To Build Character, Or To Build Self-Esteem? When PC and Sports Collide

[Dr. Mercury]

http://www.komotv.com/news/6774487.html


Ken Schram: Show no mercy

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By Ken Schram (kenschram@komo4news.com)

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SEATTLE - 64 to nothing.

Woodinville High School took it to Franklin in a game of fast-pitch softball.

Now there's all sorts of jabbering about creating a new version of the so-called "mercy" rule.

The current standard is that if a team has a 10-run lead after 5 innings, game over. The new proposal would be end of game after 3 innings if a team has a 15-run lead.

There's all this hue and cry about preserving a kids self-image, with the answer apparently being to artificially prop them up with rules that effectively say "Hey, you are such an enormous loser that you can't even be in the game."

Great lesson to teach kids.

When things get really tough, just pack it all in, head home and maybe mommy will give you some milk and cookies.

By all means, don't expose kids to the notion that competition actually means competing.

Let them believe that when the road gets rough all they have to do is just pull off to the side and wait for someone to come along and pave it for them.

Yeah, let's get behind the whole mercy rule concept.

So what if it doesn't really encourage hard work and tenacity.

Let the kids fail, but keep their self-image all shined and polished.

Mercy.

Have something to say to Ken? E-mail him at kenschram@komo4news.com (kenschram@komo4news.com).

And be sure to join Ken, along with John Carlson, on "The Commentators", which airs every weekday from 9-Noon on AM 570 KVI.

It's a lively exchange of information, insight and perspective with two guys who don't agree on much, but still manage to enjoy each other as they tackle issues of the day. Even better, callers are invited in on the verbal action.

[Kalzazz]

Bah!

In baseball or softball it shouldnt be over till its over

Nothing in the rules says you can get back from a 15 run deficit

[carmachu]

I dont know. I'm kinda torn on this. It aint over till its over, and all that.

On the other hand, there have been game match ups that are akin to kicking a puppy when I was a kid. We were out pitched, outmatched, outhit and generally outgunned. No amount trying was going to change that.

[Wook]

I dont know. I'm kinda torn on this. It aint over till its over, and all that.

On the other hand, there have been game match ups that are akin to kicking a puppy when I was a kid. We were out pitched, outmatched, outhit and generally outgunned. No amount trying was going to change that.

the point is not whether or not you can come back from a deficiet. The point is can you take a licking and keep on ticking? Losing out is part of life and filing off the sharp edges, as Chim put it, does no service to the children in question in any arena of life.

[Archer]

When you get ahead that far, the winning team is supposed to play people off the bench who don't normally get into the game.

[Parzival]

If you're getting emberrassed, you need to play better.

<shrug> I've been on the losing end of the mercy rule. It sucked. But shortening the misery has no place in sports.
(If one side keeps batting around, necessary to get the 10 run lead, the five innings aren't a bit shorter in duration than a normal 9 inning game.)

[Detritus]

I'm not sure I agree with the premise that the mercy rule was borne of political correctness. Everyone knows the score, so to speak, when the mercy rule gets invoked, even if it isn't spoken aloud -- the losers don't belong on the same field as the winners that particular game, and it's a waste of everyone's time to go further. I'm pretty sure I understood that at some level in Little League, let alone high school.

[Dr. Mercury]

The mercy rule predates PC by at least 15 years, maybe more, but the recent trend in amending it and the rules regarding heckling IMO stems from PC attitudes. I've never liked the mercy rule, and I've never been on the losing end of it.

If a team intentionally runs up a score by keeping their starting lineup in the game, that's just plain rude. Brushbacks, spiking, headhunting usually follow. But the mercy rule just adds insult to injury. My uncle's Legion ball team in the late 1970s and early 1980s was on the winning end of a dozen or so 4½-inning games, and getting out of the park without getting into a fight was a challenge.

