ONLINE ROSTERS, RESULTS, REGION STUDYING ON TAB FOR 2010

Feb. 1, 2010 – Terry Hennessy CEO

We are excited about several features on the Senior Softball-USA website designed to make life easier for managers, players and teams. The changes also will help us to make sure competition at all tournaments is fair.

One of the changes many managers whose teams have played in 2010 qualifiers have noticed already is that we are requiring rosters be filled out BEFORE the tournament.

We have set up electronic rosters designed to make it easier for managers to add and release players – and to find out immediately if there are any problems with the rosters.

For example, in the past, managers have added players to written rosters, players had made arrangements to attend tournaments and then a few days before the tournament, managers would get a call from our office telling them one or more players could not attend. The players may have played on another team and not been released, or they may not have been registered, or they may have played on a team that was more than one skill level higher than the team rating.

The real problem has been timing: because we were manually checking rosters, there was a lag time between when the rosters were sent to the office and when they were checked.

Not anymore.

Today managers can build their rosters online and they know immediately if there is a problem: giving them time to call our office and get it straightened out.

If you are a manager and you have not set up your electronic roster for the year, please call our office at 916-326-5303 and ask for Liz. In this age of instant cyberspace, it will only take a few minutes to build your roster.

Building Quality Qualifiers

As we develop more online tools, we are better able to help our Qualifier Directors produce the best tourneys in senior softball. This means that we are able to tell the directors ahead of time if a team is loading stronger players on its roster, or whether players are not registered, or ineligible to play.

All of these things help to ensure fair play at tournaments. In addition, we are requiring that all of our qualifiers have defibrillators and that one or more of the officials are trained to use it.

Regions for Rosters Under Study

The SSUSA staff is studying the breakdown of Senior Softball-USA players in each state. We hope the results of this study – and a survey that will be implemented after the study is completed – will help us to determine whether the current roster restrictions are fair.

In the 2011 season, California and Florida teams will be restricted to drawing players only from their own states. The reason? The number of players in those two states is vastly higher than other states.

We are still looking at exemptions for players who have been on teams for several years. Those will be decided on a case-by-case basis.

However, the larger question is whether the current roster restriction of players being from states and bordering states is fair.

Some years ago, SSUSA’s regions were based on the number of senior players in an area. SSUSA dropped that standard and adopted the states-and-bordering-states rule about 10 years ago when the National Senior Summit organizations were attempting to establish common rosters – and common roster restrictions.

Today, it is clear that common rosters are not possible. Therefore, SSUSA is studying the fairest way to draw regions.