2010 Mickie Gordon Invitational Baseball Tournament

Tournament Rules

Rosters / players

• Rosters can include up to 18 players.
• Rosters must be submitted to the Tournament Director or Designee prior to the team’s first game.  Rosters are requested by May 16, 2010, in order that the team’s players’ names can be printed in a tournament program.  Rosters will be accepted after that date, but your team may not be listed in the program.

• 13U Division – All players must be born on or after May 1, 1996.
• 14U Division – All players must be born on or after May 1, 1995.
• 15U Division – All players must be born on or after May 1, 1994.

Uniforms

• All players must be dressed in full baseball style uniforms, and uniforms particular to a team shall be similar in color and design (matching).  No shorts are allowed.
• Managers and coaches shall dress in respectable attire for baseball and in similar color and style to each other (matching).  No jeans/work pants are allowed.  Full baseball uniform is recommended.

Protest committee

• All tournament games will be played in the presence of the Tournament Director or Designee and Protest Committee.  Any protest must be resolved prior to continuing play and decisions by the Protest Committee are final without appeal.  The Tournament Director or Designee and a Protest Committee member from each opposing team will comprise the Protest Committee.  Each team shall submit the name of the Protest Committee Member with their line-up sheet.  This person shall NOT be a Manager, Coach, or Player.

Line-up cards

• Line-up cards will be provided.  One copy will go to the opposing team, a second copy to the plate umpire, a third copy to the official scorekeeper and/or public address announcer (if applicable) a minimum of 15 minutes prior to scheduled game time.

Batting order / line-up

• Each team may opt to use the Extra Hitter (EH) position, thus creating a 10^th position in the batting order.  There will be no designated hitter.  If a team opts to use the EH, that team must continue using the EH throughout the game.  The only exception being if a player is injured and must be removed from the game, and the team does not have a substitute player to put in his place (then the EH position may be eliminated). 
• If a team opts to bat only 9 players, then the team must continue with a 9-player batting order for the remainder of the game.
• A team must start the game with 9 players.  Otherwise a forfeit will result.

Substitutions

• All substitutes shall be reported to the plate Umpire who in turn will notify the official scorekeeper.
• There are no minimum playing requirements for individual players.
• A starter that has been replaced may re-enter the game in the same position in the batting order only once during the game.  If a re-entered starter is again removed from the game, he cannot return to the game.  The EH is considered a starting player.
• A substitute player may not re-enter the game after having been replaced.  Once a substitute player has been taken out of the game, he may not re-enter.
• Pinch-runners count as a substitution, except when used as a Courtesy runner (see below).

Courtesy runners

• A courtesy runner may be used for the Catcher with two outs.  This will not count as a substitution.  You may not use a courtesy runner for any other player, or with less than 2 out.
• The courtesy runner must be a player that is currently not in the game.  If the team does not have a bench player, the batter that made the previous out may be used.

Contact rule

• If a runner attempting to reach any base intentionally and maliciously runs into a defensive player in the area of any base, the runner shall be called out on the play and immediately ejected from the game.  The object of this rule is to penalize the offensive team player for crashing the defensive player, rather than trying to reach the bases and home plate.  This is an Umpire’s judgment call and shall not be contested by any of the game’s teams’ participants; it is not an appealable or protestable call.

Pitching

• No player may pitch more than 7 innings in any two consecutive games.  For example:
  - If Pitcher A pitches 7 innings in Game 1, he cannot pitch in Game 2, but he can come back and pitch up to 7 innings in Game 3. 
  
  - If Pitcher B pitches 3 innings in Game 2, then he can pitch up to 4 innings in Game 3.  If Pitcher B pitches his 4 allowed innings in Game 3, then he can come back and pitch up to 3 innings in Game 4.

• One pitch thrown in an inning counts as an inning pitched.
• A pitcher, once removed from the game, cannot return to pitch at any time in the same game.
• The Manager or Coach of each team shall be responsible for signing the Pitcher’s Chart directly after the end of each game.  The Pitcher’s Chart shall be kept by the Official Scorekeeper or Tournament Director or Designee.

