Length of games in tournaments?

Does anybody like drop dead??? They're the worst.

Luckily, we don't see too many drop dead rules. Often finish the inning, with a hard stop to keep on schedule. (90 minutes finish the inning, but hard stop at 1:45 or something like that) Anything below 90 minutes has always made me feel that the money was more important than the game. But it seems like 75-80 minutes is pretty standard??? Involved in running a couple of tournaments and just wondering what people think. I suppose the younger the players, the fewer the innings you get in...so you may only play 3-4 innings in a 90 minute-finish the inning game...which then seems too short...unless you are watching.

In 10U we rarely go beyond 4 innings. I think we've gotten to 6 once or twice ever, so far. Sometimes we only get through 2.

SB45 said:

Luckily, we don't see too many drop dead rules. Often finish the inning, with a hard stop to keep on schedule. (90 minutes finish the inning, but hard stop at 1:45 or something like that) Anything below 90 minutes has always made me feel that the money was more important than the game. But it seems like 75-80 minutes is pretty standard??? Involved in running a couple of tournaments and just wondering what people think. I suppose the younger the players, the fewer the innings you get in...so you may only play 3-4 innings in a 90 minute-finish the inning game...which then seems too short...unless you are watching.

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It is all about # of teams you can accept into the tournament and the number of games you want to get in.

If you are running a 3 pool/single elim tournament starting at 8am with last game 8pm:

- You can take 6 teams for every field (9 games per field) you have if you run 90 minute schedule blocks. That is 1:15+finish the inning and you will be fine 99% of the time.
- If you go over 1:15 and now need 2 hour time blocks, then you can only take 4 teams per field (7 games per field)

So if I have 4 fields I can take 24 teams or 16 teams. As an organization I am going to take 24 most of the time unless there is a specific reason not to.

redhotcoach said:

I HATE drop deads. We played a top 5 national team last month and ump stopped game with dd at bat, full count plus 2 fouls. We lucked out not having that ump again after I called him a cleaning tissue of one's rear end.

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Let's see...you know (or should know) going into the tourney that it is a "drop dead" time limit format...

So when the umpire enforces the tournament rule....he's the problem? ....seems like your anger should be directed at the TD who established the format.....