott Flodin) ... Many of them are "throwaway" addresses according to Scott ... If you don't put your name in your own visible profile, your username is categorized as anonymous ... We have no official indication who you might be, nor is it a matter of concern in the Free Speech context ... Identifiable email or snail-mail correspondence or personal appearance are the acceptable ways to communicate with the National Rules Committee in an effort to get on the Official Agenda ... Message Board posts are specifically excluded ... We'd love to hear from you through the appropriate channels ... |
| April 26, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box 3_SF ... Well, you've got about seven months or so until the next Rules Committee Sessions to put together something for our consideration or for you to plan to appear ... As we mentioned above, anonymous posts like these on an open Message Board isn't the methodology that's going to result in getting on the Official Agenda or result in any change ... Good luck! |
| April 26, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box The National Rules Committee meets for several days at the ISA/SSUSA joint Annual Convention ... It's generally the week after Thanksgiving and alternates between the East Coast (odd years) and the Western U.S. (even years) ... This year is a "Western" year, and nothing official yet, but it may be in Tucson ... There's a CONVENTION link on the MENU BAR of all website pages ... It hasn't been updated yet for 2024, but last year's agenda is there, and it doesn't change much from year to year ... |
| April 25, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Los Altos Softball Complex Five new softball fields were completed in Los Altos Park in Albuquerque less than a year ago ... All fields are at 300' concentric fence distances on a dirt and grass playing surface ... If you're not happy playing on these fields, it's highly unlikely you'll be happy playing anywhere ... Good luck and no worries! |
| April 24, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box titanhd ... I can't speak with certainty to ..all other associations as well..", but I can state that we borrowed this one directly from the USSSA rule: For the sake of consistency across all venues where SSUSA plays, the committee adopted, generally, the USSSA Rule 1, section 5, as follows: “..The batter must take an initial position with his back foot no further forward than a line defining the front edge of home plate. The batter will be called out if he hits the ball when the back foot is completely further forward than the line defining the front edge of home plate. NOTE: All other illegally batted ball infractions regarding the side and rear lines of the batter’s box, along with stepping on home plate, remain in effect..” • PASSED: 12-0-0 |
| April 24, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box "..wasn't saying Mike allowed it and he didn't condone it.. ... In re-reading my post, I'm pretty sure I didn't say that, either ... Mike's a really good Director ... But bad umpiring affects all levels of play, up to and including MLB ... Take a look at the hilarious video of the very first pitch of last Saturday's Orioles-Royals game. Ryan Blakney blew an obvious strike call that was so bad, here was the broadcast call: "Fastball is right down the middle for ball one. ... What?! ... My goodness! Not on pitch one! ... What part of that pitch is not a strike?" ... |
| April 23, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Process for Scheduling Tournament Schedules and Venues Zaman4110 ... We asked, but they didn't have enough fencing to do our 300' dimension ... They have enough for the 220'± radius for youth/fast-pitch, but not enough for a 300'± radius adult slow-pitch ... We made the internal decision that if we couldn't do all fields the same distance, we wouldn't do any ... Maybe next year their temporary fencing inventory will change ... They were first rate to work with from our side of the desk ... I hope we go back ... |
| April 23, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box JohnO28 ... That sounds a lot like a renegade umpire in play hiding out from the T.D. ... The Director at Dayton is one of our better/stronger ones nationally ... It would be a significant surprise if he was encouraging blatant disregard of the rule ... He was present and a strong contributor at the National Rules Committee meetings where the rule was adopted ... |
| April 22, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Batting Box rule change Left handed player called out correctly, entirely within the box ▲ Perfect answer in 10 words ▲ |
| April 15, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Southwest Championships -- Posted Game Results EVERY SINGLE GAME SCORE HAS BEEN POSTED! (All CAPS intended) ... And they were posted in as close to "in real time" as was possible! ... That's hilarious! ... |
| April 15, 2024 DaveDowell | Topic: Bats Discussion: Interpretation of the new bat rule OK, I get it now! ... You're going to have to transport yourself into the: Don't play in colder temps conclusion you appear to be seeking ... We believe, with numbers to support it, that there are alternatives we'll continue to offer ... And for the record, the active participants from the National Rules Committee meetings last time around (other than co-owners Terry and Fran) were from: CA (3), FL, IN, MD, MI, MO, NJ, TX and WA (2) ... Most people who aren't just being argumentative would recognize that to be a reasonable geographic representation ... They work hard and do an exceptional job ... Your apparent inference to the contrary is incorrect and unfair ... |
