Personally, I hate drop-dead time limits. If a time limit must be used, I prefer games played with a "no new inning" after a set amount of time. At least you give both teams the same number of at-bats and let a team finish what it started.
Of course, timed games are a necessary evil in tournaments with a great number of games to squeeze in and a limited number of fields to work with. Anytime you put an artificial time constraint on a game designed to be played without a clock, stalling can rear its ugly head. Of the two, there always seems to be more problems with "drop-deads" than with "no new inning" time limits.
To answer Chicoflip's question, yes, the umpire does have an obligation to prevent illegal stalling. The penalty to the team illegally stalling is first a warning, then possible forfeit if the stalling tactics continue. In fact, the umpire has an obligation to keep the game moving along at all points from the first pitch to the last!
But the actions described- a visit to the mound and a conference with the runners or the batter- do not necessarily equal illegal stalling. The rules provide a set number of charged conferences by both the defense and the offense. These legal conferences can take place at any point of the game.
If a conference with the pitcher is legal in the first inning, the same conference is legal in the last inning. All the umpire can do is enforce the rules covering the number of conferences allowed, not when they are taken. He can also ensure that the legal time out does not last an inordinate amount of time and get the game moving along as quickly as possible.
He can also, at his discretion, limit the number and length of other time outs taken that are not covered by the charged conference rules, such as meetings between the pitcher and catcher, batters requesting time while at bat or by runners wanting to dust-off or adjust their equipment.
One pet peeve of mine is umpires that do not enforce the time restrictions between innings. The rules state that a pitcher may throw five warm-up pitches and they must be taken within one minute of the completion of the last half inning. How often do you see that rule enforced?
Add two or three minutes to the down-time between innings, while the defense slowly wanders to their positions, the catcher is still in the dugout scrounging for her gear or the pitcher takes multiple warm-ups in excess of five, multiply that for both teams and you have added perhaps 30 minutes worth of non-game related activity to the game.
Or, when dealing with a timed game, it might be better to say that you have actually subtracted 30 minutes from the time limit with the lack of hustle between inning changes. Those 30 minutes can make the difference between getting all your innings played, or even one team being on the short end of the stick when the game-ending time limit kicks in.
Drop dead time limits might stink, but if you enter your team in a tournament where you know they are in place, you have to accept the possibility that your team will be put in a position to have the time limit bite them in the rear.
