The purpose of this document is to describe the policy of the Association regarding the use of callup players.
Maximize playing time for all players by setting the number of players per team only one or two players above the number that can play at one time. When deciding upon the number of teams to be created in a given league in a given season, a choice has to be made between ensuring that each team has enough players that it can field a team even with a few absences (e.g., due to vacations) or keeping the number of players per team low and using substitute (callup) players in the case of absences..
Provide opportunities for stronger players to be challenged by playing upon occasion in a higher league. There is always significant variation in talent among any set of players grouped strictly by age. Some of the better players (or their parents) may wish to play with older players in order to be more seriously challenged and to develop their skills more rapidly. If "playing up" is permitted, it requires a mechanism for deciding which players are permitted to do so. Those players who do play up may face a choice between excelling in their normal age group or being average or below average players in a higher age group. As an alternative, a callup system permits stronger players to play leadership roles on their regular teams and have occasional opportunities to experience stronger competition.
Maintain fairness in regular season and playoff games. Two systems can be used when aranging for callup players: managers may contact players on their own or players can be assigned to them by someone else. The drawback with allowing managers to choose their own callup players is that a few players will play many games and other strong players may get few or no opportunities. It is therefore preferable to have a league callup coordinator (or a set of coordinators) make the assignments. When this system is used, it is important not to allow managers to gain an advantage for their team over an opposing team by directly inviting a player to play for them.
Accept occasional forfeits due to last minute absences (e.g., due to illness). A necessary consequence of the fair administration of the callup policy described is the occasional forfeit by a team unable to obtain an assigned callup.
Minimize impositions upon Association volunteers involved in arranging callups. Attempting to find last-minute callups can be very demanding for callup coordinators. Callup parents should not be subjected to early morning or late night phone calls.
Give priority to regular games of callup players. Teams should not lose their better players so that they can play in callup games.
Each league commissioner shall decide before the player draft which of two options to use for callups. The first is the callup process described below. The second is to obtain a list of players interested in being callups from the lower league and draft these onto teams as permanent callups. The commissioner should inform the VP-Baseball or VP-Softball of which option will be used. No other options may be used. If the draft option is used, callups may only be called when not enough players will be available.
League commissioners shall inform all managers of the callup policy before the first game of the season. Managers shall inform all coaches that may be called upon to substitute for the manager.
League commissioners shall select one or more callup coordinators for their league prior to the first game of the season.
League commissioners shall provide a list of callup players, along with the name of their team and a copy of the full league schedule, to the callup coordinator(s) from the higher league prior to the first game of the season.
Managers should attempt to give callup coordinators at least 24 hours notice when requesting callups. If requests are made later than two hours prior to a game, or later than 9:00 PM the night before a game to be played at 9:00 AM or earlier, callup coordinators are under no obligation to attempt to find a callup player (they may do so at their discretion).
Callup coordinators should keep track of each callup assignment (date, time, field, team, player assigned) as well as the number of times that each player is offered the opportunity to play and that each player does play (a rained-out game does not count). They should attempt to equalize the number of opportunities that each player is offered and attempt to ensure that each player plays in at least one callup game. The attached forms are useful for this purpose.
Callup players who are offered assignments and do not choose to play on three consecutive occasions will be removed from the callup list.
If a game for which a callup has been assigned is rescheduled (e.g., due to rain), the callup player is NOT assigned to the rescheduled game UNLESS the player he was replacing will still be unavailable at the rescheduled time. If more than one callup has been assigned to a game and one or more of the missing players will be available for the reschedule game, the callups to be assigned to the rescheduled game shall be determined by drawing straws. The callup coordinator shall be informed of any changes due to rescheduling.
Any manager may contact the callup coordinator to verify that an opposing team has used a properly assigned callup. A team using an unassigned callup will forfeit the game.
Managers or coaches who contact callup players directly or use an unassigned callup will be removed from their position immediately upon verification of this fact by the league commissioner. The desire to avoid a forfeit due to an insufficient number of players is not an acceptable excuse for violating this policy.
When a team is unable to field the minimum required number of players, a forfeit will be recorded for that team. If both teams are unable to field the minimum number, the game may be rescheduled upon agreement of both managers. Failing such agreement, a forfeit will be recorded for both teams. When a forfeit is recorded, an unofficial game should be played if possible (e.g., using players loaned from the opposing team) but the outcome of this unofficial game is not to be recorded.
Written December 8, 1998. Adopted 1999. Modified 2000. Document updated Feb. 6, 2005.