As for the War On Heckling, I've seen similar rules being discussed by the State of Washington regarding HS athletics:

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/COL03/703300359/1082/SPT0102



No Chatter, chatter!
New rule silences baseball tradition: No more on-field taunting

In a few weeks, 23,000 kids in the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky area will celebrate the 75th anniversary of Knothole baseball by filling the springtime air with the nostalgic sounds of the game we all grew up with:

Hey, battuh-battuh. Please swing if it makes you feel good about yourself!

The Knothole Club of Greater Cincinnati has decided to eliminate "chatter." Unless the chatter is "positive" and directed at your own team. You can't say "We want a pitcher, not an underwear stitcher!" unless, maybe, you grew up in a culture that idolizes underwear stitchers. Standings for the Feelgood Division of the Self Esteem League will be available any time now.

Until then, a moment of silence for the death of an American tradition. Proponents of the new edict say it was a necessary response to increased incidents of taunting. They cite one especially ugly example from June, involving a game in Colerain Township between two teams of 14-year-olds in the A-2 division. One parent received 15 stitches after a player whacked him on the forehead with a metal-spiked baseball shoe.

The incident began with a coach being ejected for arguing a balk call and escalated into a full-scale brawl.

Apparently these days, one kid's "no batt-uh" is another kid's "let's throw down."

"We didn't want Knothole to get a bad name for anything," Knothole president Dave Epplen explained. "If you're saying, 'Swing, batter,' and this poor little kid is swinging at everything, he feels bad and maybe he turns to the catcher and gets mad. Honest to gosh, I didn't have any trouble doing this."

Knothole follows the Rules of Major League Baseball. Rule 4.06(a)(2) states, "No manager, player, substitute, coach, trainer or batboy shall at any time, whether from the bench, the coach's box or on the playing field or elsewhere, use language which will in any manner refer to or reflect upon opposing players, an umpire, or any spectator."

Coaches and players found guilty of "negative" chatter will be warned once, then suspended for a game. Maybe they'll be sentenced to watching "Oprah" for a month, too.

"We're going to follow the rule as it's written," Jim Pecot, umpire coordinator for District 34, said.

Practically speaking, there is reason for the move. Taking their cues from the pros, kids have raised (or lowered) the level of chatter to suit the times. It isn't enough now to tell a pitcher he has a glass arm. You also have to question his heritage or disrespect him after a home run.

Given that some of the umpires working lower-level Knothole games are as young as 12, it can be hard for them to differentiate between good-natured chatter and over-the-top woofing. As Pecot put it: "It goes from 'Hey batter, batter' to telling the pitcher he sucks. It gets out of hand. Sometimes, that can be tough for a 13- or 14-year-old umpire to handle."

Well, OK. Kids can be cruel (always have been); young umps can be, um, callow (always have been); and parents, coaches and anyone else who should know better can release their inner-ogres when it comes to kid sports (always have). Any adult ragging a 10-year-old player or a 12-year-old ump should be sent to his room with no "SportsCenter."
But, c'mon.

There are some truths we hold self-evident. Big stuff, such as life, liberty and all that. And there are other, more vital verities, such as the right to shout mildly denigrating things at the other team's pitcher.

Or to tell a batter to swing. Or that a catcher's underwear is showing. Great, all-American stuff.

Only now, that's out. You can't have little taunters screaming "Pitcher has a glass arm!" and not expect Attica to break out.

"Chatter is the foundation of youth baseball," said Nick Lutz, a coach in the Loveland Youth Baseball Organization's D-Rec League of 8- and 9-year-olds. "If my self-esteem had been damaged by Knothole, I'd have killed myself by now. I was probably a .190 hitter. I still had fun yelling 'hey batter-batter.' "

The kids on Lutz's team have varying opinions. Essentially, they come down to "Do we still get a snack after the game?"

Said Ryan Mangan, 9: "It's sort of weird, but it has a point. Some kids don't have the same feelings as you." Will Reverman, 8, allowed that the rule was "dumb." Ryan Lutz said it was "really dumb."

Eight-year-old Michael Staley had a more practical concern: "We can still steal, right?"

Dave Epplen and Jim Pecot plead for some understanding. It isn't as if they wanted the rule enforced.

