Gotta Love Creativity -- New Stalling Tactic

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

Nov 29, 2009
2,974
83
So we're playing a team in pool on Saturday, timed game, finish the inning with about 5 minutes left on the clock. We're visitors and down by 4 runs due to mental and physical errors. My team does have the ability to put up 4 runs.

Home team is up to bat with 2 outs. Catcher comes out of the dugout with her shin guards on. Has to stop and take them off. Then she puts on her helmet and all of the sudden she has trouble trying to snap the chin strap. Coach come out and tires to snap it and can't. The girl goes back to the dugout and tries 6 different batting helmets on. None of them fit. Big surprise there.... Goes back to her original helmet and amazingly now the coach is able to snap the chin strap for her.

Look at the HP umpire and give him a "C'mon Blue. Can you stop the clock?" All I got was a shoulder shrug. After all the nonsense we run out of time after the 2nd pitch.
 
Mar 1, 2015
131
0
So we're playing a team in pool on Saturday, timed game, finish the inning with about 5 minutes left on the clock. We're visitors and down by 4 runs due to mental and physical errors. My team does have the ability to put up 4 runs.

Home team is up to bat with 2 outs. Catcher comes out of the dugout with her shin guards on. Has to stop and take them off. Then she puts on her helmet and all of the sudden she has trouble trying to snap the chin strap. Coach come out and tires to snap it and can't. The girl goes back to the dugout and tries 6 different batting helmets on. None of them fit. Big surprise there.... Goes back to her original helmet and amazingly now the coach is able to snap the chin strap for her.

Look at the HP umpire and give him a "C'mon Blue. Can you stop the clock?" All I got was a shoulder shrug. After all the nonsense we run out of time after the 2nd pitch.

Quit making excuses. The other team didn't make "mental and physical errors" even though they had the same opportunities to do so. You lost. Learn from it and get better. There's a long line of shoulda coulda woulda teams out there that you are in danger of joining.

Only reason I bring this up is because you are trying to justify why your team is losing and will use the "they stalled for time and killed the clock" as another excuse.

Edit - sorry for the harshness, but we played for a coach like this once. We never "got beat" by a better team, but the umps, the weather, the clock, the errors, the sun, the schedule, the field, the....
 
Last edited:
Dec 11, 2010
4,711
113
Stalling is b.s.

Come to the park to play ball not change catchers and change catchers equipment. Very cheesy move.

Play the game, don't play games.

Edited to add, there will be a day when the kids aren't playing timed games. Changing gear won't help them then. Play the game.
 
Feb 4, 2015
641
28
Massachusetts
Quit making excuses...

Edit - sorry for the harshness, but ...

Junkball - You missed the point of the post. Sparky Guy didn't make any excuse for losing. He was simply sharing an experience they had in a recent tournament. The other team was more interested in winning by stalling vs finishing the game. If you read and listen to what many have to say on DFP, you'll learn that most of us believe that softball is just as much about teaching the girls strong life lessons, including fairness and sportsmanship. Nobody on that winning team will remember what game they won, but they'll remember how they were taught to 'not' play the game in order to win, and whatever other lesson's their coaches taught them.

Sorry to hear you had such a rotten coach and are obviously still bitter about it, but that's not an excuse to be harsh. Ideas can be shared constructively without being demeaning to other DFP members.
 
Jun 6, 2016
2,712
113
Chicago
Quit making excuses. The other team didn't make "mental and physical errors" even though they had the same opportunities to do so. You lost. Learn from it and get better. There's a long line of shoulda coulda woulda teams out there that you are in danger of joining.

Only reason I bring this up is because you are trying to justify why your team is losing and will use the "they stalled for time and killed the clock" as another excuse.

Edit - sorry for the harshness, but we played for a coach like this once. We never "got beat" by a better team, but the umps, the weather, the clock, the errors, the sun, the schedule, the field, the....

Excuses? He said they were losing because they made mental and physical errors.

I think umpires should be allowed to use their judgment w/r/t stalling, and they should be allowed to force teams who do it to forfeit. Coaches should be banned from future tournaments. It's not part of the game, and draconian measures should absolutely be used to prevent it.
 
Mar 1, 2015
131
0
Excuses? He said they were losing because they made mental and physical errors.

I think umpires should be allowed to use their judgment w/r/t stalling, and they should be allowed to force teams who do it to forfeit. Coaches should be banned from future tournaments. It's not part of the game, and draconian measures should absolutely be used to prevent it.

LOL - Scoreboard tells the story. I didn't miss the point. When you are saying we are losing...but...we shouldn't be because blah blah blah...that's called making excuses. The fact he included that detail in his post tells me he is an excuse maker. The reason WHY they were losing has nothing to do with the other team stalling for time, yet he felt obligated to cover his rear end for being in a losing situation by making an excuse.
 
Dec 11, 2010
4,711
113
Looking a lot like the Chicago trash board.

Let's not bring that crap here.

And whoever is cross posting there, knock it the hell off. It's going to drag all those idiots over here.
 
Apr 12, 2015
792
93
Stalling is b.s.

Come to the park to play ball not change catchers and change catchers equipment. Very cheesy move.

Play the game, don't play games.

Edited to add, there will be a day when the kids aren't playing timed games. Changing gear won't help them then. Play the game.

Maybe, but as long as a clock plays a role in the game, using it (or abusing it) to an advantage is part of the strategy of the game.

Don't like, fine. Play three innings, finish the inning instead of timed. End the game when a team is ahead by 7 runs after a complete inning. But if the clock is going to be part of the game, it is going to be part of the strategies, for better or worse. It is really no different than a football team kneeling out the clock to end the game.
 
Jun 12, 2015
3,848
83
Yep, the clock is there, it becomes part of the strategy. With 5 minutes left and being up by 4, if I were a coach I'd be taking my time as much as possible. I wouldn't do anything that over the top, but still.
 
Jun 27, 2011
5,089
0
North Carolina
Maybe, but as long as a clock plays a role in the game, using it (or abusing it) to an advantage is part of the strategy of the game.

It is really no different than a football team kneeling out the clock to end the game.

Anything is part of the game that people choose to make part of the game. That doesn't make it appropriate. Riding the umpire can be part of the game. Taunting players can be part of the game. Anything that commonly occurs in a softball game becomes part of the game.

And it is different than a football team kneeling. Kneeling in football (except for the national anthem) is not controversial in any way. Stalling in softball is. If they were the same, they would elicit the same reaction. They don't. They are different.
 

Latest posts

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
42,808
Messages
678,962
Members
21,423
Latest member
Wes_K
Top