default
Member
Most girls that I have seen that have worn them since 10u quit wearing them once they get to high school. Did not see many at all in 16U this year.
default
Member
Personally it is very scary watching the younger ages play without them. Especially pitchers and the corners. IMO facemasks should be MANDATORY. Sorry I don't see that wearing one is a sign of weakness at ANY age or level of play.
There is a reason why helmets with facemasks and catcher's gear are required by rule. To protect the girls playing this game. Is it not also in the rules that any player catching for a pitcher, even during warm-ups must wear a mask?
It's a little odd we will spend $300+ on a bat but we won't spend $35 on a face mask and insist our DDs wear it at all times.
With my DD, no mask, no infield play period.
There is a reason why helmets with facemasks and catcher's gear are required by rule. To protect the girls playing this game. Is it not also in the rules that any player catching for a pitcher, even during warm-ups must wear a mask?
It's a little odd we will spend $300+ on a bat but we won't spend $35 on a face mask and insist our DDs wear it at all times.
With my DD, no mask, no infield play period.
default
Member
Corner infielders and pitchers mandatory. No debate.
default
Member
agree 100% We mandate it to our players 10u and 12u.
default
Member
Like nac said, some people like them and some people don't.
My dd is going into her 2nd year of 14u and she wears a mask when she pitches but refuses to wear one at 3rd.
My dd is going into her 2nd year of 14u and she wears a mask when she pitches but refuses to wear one at 3rd.
default
Member
Scariest thing I've ever seen in the 2009 HS D-1 final four game when Kelli got hit in cheek, ball went to fence, She was one of the best fielders in the state. This year Bradley pitcher hit in forehead twice in two games. Too frequent these days.
default
Member
Am very glad to see most young girls wearing them these days, and believe that will eventually lead to more and more girls wearing them in high school and college as well. College coaches won't have any choice but to sign girls who wear them, and that will be a good thing. When my DD was coming up, the girls weren't wearing them and I will say here that my only happy moment when she just finished her college pitching career was the realization that she was lucky enough to have never been directly hit except once in the leg while playing 18-U travel ball. Her glove probably saved about 10 direct hits to the face/head over her pitching career, and while it helped that she was a good fielder, we both also know that she had a little luck. I still shudder to think what might have happened and how we both would have felt if she only had missed one of those 10 shots. I don't care if they mandate them or not, but if I had another DD coming up as a pitcher, she would wear one and never look back if I had any say in the matter.
default
Member
My DD's have been wearing face masks since they were in 10u. They don't complain about wearing them and seem to be more aggressive wearing them. One used to pitch and wore all the time, now mainly playing corners. Do not wear them in outfield, although I did see a few times this season in 14u outfielders got hit in the head or shoulder when fly balls hit the tip of the glove / web then hit the player.
default
Member
Just adding some facts and statistics to the mix.
Untitled Document
Play Ball: Will new rules for bats make baseball safer? - Harvard Health Publications
Untitled Document
Play Ball: Will new rules for bats make baseball safer? - Harvard Health Publications
default
Member
Hey those FACTS are really great....but um.... we are talking FASTPITCH SOFTBALL here not Baseball. The NCAA did a Baseball study on line drives to pitchers, not a fastpitch study... No they are not the same sport. Pitchers in baseball are 150% farther away then a fastpitch pitcher is from the plate.. Leave to the NCAA to do a study on wood bats verse metal bats for baseball than turn around and say "Nope no need for facemasks in fastpitch either"
If they study fastpitch, it would say fastpitch softball, not baseball..And if NCAA does not know the difference between the two , well that helps to explain our educations issues here in the USA.
default
Member
[video=youtube;edv8cAhUVds]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edv8cAhUVds[/video]
Also if anyone has watched the sports science show knows that a softball has a far greater impact force than a baseball....
Also if anyone has watched the sports science show knows that a softball has a far greater impact force than a baseball....
default
Member
if only he had on a mask..... How do you argue this....
Batted balls can injure—and worse
When a baseball batter with a good, hard swing makes contact, the ball can leave the bat going 100 miles per hour or more—and that’s with a wood bat. It’s amazing, really, that people don’t get hurt more often. This spring, Luis Salazar, a minor league manager for the Atlanta Braves, lost an eye after he was hit by a foul ball. And four years ago, a minor league first-base coach, Mike Coolbaugh, was killed when he was hit in the head by a line drive. After Coolbaugh’s death, the rules were changed so first- and third-base coaches in the minor and major leagues are now required to wear helmets.
It takes just a few minutes (actually, more like seconds) of Web searching to find several reports of high school players getting seriously hurt by batted balls. The case that has attracted the most attention is 18-year-old Brandon Patch, who was pitching in an American Legion game (American Legion is a summer league for high school players) in Montana in 2003 when he was struck in the head and killed by a batted ball. His parents have campaigned for a ban on metal bats and have sued the bat manufacturer.
Some systematic research has also been done. Several years ago, researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, collected reports of baseball-related injuries for the 2006 and 2007 seasons from a representative sample of 100 high schools. About 12% of the reported injuries (50 of 431) were from batted balls and half of them were to the head or face. The results were published in the journal Pediatrics.
I spoke with one of the Center’s researchers, Christy Collins, and she generously e-mailed me some additional data from Center’s the 100-school sample.
Overall, high school baseball is safe relative to other sports. Compared with eight other high school sports, it had the lowest injury rate during the 2009-2010 school year, according to the statistics Collins shared with me. (Not surprisingly, boys’ football had, by far, the highest injury rate).