"It's society now," Pecot said. "It has taken a lot of the fun out of it."
A committee made up of coaches and members of Knothole's board of directors made the decision. Leagues began enforcing the rule halfway through last season, Pecot said.

"It's not like all of us stood up and said, 'Yea, this is great.' I've (umpired) some games where I'm glad it's there and other ones with the younger kids where I wish it wasn't."

Epplen, 62, is a Northern Kentucky native. He's also an umpire who credits Kentucky resident and National League ump Randy Marsh with teaching him to call a game. Epplen's five sons played Knothole. Epplen himself is a Knothole alum. He was a catcher.

"I was back there telling kids to swing at everything," he said.
Hey battuh-battuh?

"Absolutely. That, and things like, 'C'mon, batter, you can't hit,' " Epplen said. Enforcing the anti-chatter rule "doesn't feel like baseball," he said. Nick Lutz put it differently: "It's the most asinine thing I've heard in youth sports, and I've heard a lot."

As a public service, we offer Coach Lutz and his players and peers a few suggestions for proper chatter, to nurture a sensitive, non-threatening environment that preserves the dignity and self-worth of our tender young people:

"Hey, pitcher, your mother wears Manolo Blahniks!"

"We want a pitcher, not a glass of the finest French Cabernet!"

"Yes, batter! Yes, batter!"

"The umpire is visually challenged in a positive way!"

Finally, instead of whistling "Three Blind Mice" to disagree with an umpire's call, bow deeply from the waist, refer to the man in blue as "My Lord" and offer to wipe his glasses with a silk pocket square from Neiman Marcus.

Let's see 'em toss you for that.

E-mail pdaugherty@enquirer.com

[Detritus]

The no-chatter thing is just silly. It's one thing if it's inappropriate (e.g. racist), but just trying to induce the batter to swing should be fine.

Shortening of the mercy rule might be a symptom of the cult of self-esteem run amok. I guess I can see that. The 5-inning rule is fine for 7-inning games, that's about 70% of the game, enough of determine whether it should be ruled a TKO. I've never played in an "official" (i.e. at least one umpire is getting paid to call the game) 9-inning game. In that case, I don't think the mercy rule should be invoked before the 7th inning, if you were going to use it.

[carmachu]

I'm not sure I agree with the premise that the mercy rule was borne of political correctness. Everyone knows the score, so to speak, when the mercy rule gets invoked, even if it isn't spoken aloud -- the losers don't belong on the same field as the winners that particular game, and it's a waste of everyone's time to go further. I'm pretty sure I understood that at some level in Little League, let alone high school.

Pretty much. I remember T-ball having a similar rule for them, after 9 batters the inning ended, and they teams changed from fielding to batting, due to the small kids not being able to field well....

Seems born of the same methodology.


No chatter is good and bad. Back when we played, I dont recall chatter being a problem. But if folks are yelling inapproriate stuff, it should be stopped.

[Dr. Mercury]

The culture of self-esteem seeped into the major leagues a few years ago when the Seattle Mariners began ejecting paying customers for wearing Yankees Suck T-shirts and for throwing pay money at a certain then-shortstop then playing for the Texas Rangers. I also got threatened with ejection for heckling Cleveland's C. C. Sabathia about his weight. The clueless alleged fans in front of me objected to my comments and called an usher over.

The usher asked me if I was so callous and hypocritical as to injure a man's self-esteem and jeopardize his ability to perform his job. I told him (a.) that was the point because (b.) he's the enemy and (c.): "If I were paid millions of dollars to play a kids' game, I'd be in shape. Now, unless I'm using obscene language or waving my d:tapedshut:ck around, or I'm falling-down drunk, leave me alone."

[carmachu]

Nice job there Doc!

[Kalzazz]

I thought making fun of the other side was a time honored baseball tradition?

[Parzival]

I'm aghast.

[Dr. Mercury]

I thought making fun of the other side was a time honored baseball tradition?
It is. So's booing the home team when they elevate(?) ineptitude to an art form.

[Kalzazz]

Decrement maybe?