Vertical Sports Adult Men’s and Coed Softball Rules

No one may be added to a roster during the tournament. Rosters and schedules will be added to www.quickscores.com/verticalsports.

• Improper attitude will not be tolerated. There will be no questioning or arguing about judgment calls, all rule infractions may be handled by the coach, and only in a proper manner.

• Base distance is 70 feet, and the pitching distance is 50 feet.

• All players must wear their jersey and all jerseys must match.

• Men and Coed Leagues will use a 12" USSSA stamped ball. All balls will be Classic M balls with .40 COR and 325 compression. Game balls will be provided by the Sports Ministry.

• First team listed on the schedule is the home team. Due to COVID-19 restrictions each team will have their own devotion and prayer separately before the game. A devotion will be provided to each team in the dugout. A scorekeeper will be provided by Vertical Sports for all adult games. We encourage social distancing as much as possible, including within dugouts (if you need to setup an area behind the dugout please do so. We will hand sanitizer in dugouts to use between sharing equipment.

2021 USSSA slow-pitch rules will apply in addition except for the following:

• Game Time – A ten minute grace period will be allowed before a forfeit is called. Must have nine players present to begin a game. An out will be taken for your tenth batter if the tenth batter is not present. A team can complete the game with eight players in the event of an injury or emergency. There will be an out assessed to the departing player's position in the batting order if only eight players are left. If a game begins with 9 players and a 10th player shows up, they may be added in the field and must be placed at the end of batting order. If a team has 8 players, they can add/pickup to make 9 players but NOT to make 10 players. If a team has 7 players, they forfeit.

• Pitcher’s Screen- A protective screen will be placed beside the pitching rubber at all times.

• Stealing Base- There will be NO base stealing in either men’s or coed due to the addition of the Pitcher’s Screen.

• Extra Batters- All leagues will be permitted to bat as many as they wish in the lineup granted they submit the lineup prior to the first pitch. Once the lineup is submitted additional players must be added to the end of the batting order and scorekeeper notified. If all players in lineup have batted, no additional batters may be added.

• Extra Innings - Ties will result in an extra inning with the batter facing a 3-2 count. The batter will take a walk or strike out. Extra innings will last until a team has won the game. There will be no additional runner in extra innings.

• Home Run Rule - Limit of 3 over the fence home runs by one team. Plus one rule applies for additional home runs. Any home runs that exceed the limit result in an automatic out. Plus one clarification: regardless of who gets to 3 homerun limit first, once both teams are at 3 the option to hit a 4th is open to BOTH teams. This applies to home runs 4, 5, 6 and so on as well.

• Time Limit –Game time limit is an hour (you will have 5 minutes on the front end of the game for team devotions. Cannot start new inning after 55 minutes. This will help us get all games in while still disinfecting for COVID-19 procedures. Players will be encouraged to expedite changing of field between innings. Umpires will penalize teams if this becomes a problem (i.e. one strike on the incoming team; one ball on the outgoing team). Pitcher will only be allowed warm up pitches as time allows.

• Batting- All batters will start with a 1-1 count with a courtesy foul, including Coed. Coed: You can bat all your players as long as you have equal numbers of men and women. The order will be male, female, male, female with no men batting back to back but if you have more women than men you can bat women back to back. Lineups should have 10 or 12 players, including at least 5 women.

• Run Rule - If one team is ahead by twenty (20) or more runs after three (3) complete innings or fifteen (15) after 4 innings or 10 after five (5) complete innings the game is over.

• Intentional Walk - If a team wishes to intentionally walk a batter, the pitcher need only to notify the umpire behind home plate. No pitches are thrown. • Coed: If male batter is walked, he takes 2nd base. Subsequent female batter may either bat or take first base if there are two outs. If there are less than two outs the female batter must bat.

• Courtesy Runner- Teams are given 1 courtesy runner per inning. The runner may be any person in the lineup. If the runner is still on base when his/her turn in the batter order comes up, it will be an out. • Coed may have 1 male and 1 female per inning.

• Any player ejected from a game will not participate in the next game; and any disciplinary action taken by umpires is subject to review for further action from the Sports Minister.