Collins ran the numbers for baseball for the past five years from the high school sample, and the percentage of injuries from batted balls hovered around 10% of the total number of injuries (the same is true for girls’ softball). Pitchers (24.7%), third basemen (14%) and second baseman (11.8%) were the players most likely to be injured by a batted ball.
But the injury data that Collins and her coworkers have collected can’t be used to make comparisons between wood and nonwood bats because so few wood bats are used in high school.
Batted balls can injure—and worse
When a baseball batter with a good, hard swing makes contact, the ball can leave the bat going 100 miles per hour or more—and that’s with a wood bat. It’s amazing, really, that people don’t get hurt more often. This spring, Luis Salazar, a minor league manager for the Atlanta Braves, lost an eye after he was hit by a foul ball. And four years ago, a minor league first-base coach, Mike Coolbaugh, was killed when he was hit in the head by a line drive. After Coolbaugh’s death, the rules were changed so first- and third-base coaches in the minor and major leagues are now required to wear helmets.
It takes just a few minutes (actually, more like seconds) of Web searching to find several reports of high school players getting seriously hurt by batted balls. The case that has attracted the most attention is 18-year-old Brandon Patch, who was pitching in an American Legion game (American Legion is a summer league for high school players) in Montana in 2003 when he was struck in the head and killed by a batted ball. His parents have campaigned for a ban on metal bats and have sued the bat manufacturer.
Some systematic research has also been done. Several years ago, researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, collected reports of baseball-related injuries for the 2006 and 2007 seasons from a representative sample of 100 high schools. About 12% of the reported injuries (50 of 431) were from batted balls and half of them were to the head or face. The results were published in the journal Pediatrics.
I spoke with one of the Center’s researchers, Christy Collins, and she generously e-mailed me some additional data from Center’s the 100-school sample.
Overall, high school baseball is safe relative to other sports. Compared with eight other high school sports, it had the lowest injury rate during the 2009-2010 school year, according to the statistics Collins shared with me. (Not surprisingly, boys’ football had, by far, the highest injury rate).
Collins ran the numbers for baseball for the past five years from the high school sample, and the percentage of injuries from batted balls hovered around 10% of the total number of injuries (the same is true for girls’ softball). Pitchers (24.7%), third basemen (14%) and second baseman (11.8%) were the players most likely to be injured by a batted ball.
But the injury data that Collins and her coworkers have collected can’t be used to make comparisons between wood and nonwood bats because so few wood bats are used in high school.
default
Member
As a manager of older players, I don't tell my players whether they have to wear one or not. That's for the individual player and her parents to decide. The way I see it, though, is that if the player plays her position right and is sure of what she is doing, she shouldn't need one. At this rate, all nine girls will be wearing full body gear to protect themselves. Here's an idea for the parents and the coaches of the younger age groups -- please teach the girls proper fundamentals and hit ground balls at them endlessly. Prepare them for every kind of bounce or hop. Make them learn how to play the position right. Prepare your daughters for the game and all of its possibilities. A fielder who plays the position right doesn't need a mask. This is sports, not checkers. Accidents will happen, I could get hit by a bus, but that doesn't make me wear body padding or a helmet everywhere I go.How many of these incidents occur because the fielder was in improper position, didn't charge the ball and let it play her instead coming in and taking the ball before the hop, turned her head or closed her eyes? Take responsibility and teach the game. It's frustrating for those of us who get older kids who have never been taught the right way and have no idea how to play the game the right way.
default
Member
My dd wont even worm up with out it. Learned a few yrs. ago on rocky fields that she was pulling her head to avoid a bad hop, started wearing a mask and that made a better player out of her. She wears it in outfield as well because there have been times she switched to infield during an inning. Had a girl hit in face this yr. worming up and it knocked her 2 front teeth out, she was done for the season. Our short stop did not wear a mask and is the best kid on the team but missed several balls simply because she pulled her head up because she was afraid of a bad hop. When you pull your head your eyes come off the ball and your glove usually comes up with the rest of your body just enough for the ball to get under a grounder and last but not least, you only have one set of teeth.
default
Member
I may be on my own here but I would never let my kid (who is primarily an outfielder and sometimes plays 2nd) wear a mask in the outfield...
default
Member
No hijack intended, but why are we always addressing the face mask and letting the ball and bat manufacturers off the hook? The real reason for the mask is to protect the players inability to react quickly enough to a hard hit ball. If in fact the mast is to be worn as safety equipment shouldn't we be looking at the real causes that erode that reaction time? Or are we so enamored with the long ball that we will overlook the real unsafe equipment?
default
Member
We "let them off the hook" because we like it when the ball exits off the bat going 100 mph - that is why we shell out big $$$$ for the hottest bats!
default
Member
no doubt wear them. Seat belt debate can kick in now too...
End the college debate like this... if you (Collegiate Head Coach) don't like my DD because she is safe and not lacking ability... then we don't like you and someone else will get a super player that is safe and will go all out! Stop the BS, put it in the "unwritten" books as OK (not in the rule book) and move on.
End the college debate like this... if you (Collegiate Head Coach) don't like my DD because she is safe and not lacking ability... then we don't like you and someone else will get a super player that is safe and will go all out! Stop the BS, put it in the "unwritten" books as OK (not in the rule book) and move on.
default
Member
you are not on your own- OF with masks look ridiculous and I have a 12u that is an OF
default
Member
we were crushing balls to our outfielders to simulate grounders on a rough outfield.... thank the man upstairs this player had a mask... it her on a naaasty hop and not exaggeration... blew the mask off her face 10-12'! So, up to you! And depends upon where you play. And let me say she has incredible cat-like reflexes and very talented. So... it's like the one in a thousand chance (or whatever) and we just saved her from season ending surgery and maybe even worse!
