The Mercy Rule

GunnerShotgun said:

If I am down 50 (or some large number) in basketball and the other team is pressing, is that the other coaches problem or my problem?

As a coach I think that is my problem. I am never concerned with what the other team does or doesn't do.

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Out of curiosity, if that other team had a goal of beating you 120 to nothing and continued to press, you wouldn't do anything? I coached basketball for a couple of decades and had some teams that could probably do this to other teams. Still, I wouldn't do it. However, one year, I coached in a game where ... I deleted the rest of this long response. In short, there is a point where there is going to be a major conflict between me and the other coach.

RADcatcher said:

How devastating would that be if it was called Slaughter rule in the books LOL.


Announcer
"And Oklahoma completely slaughtered _____________.
It was like a meat processing plant in the Box."

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What OU is doing to some of their opponents is way more disgusting than any meat processing plant.

obritt said:

There are other ways to show mercy than just stepping off the bag. Coaches who know the game would end up this way can use a pitcher that needs circle time, girls that are working on slap hitting that never get slap in a game get the chance, girls work on bunting ETC.

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With my weaker teams, I always dreaded when teams would start bunting because half the time we couldn't get them out even if we knew it was coming.

The only one that makes me feel bad is when girls on the other team start batting lefty. I don't get mad; it's our fault we're down that much, but it's the one move that actually embarrasses me.

GunnerShotgun said:

If I am down 50 (or some large number) in basketball and the other team is pressing, is that the other coaches problem or my problem?

As a coach I think that is my problem. I am never concerned with what the other team does or doesn't do.

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You wouldn’t be concerned if a far superior team was purposely embarrassing your team?


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Rick M said:

I think it would be really tough to give the losing team the option. Even if you’re completely overmatched, admitting so and asking for ‘mercy’ is much harder than a run rule where the outcome is predetermined based on the score alone.

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The losing team having the option when they are not completely overmatched would not be.

Orange Socks said:

I was thinking about the Mercy Rule the other day. In college it's 8 runs after 5 innings. I think that number is way too low in this day and age of offense. Back in the early days when Rad was playing, the pitchers dominated and scores were 1-0 it makes sense.

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A pitching change can turn the game around.

My daughter's teams through the years have been on both sides of the mercy rule and stepping off of the base intentionally. I appreciated the sportsmanship when we were on the short side and felt terrible when we were on the winning side.

Ironically enough, one of my daughters fondest softball memories is a game that we got mercy ruled. When were were playing on a town travel team at 10U and we ended up drawing one of the top teams in our state in a tournament playoff. Our team lost 10-0 and we got exactly 2 hits, both by my daughter (she also had a great game in the field). Even after winning multiple tournaments since then, she'll still remind me every year or so, "Remember when we played that really good team at 10U and I was the only one that was able to hit the pitcher?" There can be success even in defeat.

Stepping off is 100% supported here in Florida.

Leaving some over-matched team out in the 100+ degree sun fielding for 45+ minutes is not 'overcoming hardship' or 'life lesson' it is just stupid BS. No one is gaining anything when team are totally mismatched.

I may not agree with many of the tournament directors for a variety of things in Florida, but If you win a travel game here 23-0 the head coach will be getting a call and outright be told not to do it again. Last time the coach tried to talk back, to one of the directors over this, the director went ahead and called him out publicly on Facebook.

And they do a reasonable job of making sure teams that are 'trophy hunting' get the tougher pools and matchups as much as they can. Even in open tournaments, they are splitting brackets and making sure the 'A' teams are in the top bracket.

That for seven inning games. i feel the NCAA 8 after 5 is a little aggressive for me. I prefer the Florida HS rule which is 15 after 3. 12 after 4, 10 after 5
For timed travel games I do like the 12 after 3/10 after 4/8 after 5 run rule.

RADcatcher said:

Thinking about the word ...Mercy...
That conversation goes
Q~ How did your team do?
A~ The other team stop playing us because we couldn't score enough.
So they showed Mercy.

Is that really what a team that's losing wants? Mercy...?!
Maybe they want to keep trying?!!!
Especially when games have a game time anyway why not play it out?!
Should the mercy rule be an option for the team that's losing?

What do you think?
GO DFP

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Our team was one run away from being mercied this week, a day after we mercied another team.
Score was 11-1 at one point and we scored a couple to survive. We kept chipping away and in the bottom of the 7th, we scored two more to tie. Game was called due to pending darkness but everyone wanted to go extra innings. Game ended 11-11.

Having been on the bad side of run rule games many times, my concern is for my pitcher. There's no need to have a 12 year old kid throwing well over 100 pitches when the game was completely out of hand 50 pitches into it and you have no more options that can throw a strike.

And honestly, having been on the other side of it, it's really not much fun beating the crap out of a bunch of overmatched, clearly miserable girls.