Home of Senior Softball-USA and Senior Softball World Championships
| Jan. 21, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Requesting an Intentional 3rd out Recently read something about when you're getting close to time limit and you have 2 outs and want to finish an inning prior to the game clock expiring you can ask the ump to take your 3rd out without having to run someone out to the batters box. This would be if you can see a team intentionally stalling on the field trying to run out the clock and you're down several runs and nobody on with 2 outs. It's been said you can ask the ump to take an intentional 3rd out just like you would ask for an intentional walk, is there any truth to this? I've never seen this done and can't remember ever seeing it in a rule book. |
| Jan. 16, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: When numbers in a division are low Westersizzle, I don't work for SSUSA and I'm sure Dave will be along to answer this better. I do believe there are midseason bumps made in certain circumstances but, 50AAA teams shouldn't be bumped up just to create more 50M teams at tournaments. Now, if that 50AAA team is running through everyone in the area then yes they should be considered to be bumped up to 50M but to do it just to create more teams isn't fair to that team. Plus we all know just because a 50AAA team is good at a few tourneys in the Midwest doesn't mean they are a legit 50M in other geographic areas where they might travel to play. |
| Jan. 14, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Roster Question MCK71, Definitely not saying that that notification about a player not being able to be added due to them being 2 levels above because I've never tried to do it so I wouldn't have ever seen it. I just know there are a few things that pop up as to why you can't add a player. I believe it's usually because they're already on a team, not the correct age group and I believe if they're not a neighboring state it will pop us as well. I just checked and the only notifications I can see currently when trying to add a player is either age restriction and Geographic locations. |
| Jan. 14, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Roster Question DKrollw364, You keep asking the same question and changing your wording. You can't at any time have more than 3 "Chip" players on your master roster. In order to add a player to your tourney roster that is a "Chip" you would have to drop one of the other "Chip" players thus making them ineligible to play for you again that season. I could be wrong on this an "IDLE" player as you're referring to is a player who isn't on a roster currently and is a free agent. I've been running teams for quite a while now and I have never seen an option to "IDLE" a player especially when you're using it to circumvent the system. Once they're on you're on your team the options are to keep them or send an email to SSUSA releasing them and once that's done they can't play for you the rest of the year and also limits them to only playing for whatever team picks them up afterwards. IF they've been on your roster and leave they are only allowed to play for one other team for the rest of the year, pretty much to prevent team hopping. MCK71, I've never seen that pop up when adding a "Chip" player to any of my teams. You can add them, the only notification I've seen is if you're trying to add a player that isn't eligible like a 50s player on a 55 team or a player on another team. I've never even seen a notification saying I couldn't add a player even if they were 2 divisions above. But then again, I've never tried to add a M+ player to my AAA team. |
| Jan. 12, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Roster Question NO |
| Jan. 12, 2026 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Roster Question Someone like DD will have a better answer for you however as far as I know you would have to carry them on your roster all year which would then give you 4 Major players bumping you up to Major. There might be a loophole by adding and dropping for each tourney but then you would have to submit an email to SSUSA HQ each time you wanted to drop them to add one of the other ones and from what I have been told once they're dropped from your roster they can't come back and play for you again. Will be interesting to see SSUSA answer on this but IMO the rules are written so this can't be done |
| Nov. 24, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Pitching screens for tournament play 2026 Stick8, I thought the same thing, but if you play One Nation(not available everywhere I know) the rules state that if one team wants to use the pitching screen both teams have to use it. It's not optional for the other team which to me makes no sense and I've been fighting with them over it for the past 2 years. If it's an option for 1 team it should be an option for both teams. Makes no sense to me. |
| Oct. 20, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Illegal Pitch Rule I know this isn't the SSUSA rule but just curious about how everyone feels about the associations where they don't call illegal pitch until after it lands. I like the way the rule is written in SSUSA that it's called while the pitch is in the air but other places don't call it until after it lands. To me that makes zero sense at all, the spirit of the rule is there to assist the batter. How are you helping the batter when there is no verbal or even hand signal saying it's an illegal pitch. I don't agree with the hand signal either but at least if the on deck batter is paying attention he can tell the batter it's illegal if the ump puts out a hand. But when the ump does nothing until after the pitch lands what is even the point. |
| Oct. 14, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Pitching screens for tournament play 2026 John Edinger, I don't pitch but when we play places that allow screens I leave it up to my pitcher to decide if they want to use it or not. There is good and bad points to a screen and with the varying rules regarding the usage it can be a huge advantage for some teams defensively. In One Nation if one team wants to use the screen BOTH teams HAVE to use the screen, you're not given a choice even if you don't want to use it. That might be the dumbest rule I've ever heard and if that wasn't enough they combine it with the Pitcher is also allowed to field the ball as well. I've only played a couple TPSSA tourneys and have rarely seen them used but like their rules pertaining to their use. Can't recall ever seeing one used in ISSA but that doesn't mean I haven't seen one. LOL.. Things run together and I don't always remember which tourney was which where I've seen screens. I do feel that associations that allow screens but forbid pitchers from being the first person to touch the ball is a good thing safety wise but also gives the defense an upper hand. A screens fielding percentage is always 100% if it hits it, pitchers not so much there is still the human error factor in not using a screen. I'd be willing to be no matter how many pitchers chime in to say Middles Closed less than 70% of the balls hit back at them are fielded, especially the longer a tourney going on. |
