Blue's Quote if the Day

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During casual, between inning, conversation, I pointed out that the opposing team's Flex was playing in the field every-other inning and suggested he may want to "educate" the coach since some other coaches may not be as tolerant as I am. Blue said, "This is school ball and we follow OHSAA rules 'to the letter'. The Flex can come in or out at will." My response, "I guess I'm gonna have to get me one of them there OHSAA rule books." Oh boy; gotta love school ball.

 

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It could be legal for the FLEX to play defense every other inning. Of course, it involves some other moves and substitutions and you didn't mention if any of those were happening or not.

 

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As bretman stated...playing defense for multiple players is not a problem. Its when the Flex enters the lineup for the DP that the real issue begins.

 

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I think the point is that the flex did not play defense every other inning, For that to happen they have to be removed from lineup and can only re enter one time.

 

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The OP says that the FLEX was playing defense every other inning. Remember, the FLEX is a position in the line-up. A team can go back and forth between using, or not using, the FLEX an unlimited number of times in a game.

Now, if you're talking about the player occupying the FLEX position that is a different story. The actual player is subject to the same re-entry rules that any other player occupying any other position is subject to.

How about this:

Sally is the DP. Mary is the FLEX.

inning 1: Mary/FLEX plays defense. All good so far.

Inning 2: Sally/DP plays defense. Mary/FLEX sits out and has left the game.

Inning 3: Mary/FLEX plays defense again. This requires one re-entry.

Inning 4: Sally/DP plays defense again. Mary/FLEX sits out. She is now out of the game permanently.

Inning 5: Now, we have an issue.

At what point was it discussed about the FLEX playing every other inning? As this shows, it could be the fifth inning before it even becomes an issue with the starting FLEX (Mary).

Of course, they're free to put a sub in for Mary and the sub would become the new FLEX player.

For Inning 5, the new player occupying the FLEX position (let's call her Cindy) plays defense.

Inning 6: Sally/DP plays defense. Cindy/FLEX sits out and has left the game. She has one re-entry left.

Inning 7: Cindy/FLEX re-enters and plays defense.

It is possible for the FLEX to play every other inning for an entire game. The same player can't be the FLEX in this case. Maybe they were trying to use the same player from the fifth inning on, but that's not what the first post said.

 

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I wouldn't have pointed it out if they had substituted and had a different player in the flex "position" as that wouldn't have been against the rules. Which rules? OHSAA, of course. Oh well, thought OFC would get a kick out if it; my bad.

 

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I wouldn't have pointed it out if they had substituted and had a different player in the flex "position" as that wouldn't have been against the rules. Which rules? OHSAA, of course. Oh well, thought OFC would get a kick out if it; my bad.

No problem - that was implied and everybody understood that. I think Bretman was being a bit of a smartaleck. Ironically, for someone that is splitting hairs, his explanation of an example wasn't thoroughly accurate.

 

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Smartaleck, maybe. But I was really just pointing out that if the beef was with the FLEX playing defense every other inning- which is exactly what TR said was happening- it's possible that can be done legally.

Which part do you think is inaccurate?

 

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Simply mentioning Sally played defense is irrelevant to the Flex's status - Sally could have played defense every inning.

You didn't mention whether there was a substitution for the Flex in innings 2, 4 and 6. If there wasn't, it would have been accurate to say Sally played defense for the Flex, so the Flex left the game.

Cindy can't be a sub for Mary because Mary was not in the game. Cindy simply entered the game in the Flex position.

 

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Fair enough. But I wasn't saying that the rotation I listed is the only way the FLEX could play every other inning. It is just one possible example. If you threw in every possible comination of the DP playing defense for players other than the FLEX and all the possible substitutions that could be made, that post would get really...long. Even longer than it was.

As for the last part, I guess that technically you're correct that Cindy wasn't a substitute, since no one had to be withdrawn from the game to let her come in. She was "a player who had not yet participated in the game that was inserted into the vacant FLEX position". Better?

 

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Fair enough. But I wasn't saying that the rotation I listed is the only way the FLEX could play every other inning. It is just one possible example. If you threw in every possible comination of the DP playing defense for players other than the FLEX and all the possible substitutions that could be made, that post would get really...long. Even longer than it was.

Irrelevant. My main point was your explanation lacked the level of detail that you brought up regarding the OP.

As for the last part, I guess that technically you're correct that Cindy wasn't a substitute, since no one had to be withdrawn from the game to let her come in. She was "a player who had not yet participated in the game that was inserted into the vacant FLEX position". Better?

By definition, Cindy was a substitute since she wasn't in the starting lineup. Again, the inaccuracy was mentioning Mary when Cindy entered the game because Mary wasn't in the game at that point.

 

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Irrelevant. My main point was your explanation lacked the level of detail that you brought up regarding the OP.

The relevance is that it was a sample rotation that I constructed myself. So if my example says "the DP sat out", or "the FLEX played defense", that can't be an inaccurate statement because it is simply the scenario I created.

If, on the other hand, I had said something like "this is the only way this rotation can be accomplished", or that "the DP and FLEX can't be playing defense at the same time", those would be inaccurate statements. But I didn't say that.

By definition, Cindy was a substitute since she wasn't in the starting lineup. Again, the inaccuracy was mentioning Mary when Cindy entered the game because Mary wasn't in the game at that point.

Wordsmithing aside, is there anyhing in my post that would be a rule violation? No.

Now, true or false: The FLEX may legally play defense every other inning throughout the entire game.

This is a true statement. But the OP seemed to imply that it was false.

 

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...Now, true or false: The FLEX may legally play defense every other inning throughout the entire game.

This is a true statement. But the OP seemed to imply that it was false.

Bretman, I agree with most of what you have said, however, what I "implied" was that there was a rules violation in my case and I pointed it out to the umpire. The point I was making in my OP was that the umpire said, "...The Flex can come in or out AT WILL..." which is absolutely false. Further, he said, "This is school ball and we follow OHSAA rules 'to the letter'." OHSAA doesn't have a Flex/DP rule, NFHS does. You guys have steered this completely into the weeds. I understand that the topic of Flex/DP is so widely misunderstood that the mere mention of it elicits "rules explanations"; however, this was about an umpire saying something silly (two things really) and not an inquiry for "How could a Flex play every-other inning?"

 

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So... for the "violation clarification" (since this is where the thread ended up) - Opponent turns in a lineup that has Sally in the Flex and starting at 1B. After we score 7 runs with only one out, Sally (also a backup pitcher) is pulled from the field and the DP put on 1st base. Sally is warming up and getting ready to pitch. Original pitcher finishes the inning. For inning #2, Sally is on the rubber but she wasn't getting it done either. For inning #3, the original pitch is back in and Sally is on the bench. For inning #4, Sally is playing 1B again. No "substitutions" were made. At this point I mention it to Blue and he makes his silly comments.