Volunteer Roles Explained
Thank you for volunteering to manage, coach, or be a team parent. You will play an integral and vital role in the success or failure of our league. This handout was created to lay out the responsibilities of each of the above positions. While it is not an exhaustive listing of duties, it does lay out the fundamental duties that you will be accepting.
Little League has provided many informational videos and plans on their website designed for managing a practice from tee ball through Majors. I strongly encourage each of you, in fact everyone involved in our program, to visit little league’s coaching site, study and apply their suggestions.
The following listing of responsibilities may seem daunting but the very-most-important role you will fill as a manager, coach or parent is to be a mentor of solid character. YOU may be the first and only positive role model for many of these players. We do not know what these players come from or go home to after baseball (YOU WOULD PROBABLY BE SHOCKED). Take this responsibility seriously and keep it in mind throughout.
Your main job, your most important job/role/responsibility is to be a model of good character, sportsmanship and work ethic. Your team’s character will be nothing more or less than a reflection of your character.
Team Manager
This position could be referred to as the head coach. You are the person who is in charge of the team from selection of players, equipment, uniforms, pictures, scheduling practices, designing a practice plan, executing the practice plan, making the game lineup, substitutions, field preparation and field recovery after games, dealing with parents and dealing with the league. You are also in charge of delegating. A strong knowledge and understanding of the rules of baseball is essential to successful managing.
Team Coach
Your role is to assist your team manager in carrying out your teams daily and seasonal goals. A strong knowledge and understanding of the rules of baseball is essential to successful coaching.
Team Parent(s)
As a team parent you will assist the manager with the team parents gathering information that is required from time to time. The main roles of the team mom or dad are uniform sizing and concession.
· Uniforms: The team will need fitted for uniforms, in the past Broughton’s has compiled a couple of boxes of different sized shirts and pants and these are cycled through the teams to size the players. A listing of team name, player names, sizes and jersey numbers then need taken to Broughtons to be created. Then the uniforms need picked up and handed out.
· Concession: Each team in the league is assigned a time slot to work concession. The team parent(s) is responsible to open the concession and get it up and running during their teams scheduled times. The team parent(s) is responsible to schedule the team parents during that time slot. If parents are not willing to work the concession we will have teen age helper available, however, the Team Parent IS responsible to be there and open the concession and get it started.
· Catch All: Assimilating and disseminating Picture Forms, Medical release forms, other paper work as the team manager requests.
MANAGERS
· Read the Rule Book and make yourself knowledgeable before taking on this endeavor
· Team Selection (except T-Ball)
o You will be expected to attend any player tryout sessions
o You will select the players to your team during a draft meeting
§ Your child, if applicable, will be your automatic first round pick
§ Siblings are applied to the draft round the first sibling is selected, the additional sibling(s) will fall to the next round(s).
§ Parents are attached to players – players are not attached to parents. Meaning, in order to get John Doe as a coach for your team you must select his son Johnny Doe during the draft.
§ Tee Ball – teams will be assigned
§ 6-8 Minors – there will be no tryout, simply a selection process
· Team equipment
o You are responsible for equipment pick up, maintenance and returning your equipment at the end of the season.
o This equipment is the PROPERTY of the league, however, treat it like it belongs to you and take care of it.
· Schedule team meeting
o Collect team information
§ Medical Release forms – you as the manager will keep your teams medical release forms with you and have them at all team functions. If the parent of a player is not available the release form will be necessary to treat the player.
§ Check your contact information
o Lay down your team rules, practice plans, etc
o Select your Team Parent or Parents
· Schedule practices – 9-10 and 11-12 and softball-practice schedules will be designated by the league for use of the River Bend facilities. For extra times you will have to find your own spot. (Tee Ball and 6-8) our league carries insurance on the City of Elkins, Randolph County Schools and Davis and Elkins College.
o RCBOE and schools - You will need to contact the principal of the school you wish to use for permission ( once they verify insurance we have never been turned away)
o City of Elkins property – we only need to avoid the soccer fields. We stay off their fields and they in turn stay off of ours.
o D&E – Permission is required for use. Contact the athletic department (304-637-1222)
· Games
o Know the RULES of the GAME
o Make team lineup
o Make substitutions per Little League guidelines.
Providing the Player Agent with a list of team members willing to serve as pool player as it becomes necessary.
Saturday Manager meetings and facility maintenance
COACHES
Your role is to assist the manager in all of his duties listed above and to read the rule book and know the game.
LOCAL RULES FOR MANAGER AND COACHES
· *Home Team Managers/Coaches
o Responsible to get the field ready for play
o Responsible for returning bases to building, raking the playing field and ensuring the lights are off (last game on that field for the day).
o Responsible for providing an ADULT scoreboard operator (if score is kept for your division)
· *The last game of the day: the home team manager/coaches are also responsible to check ALL doors on all buildings and ensure that they are locked, that all lights are out and remain until the concession stand is closed for the evening. It is generally dark when the concession closes and these ladies need to be protected.
· Pitch Count : Your opponent’s pitch count is the official count for your pitchers
Facility Maintenance
Many parents believe that someone or some entity is paid to maintain the facility. It is not true. WE, you and I, all volunteers without monetary benefit, maintain the facility. It only takes one trip to an out of county baseball park to realize the quality of our facility. Maintaining that level of quality requires a continual effort.
· Saturday Mornings – every Saturday morning – or any time it needs done.
o Bathrooms cleaned. Easiest job we have.
o Trash cans emptied and relined. Or whenever you see them full.
o Weeds cut and removed from anywhere you see one anytime you see them.