| Oct. 9, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Purposeful Stalling Stick8, Seems reasonable, I have honestly never once seen an umpire add more time to a timer in all the years i've been playing. Most seem not to care about it even when I hear them say hurry in and hurry out it doesn't seem like there's much intent behind it. Not all Umps mind you but most seem detached from caring about it. |
| Oct. 9, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: Rules of the game Discussion: Purposeful Stalling Anthony, I think to some extent we all see some stalling at every tourney throughout the year. 5 minutes is very excessive for a pitcher to get ready for sure. I will tell you this since it's your first post, posting on here will accomplish nothing. The power to be have said countless times the rules committee will never vote on something they read on here, if you want it to be considered then you either have to show up at the annual rules committee meeting which are posted on this site or write a formal letter to them for it to be considered. Posting on here might help you gain some traction and get more people thinking like you are but it won't get presented to the rules committee without it being done in one of the two ways I mentioned. |
| Oct. 7, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Whats the ruling? Dave, Thank you, next time I will just have to say I want to file a formal protest. |
| Oct. 7, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Whats the ruling? Dave, I called time and asked for clarification on why the batter wasn't out. He told me it was his mistake for giving the batter bad information so he was allowed to give him a "do over". At that point I asked the director to get involved and he said he didnt see it but the umpire is allowed to do whatever he wants in this case. I them asked for the director to escalate it so the main office and was told they wouldn't be able do anything either since they didnt see it. The umpire has the final call. I then specifically asked him to reach out to you specifically and was told he couldn't. Maybe had I asked to file a formal protest he would have done something differently but he told me escalating it further wasn't a possibility but he would ask for his own future knowledge. When I post things like this it's for mine and whoever else's future knowledge in case I run across it again or it benefits someone else if they run into it they will know exactly east theyre talking about. |
| Oct. 7, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Whats the ruling? SSUSA Staff, So, in the case I presented you didn't really answer my question. Was it the right call by the umpire to gift the batter an extra courtesy foul because he didn't tell the batter it had to be fair? We've all been playing this game long enough to know that you get ONE courtesy foul after your second strike and it has to be fair afterwards. Why would the batter get an extra foul ball because the ump didn't tell him the right thing, you don't get an extra out if the ump accidentally tells a batter there is 2 outs when there is only one. That call doesn't ever happen where the batter would be safe if the defense knew there was one out and roll up a double play the batter can't say the ump told me there were 2 outs so I didn't run so why would there be an extra courtesy foul given? |
| Oct. 5, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Whats the ruling? Umpire screwed up. After the first foul never announced "must be fair" and then after the second foul which he should have been out then said "must be fair". None of which could be heard from the benches. Batter should have been out after the second foul so I called time and questioned why the batter was still at the plate. He said I didnt tell the batter he had no foul to waste so it doesn't count. At which point I asked to talk to the director and the director said it didnt matter that the batter knew he had used his "courtesy" foul because the ump didnt advise him that he had to hit it fair. So instead of the inning being over because he was the 3rd out the batter hot a double and 3 runs were scored after. My stance is regardless of what the ump said the facts are the facts and the batter should be out. Director said it's not up to the batter to know the count which IMO is BS... |
| Oct. 5, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Whats the ruling? First pitch strike. Second pitch ball. Third pitch foul ball. Fourth pitch foul ball. Ump then announces 2-2 must be fair... |
| Oct. 2, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Updated seeding Men's 50 What about 50AAA.. |
| Sept. 30, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: Associations Discussion: Age Discrimination I swear I've read this post in the past or something very similar to it on here before. |
| Sept. 28, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: Tournaments Discussion: Bracket Updates Steph, Maybe I'm looking in the wrong spot but I'm looking on the Tournament page for 55's in Vegas from when I was there and those brackets were never updated.. |
| Sept. 24, 2025 JohnO28 | Topic: General and miscellaneous Discussion: Vegas Worlds We had about a 3 hour delay as Desert Breeze on Saturday in the rain. Vegas is very ill prepared for it to rain that long. There seemed to be 1 grounds crew member on site and what might have been his wife doing the fields.. They got 3 out of 4 playable along with some players help once the rain slowed down. I thought considering who was staffing the park and the length of the rain it was done in a fair amount of time. Having only 3 out of 4 fields usable made it difficult to know when we were playing and I believe our 5 00 PM game started just before 9 but then had to deal with every light in the complex going off in the middle of a play. So another 20 minute delay to get the lights back on. I was talking with the site director during the light outage and he told me he called whoever is in charge of the park during the day to tell them they were out of soap and they told him we don't supply soap that's on SSUSA to supply their own soap if it runs out. It was a total WTF moment. |
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