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Online now: 1 member: Larry20; 8 anonymousDetails for Brock
Real name:
Greg Broeckelman
Location:
Colorado Springs, CO
Division:
Men's 80
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| Aug. 14, 2024 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Western Nationals or is it the West Coast Nationals? Dave Dowell, as you know our 80s Exhibition team had to drop out of the Rocky Mountain Championships tournament due to injuries and COVID issues. I live in Colorado Springs so will not be attending the tournament even though I am one of the healthy ones. Maybe we can do this with a phone call sometime. We were in Columbus Ohio last week for the SPA World Tournament playing at a 32 field complex called Berliner Park with all turf infields and grass outfields. Might be an alternative for the Eastern Nationals to get it off the East Coast. Just an example. I'm not suggesting the Westerns be in Aurora again but I'm sure there are other cities with better field availability in cities west of the Mississippi River. The problem is getting the west Coast teams to travel east but the field situation around Sacramento is not ideal either except for the captive West Coast audience. |
| Aug. 1, 2024 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Western Nationals or is it the West Coast Nationals? Dave, I would like to do that. I'm no longer the President of the SI Club as I was when we had the Western Nationals at the Aurora Sports Park in 2012 but I'd be glad to meet with you about the tournament and we might be able to include the current president also. I'll be playing with the combined 80 and 85 team playing as an 80's team in exhibition status. |
| Aug. 1, 2024 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Western Nationals or is it the West Coast Nationals? Full Count, I'm sure the fields are cheaper. The Aurora Sports Park is expensive but the fields are some of the best grass fields in the country. They take really good care of them. That's why the # of teams attending the Rocky Mountain Championships seems to grow some almost every year even with the higher entry fee. Teams like the fields and the fact the 12 fields are in one spot so they can watch other teams from their area play without having to drive to other fields to do so. They can't do that in the Sacramento area with fields in four different areas. |
| July 31, 2024 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Western Nationals or is it the West Coast Nationals? Regarding Dave's criteria for making a change. Besides the 12 field complex at the Aurora Sports Park there are a number of other 300 feet fields in the Aurora area. It's hard for me to believe that using fields in Sacramento, Elk Grove, Roseville and Lincoln makes teams relish going to the Western Nationals, especially when you don't know until a couple weeks ahead of time what fields they might be playing on. There are so many teams in CA that won't travel if they have to fly somewhere because it's too far to drive that it hurts teams in the rest of the country that have to fly to get to most tournaments. We have 17 Scrap Iron teams. Most will attend at least five or more SSUSA tournaments on average and have to fly to most tournaments. As the previous poster indicates it gets expensive paying for flights, hotels, rental cars and meals when a team has to fly to most tournaments. If SSUSA appreciates that teams are paying their staff salaries they would move it to another location off the coasts from time to time to show that appreciation and give other teams the chance to win a triple crown. Enough said. |
| July 27, 2024 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Western Nationals or is it the West Coast Nationals? Just looked at the teams attending the Western Nationals. I added up all of the teams attending from the West Coast or teams that border California, Oregon and Washington. If I counted correctly there are only four out of 148 teams outside the states I indicated. One from Utah, one Scrap Iron team from Colorado and two teams from Texas. Since the Western Nationals is supposed to attract all teams that are west of the Mississippi River it appears to me that this tournament needs to move further east if it should be called a true Western Nationals. We had it at the Aurora Sports Complex one year and it attracted teams from many other states but very few from CA, WA or OR or states bordering those states. We still had almost 90 teams which is about what the Rocky Mountain Championships now attracts. A number of our Scrap Iron teams used to attend but now it's down to one team. I wonder why.... |
| April 1, 2023 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: nicest softball complexes I have to give a plug for the Aurora Sports Park 12 field complex in Aurora, CO. This is a grass complex and I don't recall playing on better grass fields anywhere in the country. Plus teams like playing there because they can go watch their other teams play without getting in a car and drive to another complex. Great fields. Those are reasons that the Rocky Mountain Championships continue to grow almost every year. |
| March 25, 2023 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Cancellation of Tournaments due to weather They have already done that. As an example, I'll use the Rocky Mountain Championships. They raised the fee $100 and reduced the game guarantee to four. When after a majority vote to go back to five, they raised the fee another $75. The two increases came to 31.2% increase. Inflation is less than 10%. My guess is that most TOC tournaments have similar increases. At some point we, their customers, are going to say enough is enough. |
| March 25, 2023 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Cancellation of Tournaments due to weather I can agree with both messages but in this case, SSUSA needs to do the right thing and reimburse all teams who cancelled because the weather forecast was accurate or teams that decided to show up anyway. Session 2 was cancelled due to weather and the right answer is to reimburse all teams. Our team waited until Sunday night before deciding to cancel. It was already raining in St. George and the forecast indicated rain thru Thursday. I advised Dave D we had decided to cancel Monday morning. Terry, you and your staff need to look at this and do the right thing for your customers. Like I told you when the debate was gouing on about the five game guarantee or four, I realized your expenses were going up but you needed to realize that travel expenses for teams were also going up. We can live with forfeiting our entry fee but based on all of the facts in this situation, The right thing to do is to reimburse all their entry =fees for Session 2. Thanks for listening...Greg Broeckelman |