• In the Pool Play round, the home and visitor team designations will be pre-determined by the tournament director and listed in the schedule
• In the Semi-Final round, the higher seed will be the home team
• In the Championship game, the home and visitor team designations will be determined by a coin toss prior to the start of the game.
• Home team takes 3^rd-base dugout; Visitors take 1^st-base dugout.

Warm-ups

• Each team will be allotted 10 minutes of infield-outfield time before each game, on the game field.  If a team does not take its infield-outfield at the allotted time, it forfeits its warm-up. 
• The visitors will take infield-outfield first (25 minutes prior to game time), and then the home team will take infield-outfield second (15 minutes prior to game time).  The remaining 5 minutes will be used for team introductions and the Umpires meeting at home plate.

Pre-game batting practice

• Due to schedule requirements, batting practice will not be allowed on any game fields.

Game time

• No new inning will start after 1 hour and 55 minutes from the start time.
• All innings that start prior to the 1:55 time limit will be finished, subject to the following: 
• If the home team is ahead after the visitor’s bat in the top half of an inning, AND the 1:55 time limit is reached, then the game is over. 
• If the home team is at bat when the 1:55 time limit is reached, then the game will be over if and when the home team scores the go-ahead run.  If the home team is already winning and at bat when the 1:55 time limit is reached, then the game will end at that time.
• The home team will get its chance to bat in the bottom of an inning if the game is tied or the visitors are winning, even if the 1:55 time limit has been reached.

Tie games

• For pool play games, a game that is tied upon reaching the time limit will end in a tie, provided an equal number of innings at bat for the visitor and home teams.  For the purposes of seeding a team into the playoff round, a tie will count as one-half a win:
  
  -- A team with a record of 3 wins, 0 losses, 0 ties (3-0-0) will be seeded higher than a team with a record of 2-0-1.
  -- A team with a record of 2-0-1 will be seeded higher than a team with a record of 2-1-0.
   
• For playoff round games (including the Championship), games tied at the end of 7 innings, or upon reaching the time limit, will be played until a winner is determined.

Mercy rule

• The 10-run rule applies, which calls the game ending in the following scenario:
• One team leads by 10 or more runs after 5 innings (4½ if the home team is ahead).
• The Mercy Rule will NOT be in effect for the Championship game in each age Division.

Tie breakers and seedings for pool play format

• Teams will advance from pool play into the playoff round and be seeded in the playoffs based on their overall win-loss record. 
   
• Tie-breaker for two teams in same pool
   
  1. Head to Head
  2. Fewest runs allowed
  3. Run differential in games won with a max of 7 runs differential allowed per game
  4. Run differential in games played with a max of 7 runs differential allowed per game
  5. Fewest runs allowed per innings played  
• 6. Coin Toss 
   
• Tie-breaker for 3 or more teams (at any time a team is eliminated on tie-breakers, the tie-breaker "restarts" and reverts to the two team tie-breaker)
   
  1. Fewest runs allowed
  2. Run differential in games won with a max of 7 runs differential allowed per game
  3. Run differential in games played with a max of 7 runs differential allowed per game
  4. Fewest runs allowed per innings played

Player, Manager, and Coach conduct

• All players, Managers, and Coaches shall at all times act appropriately and represent their league and/or organization favorably.  Participants who for whatever reason/s are ejected by Umpires from any game during this tournament shall be asked to leave the field immediately; this means beyond the ballpark entrances.  Play will resume upon the satisfaction of the Umpire/s and the Tournament Director or Designee.  Ejected participants will be allowed to return to their positions with their team for later games at the discretion of the Tournament Director or Designee.

Refunds of entry fee

• Attempts will be made to reschedule games cancelled due to weather.
• In the event that there is no agreeable solution to make-up games (due to weather), entry fees will be refunded as follows:
• No games played – All but $50 administration fee will be refunded.
• One game played – 50% of the entry fee refunded.
• Two or more games played – No refund.
• If a team does not show for a game no refund will be awarded.