Travel Baseball Rules
Travel baseball is a collection of teams and organizations that promote competitive baseball for kids from as early as eight and nine years old through the day they earn a college scholarship. Most of the travel teams operate with the purpose of exposing players to high-level coaching. They are also take teams tournaments and showcase events to provide them access to both college and professional baseball scouts. The rulebook that is used within the travel ball fraternity is compiled by the United States Specialty Sports Association.
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Field Dimensions
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The USSSA rules that are in use by travel baseball teams use a variety of different field sizes to conform to the age of the players involved. Seven and eight-year-olds play on a field with 60-foot base paths and with the pitching rubber 40 feet from home plate. Nine and 10-year-olds move to 65 feet between bases and 44 feet (nine) or 46 feet (10) from the plate to the pitching slab. Eleven and 12-year-olds play with 70-foot base paths and a 50-foot mound placement, while 13-year-olds are at 80 feet and 54 feet. Fourteen-year-old teams can choose to play at the 13-year-old distance or at 90-foot base paths and the rubber at 60 feet, 6 inches. That is the size of a regulation baseball diamond and is the field that 15-18-year-old players use.
Equipment
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All players must wear uniforms and all uniforms must have numbers on them. The tournament or league director is responsible to enforce uniform regulations. Players age 12 and under are not allowed to wear metal cleats, but once they reach age 13, metal cleats are allowed. The catcher is required to wear and helmet and mask, with a throat protector either as part of the helmet or attached to the mask. He must also wear shin guards and a chest protector and use a catcher's mitt. All hitters, on-deck batters and youth baseball coaches must wear a helmet with flaps covering both ears.
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Line-Up Options
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Teams in the divisions for players age 14 and under have three options for their batting order. They can hit with the standard nine-player batting line-up with the other players being used as subs. If this is the choice, starters are allowed to leave and re-enter the game one time. The second option is an extra player. The team would bat 10 while having just nine in the field. The third choice is to use a continuous batting order in which all roster players on the roster bat regardless of who is in the field. A team must designate the approach it will take before the game, and it must stick with it the entire game. The 15 and older divisions do not have the extra player option or the continuous batting option, but they do have a designated hitter rule that follows the high school rule. One hitter can be designated to hit only in place of one position player who plays the field but does not bat.
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References
- Photo Credit throwing the baseball image by jimcox40 from Fotolia.com