· Mowing and field striping is provided
· Dirt and field maintenance
o Do not drag or rake dirt into grass
o When dragging remain 6-12 inches from grass edge
o When raking along grass
§ Rake parallel to the grass edge not into the grass
§ Do not rake dirt into the grass
o Do not broom water off dirt
§ Use the "super sopper" and apply dry dirt if necessary
o When low spots develop – look for the high spot nearby and move some of the high spot into the low spot. Rake the turface off of the dirt, move the dirt from the high spot to fill the low spot then top dress with the removed turface.
o Daily or weekly – the “lips” need to be broomed into the playing dirt. Sweep the dirt from the edge of the grass back into the dirt playing surface. This will be a huge benefit in preventing lip development.
o Do not allow your players to create holes by kicking, especially in the outfield. Keep an eye on your field, the less it is unnecessarily disrupted means less time repairing.
Game Cancellations (In Rule Book)
· Prior to team/manager arrival a board representative may cancel the game
o If possible – notice will be sent via email
o Facebook will be utilized as well. (Follow us to be informed)
· Once teams arrive and before the lineup cards are given to the umpire, the team managers, if agreeing, may cancel their game.
· Once the lineup cards have been given to the umpire, the umpire is in full control of the game and may pause or cancel the game as he/she sees fit.
All effort and diligence should be exhausted before cancelling.
Pool Play
A list of pool players will be received from the team managers and maintained by the Player agent or his/her representative. The player agent is to be contacted if a team needs a pool player and the PA will randomly select a player to fill that need.
Recently, players not showing up nor contacting the team manager have become a regular occurrence. The modern, technological world we live in provides no excuse for this to occur. If you have not been notified by 45 minutes before your scheduled game time that a player will be late or not there, you may contact the PA and request a pool player. This applies only if you require one pool player to make 9 players available to play. If the player who gave no notice of being late shows up after you have requested a pool player, he or she will not be added to your team roster for that game. (Read the rule book: If a player arrives after the team lineup has been officially handed to the umpire, that player is not required to be added.)
· A team may request a maximum of two (2) pool players for any one game. The team is limited to nine (9) players including the 2 pool players and 7 regular team members. If you only have 6 team players able to attend, the game will not be played.
· Pool players WILL:
o Play the entire game.
o Be positioned in the outfield
o Be placed at the 9 or the 8 and 9 position in the batting order
Umpiring
Umpiring: you and your staff will be expected to umpire games or find adequate adults to substitute for your being there. It is unfortunate that we do not have volunteer umpires but we have to have umpires.
· KEY INGREDIENTS TO UMPIRING
o KNOW THE RULES
o Be in charge and stay in charge. Though uncommon, there are extreme cases when parents, managers, coaches and or players need ejected. Set the tone early in the season and it will be a more enjoyable experience for everyone. You as an umpire will receive as much hassling as you allow.
o Keep the games moving between innings. Keeping the game moving is somewhat of an art; however, once you get into a routine, and follow some of the following tips, the games that you umpire are almost guaranteed to move at a quicker pace.
Keeping a game moving actually begins before the first pitch is thrown.
- Umpires should strive to arrive at the game, approximately 30 minutes prior to game time.
- Introduce yourself to the Managers and tell them that you will meet them approximately 10 minutes prior to game time, in order to inspect the equipment.
- At five minutes prior to game time, after inspecting the equipment, arrive at home plate to meet the Managers for ground rules.
- The ground rules’ meeting is primarily for discussing any unique rules for that field. (I.e. what happens if a batted balls rolls into a tube that holds the tarp).
- This meeting should be brief. Do not issue a whole bunch of warnings at this meeting about player and coach behavior. It sets a negative confrontational tone that is not necessary or desirable. You should set the tone with an aura of cooperation and mutual respect.
- During this meeting, ask the Manager to have a player who is not actively involved in the game, to come out with a helmet between batters and retrieve the bat.
- Ask the Manager to have the catcher ready to take the field as soon as the last out is made of his offensive half of the inning. If the catcher is the last batter of the inning or on base, have a back-up designated to warm up the pitcher between innings.
During the game,
- Always keep at least 2 balls in your ball bag.
- On foul balls and passed balls (with no runners on base), let the catcher retrieve the ball. Take a ball from your bag and toss it to the pitcher. (Just make sure the pitcher is awake and ready to catch the ball that you toss to him/her... (I’ve hit a few pitchers in my time!)
- Avoid calling time out unnecessarily!
- Many times, infielders will ask for time out as soon as they catch the ball. Avoid calling time out every time the ball is returned to the infield.
- While behind the plate, maintain a well-balanced stance, properly positioned in the “slot” with good head height, and timing. Call those borderline pitches strikes, starting early in the game and maintain consistency throughout the game.
Between innings,
- The plate umpire should take a position about a ¼ of the distance between home plate and on the side where the defensive players are coming out of their dugout.
- Remind the players to hustle on and off the field.
- Limit the pitchers to 8 warm up pitches in the first inning, or a new pitcher, and 4 during the rest of the game. (In softball, you can get away with 5 and 3, respectfully).
- Rule 8.03 tells us that these preparatory pitches shall not consume more than one minute.
- While we are not going to use a stop watch to enforce this, we do want to ensure that we are not wasting a whole lot of time with warm up pitches.
- If the last half inning was long, or if it is cold, you may want to give the pitcher 5 or 6 warm up pitches. Conversely, if the catcher is not ready and an alternate does not come out immediately, you may want to reduce the number of warm up pitches.
By following the above suggestions, you may be able to reduce your games by as much as twenty minutes! For more information about plate mechanics, please visit Little League’s Umpire Resource Center at: www.littleleagueumpire.org
§ Finally for umpiring :
READ THE BOOK AND KNOW THE RULES