Discussing the rules

Teams May Qualify More Than Once; Exhibition Label Explained

May 1, 2000 – Senior Softball-USA

Many players and managers are confused about two classifications of teams: "non-qualifying" and "exhibition."

To put it simply, there are no more non-qualifying teams. There are only exhibition teams, which can play under special circumstances.

Here is the reason.

"Non-qualifing" first appeared as a way of identifying a team that had already qualified to advance to the World Championships and wanted to play in subsequent qualifying tournaments. By identifying the team as a non-qualifier, any team below them in the standings would be rated as if the non-qualifying team did not participate. The purpose was to prevent a previously qualified team from eliminating a team that was attempting to qualify. The non-qualifying team could still win awards.

The term "exhibition" was used to replace "non-qualifying" when it was discovered that some teams were taking advantage of the non-qualifying status.

Here's how it was working: A manager would load up his team with "renegade" players and enter a tournament as a non-qualifier. Teams were bringing in players from outside the region, giving players addresses of RV parks and, in some cases, the manager's own residence. They tried to avoid registering players on the team ˆ and verifying their ages ˆ saying they were just a local team and "wanted to have some fun."

Their idea of fun was to create an unfair advantage so that they could win all of the games and walk away with the awards.

To prevent this from happening, the term "non-qualifying" was dropped and "exhibition teams" were born.

"Non-qualifying" was dropped because teams are permitted to qualify every time they play in a qualifier. This change was made because teams that qualified early in the year sometimes end up losing as much as a third of their team by the time the World Championships rolled around. Further, new players moving into the region were prevented from joining teams that were already qualified.

Now a team can qualify as many times as it wishes. The team is rated at every qualifier and must choose the roster it wants to use for the World Championships. A team can't mix rosters. Exhibition teams can play under special circumstances, but they can not win awards.

The reason for allowing exhibition teams is because it enables teams to compete that lose players during the tournament or travel a great distance only to discover some players did not show up. The exhibition status avoids forfeits, which no one wants. Exhibition teams CAN NOT use illegal or suspended players.

Bob Mitchell is president and founder of Senior Softball-USA and Senior Softball World Championships.