News story

National Ratings Accord: Summit Organizations Agree on Hall of Fame, Advisory Board

March 1, 2001 – Senior Softball-USA

LAS VEGAS ˆ In a historic stroke of unity, the nine independent National Senior Softball Summit organizations voted here to enforce a National Team Rating System.

Summit delegates voted last year to use the National Team Ratings as a guideline, but individual organizations continued to independently rate some teams.

This year, the Summit delegates voted on the official preliminary ratings of the top Major and AAA teams and appointed a 3-member Ratings Committee to establish final team ratings for the remainder of the season for all organizations.

All nine Summit Organizations agreed to adopt the Ratings System, including ASA, the Huntsman Games, ISA, ISSA, NSA, SPA, SSUSA, SSWS and USSSA

In other major developments, Summit delegates voted to:

-- Streamline the Hall of Fame selection procedure and cut the number of people inducted into the Hall of Fame from 30 to 15 a year.

-- Establish 3-year terms for the National Advisory Board.

-- Established a Women's Advisory Board.

-- Agreed that players caught with altered bats would face serious disciplinary action.

-- Agreed to inform other organizations if players were caught cheating.

In addition, SPA announced it has adopted the strike mat. Only two of the nine national Summit organizations ˆ ISA and NSA ˆ do not use the strike mat.

But the biggest advance was agreement on team ratings.

"The ratings system will bring a degree of fairness to the play in senior softball," said RB Thomas, executive director of ISSA and chairman of the Summit Ratings Committee. "Collectively associations can determine where teams should be playing to provide a fair opportunity for all teams."

Relying heavily on Thomas' comprehensive team ranking of the top teams in 2000, the delegates established preliminary ratings for the teams (See ratings on the Summit website: www.softballratings.com). National Summit delegates also agreed to abide by the ratings and appointed a Ratings Committee.

The three-member Ratings Committee ˆ including Thomas, SPA president Ridge Hooks and SSUSA executive director Terry Hennessy ˆ will begin making the final ratings decisions by May 1. Every 30 days thereafter, until the National Championships begin, the committee will update the ratings.

"Teams that need to appeal their ratings can go to the Summit website for a form to submit, or call 916-393-8566 to receive a form by mail or fax," said SSWC's Hennessy. "The appeal must be in writing and provide new, specific information."

"Ratings decisions will only be released in May and every 30 days thereafter to avoid organizations and committee members being flooded with requests for decisions," said Hennessy, who was elected Summit Chairman for 2001-2002. Ridge Hooks was Summit Chairman for 1999-2000 and will act as Vice Chairman in 2001.

In other action, Summit delegates agreed on a simplified format for induction into the Hall of Fame. Under the new system, all nominations are mailed to Winkey Blackman, president of the National Hall of Fame, at 611 Grassdale Rd., Suite A, Cartersville, GA, 30121.

Blackman does the initial sorting of the nominations and sends them to Eastern or Western Hall of Fame screeners, who look into the nominations in depth. Summaries of the nominations are then sent to all National Summit organizations for a secret ballot.

The organizations votes are tallied and the top 10 players and 5 people in other categories are selected. The Summit cut the number of Hall of Fame inductees from 30 in 2000 to 15 this year.

Summit delegates also formalized the selection of the 15-member National Advisory Board, made up of key players and managers from around the country.

Advisory Board members serve 3-year terms beginning in 2002. The first 5 advisors leaving the Board will become alternates for the year. The Advisory Board must have representatives in all age groups and must be from different states. The only exception is California, which is allowed two representatives because of the number of teams in that state, according to Summit officials.

New Board members are chosen by the Advisory Board, which is chaired by Tony Castaldy form Long Island, New York.

The Women's Advisory Board planned on kicking off its first meeting via a conference phone call between national delegates, according to the Women's Advisory Board representative Layla Bryan of Texas. Two other delegates were also announced: Carol Ford of Southern California and Pat Blackmon of Virginia.

Summit organizations reaffirmed their vote last year to ban players caught falsifying documents about their age and also voted to take appropriate disciplinary action on players using altered bats.

"The real strength of the Summit is that all National Organizations are now communicating ˆ and that is the best thing for senior softball," said Hooks.

Summit delegates also updated a Rule Comparison Chart, which is on the Summit website (www.softballratings.com)