| March 25, 2023 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Pitching Net We use a screen in all of our senior leagues (over 40 thru over 70) in Colorado Springs. We place the screen measured 40 feet from the back of home plate and the pitcher can pitch from as deep as 55 feet. The pitch must be delivered OVER the top of the screen which basically eliminates calls of illegal low pitch since the screen is six feet tall. Any hit ball that hits the screen is a foul ball unless it's the 3rd strike then it's an out. Any hit ball up the middle that misses the screen may be fielded by the pitcher but the pitcher must stay behind the screen until the ball is hit. We've been using the screens for several years now. Some pitchers were against it in the beginning but now love having it there. Using a screen eliminates the pitcher having to wear any protective gear. |
| March 20, 2023 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Notice on changes to Spring Worlds Session #2 due to rain forecast For Dave Dowell. I assume you'll hear from Ron Howard/Dennis Lutz but the Scrap Iron 80s decided to cancel last night. With the rain forecast at 40 to 90% every day for five days from Sunday through Thursday we decided it was a lot cheaper to forfeit our entry fee than everyone paying to get to St. George with chances of playing slim and none. |
| March 1, 2023 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: 5gg spring championships Hawaiians Makes a good point. I just checked the Rocky Mountain Championships. Last year the entry fee was $560 for five game guarantee. For 2023 you raised the fee to $660 and reduced the guarantee to four games. Now the fee has gone up to $735 and back to a five game guarantee, the same as last year. Bottom line is that you've raised the fee $175 or 31.25% over last year. My guess is that if I check the other TOC qualifiers that I will find similar results. Talk about inflation! Somebody needs to sharpen their pencil. |
| Jan. 10, 2023 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Virgin Rivers Reservation Code I called the number, gave them the code and booked a room for $32 plus tax. Total $36. So the code works online or by phone. I did it about a week ago now. |
| April 2, 2022 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: website It's been really slow to load and as of yesterday I was told the site doesn't exist. However, I can sign onto spasoftball.com, click on HOF link and then the SSUSA link and it loads instantly. That's what I did just now to get on. I'm no techie so I have no idea what's going on except that I know how to get to this website by other means. |
| March 30, 2022 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Spring Worlds St. George Glad to hear this. Dave, you mentioned to me when I checked in that you will be coming to the Rocky Mountain Championships this year for the first time. That was great to hear also. I was hoping to talk to you again on another suggestion but I never saw you again at Little Valley. I note that you're doing more round robin brackets and I'm suggesting to consider doing even more of them. For instance, the 75 major/major+ bracket had four teams so we played each other in the round robin and then had a double elimination bracket. Instead, why not just do a double round robin and best record wins. Again, the major+ team, if there is one, would have to win to get the goodies for major+. That way when the schedule is released, every team, no matter where they finished, would know when they would be finished for planning purposes. Just a thought. |
| Dec. 30, 2020 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Elite Sports jerseys I don't post very often but I post here to applaud jimperry19's thoughtful comments. And he's right. No such thing as free shirts. When one adds up the expenses to go to a tournament and win a shirt, it will be the most expensive shirt in the closet. It's been over a month since Phoenix. I'd be inquiring also if my team had won a set of shirts. |
| Aug. 10, 2020 Brock | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: 70s Senior League Situation Situation is bases loaded, one out, 5th run on third. Batter hits short fly ball to right center. Fielder catches the ball and throws toward home but runner beats throw. However, the runner on first led off before the catch and never returned to first base. Throw goes to first which is the third out and is a force play, no tag needed. Inning over and the fifth run should not count as the play continued. Or so we thought. Both teams have former umpires. One says the fifth run should not count and the other says it should because force plays only happen going forward, not going back to the base. Comments.... |
| May 8, 2020 Brock | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Reno Tournament This week's newsletter appeared to indicate this may or not be a go yet. They indicated a final decision would be made two weeks ahead of tournament date and suggested that you not make flight and hotel arrangements now. Some of us have made those arrangements but both can be cancelled with no penalty. I hope we have something concrete in next week's newsletter. |
| May 1, 2020 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Reno Tournament I reserved a room at the Sands sometime ago after they closed. They had to call me back but when they did they gave me a reservation. After receiving the latest SSUSA newsletter I called to change my reservation to the following week since SSUSA hopes to play the 60s - 85s from June 2 -4. No return call so far from the Sands and now the SSUSA website says the Sands is not taking reservations until July 1. Not sure what other hotels/casinos are doing but it appears to me the tournament is going to have to be rescheduled and/or cancelled this year. I agree with Wood_1966. |
| Sept. 11, 2018 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Cheyenne Park Then I guess we won't know whether all of the field and other issues will be taken care of before we play. If I read Dave's post correctly the 70 majors will not be moved to other facilities. |
| Sept. 11, 2018 Brock | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Cheyenne Park LVSSA/SSUSA still has almost two weeks to make some changes. Mike's (Scrappy) post of yesterday I assume is being heeded by the powers that be. The 70 major tournament should not have to be played on what used to be and appear to still be terrible fields. I note SSUSA Staff, in their Sept 9 post, did not address the Cheyenne fields, only the Lorenzi issue. Here's hoping for some changes before Sept 24th!! |
