We couldn't steal until 10. But that was basically the only limitation when we were 9.

I think your post was meant to be re-assuring, but these rules suck. no homeruns? and I don't even know what 'no advancing on errors' means in the context of little league.

OK, I guess I didn't explain. Hit the ball over the fence and it's a home run. It happens about 5 times a year per team at the 9-year old age. You can hit doubles and triples if you hit a ball that the coach thinks would be one. So if you hit the ball over the OF's head to the wall, you can keep running, like real baseball. What you can't do is run around the bases when the ball goes through the second baseman's legs. You get the "single" but you don't go to second base in that case. The idea is to prevent this:

Ball goes through second baseman's legs.
Runner goes for second base.
Right fielder throws the ball to second base.
Shortstop misses the throw.
Runner goes for 3rd.
3rd baseman goes into short left to get ball.
3rd baseman throws ball to pitcher, who isn't exactly on third base.
Ball rolls to foul territory.
Runner goes for home.
Catcher runs and gets ball but can't get back home in time.

This would happen just about every play.

Keep in mind that I'm still talking about 8-9 year olds. When you hit 10 it's everything, stealing, inside-the-park homeruns on outfield misplays, etc.

The idea is to prevent this:

Ball goes through second baseman's legs.
Runner goes for second base.
Right fielder throws the ball to second base.
Shortstop misses the throw.
Runner goes for 3rd.
3rd baseman goes into short left to get ball.
3rd baseman throws ball to pitcher, who isn't exactly on third base.
Ball rolls to foul territory.
Runner goes for home.
Catcher runs and gets ball but can't get back home in time.

This would happen just about every play.

Ok, I guess. But I think you want to reward the teams that don't 'throw the ball around' and can get the ball into the pitcher reasonably fast.

Ball goes through second baseman's legs.
Runner goes for second base.
Right fielder throws the ball to second base.
Shortstop misses the throw.
Runner goes for 3rd.
3rd baseman goes into short left to get ball.
3rd baseman throws ball to pitcher, who isn't exactly on third base.
Ball rolls to foul territory.
Runner goes for home.
Catcher runs and gets ball but can't get back home in time.

Wait - my recollection from little league is that those were homeruns... Is it possible that I didn't hit a bazillion home runs in my little league career?

Yes, at the age of 8, you would have all the kids hitting home runs that were really misplayed grounders. This way they learn things like baserunning. Again, it's a gradual introduction. By the time they're 10 they're allowed to take the extra bases if the defense screws up.

I don't remember when they're allowed to truly steal. At 10 they can "steal" with 2 outs, but they can't leave the base until the ball crosses the plate. So while it's called stealing, you would call it a wild pitch. And here's the thing. I've never seen a kid get thrown out stealing this way. The catchers don't catch all that many pitches and the catchers can't throw the kids out even when they do (and, to be honest, the middle infielders don't always make it over to the bag anyway). So as soon as there are two outs, a single or walk is an automatic triple. Slow kid, fast kid, whatever. You have to limit what the kids are allowed to do in order to give them a good sense of the game.

Seriously, though, did Little League used to start with older kids or something? I have a friend who's in his late 40's. He insists that from day 1 they played full rules baseball, with kids pitching and catching and stealing and everything. He claims that only the fast kids could steal because the catchers would throw out the slow runners. The pitchers all could pitch and there weren't too many wild pitches and if there were the kids could take the bases.

My sons have both played Little League since they were eligible and it seems like the skills are matched nicely to the ages. Once the catchers are capable of both catching pitches and throwing out baserunners, they get full license to steal, etc.

'We' did not keep score, but the kids sure as hell did.

True. Sort of. I've listened to the kids recap and it bears incidental relationship to reality.

Seriously, though, did Little League used to start with older kids or something? I have a friend who's in his late 40's. He insists that from day 1 they played full rules baseball, with kids pitching and catching and stealing and everything.

I'm in my early (okay, getting damn closer to mid) 50's. When I played Little League, starting with 8-year-olds at the Farm level, that's how it was. (Only with stealing, you couldn't leave the base until the pitch reached home plate.)

He claims that only the fast kids could steal because the catchers would throw out the slow runners. The pitchers all could pitch and there weren't too many wild pitches and if there were the kids could take the bases.

On these points, your friend is FOS.

I've listened to the kids recap and it bears incidental relationship to reality.

Oh sure. But the running tally isn't that far off.

Yeah, [105] is insane. I'm... what... 31 now. Our LL had 2-year age brackets. Pinto was where I started, and it corresponded fairly exactly with under-10 soccer. So 8 and 9 year olds. Coaches pitched, everybody was terrible. My greatest achievement was catching a foul popup. 1 base on an overthrow. But that was the extent of our mollycoddling. Next bracket was Mustang, 10 and 11 year olds, and we pretty much just played baseball, except that you couldn't leave the bag til the pitcher released the ball. Stealing was still about a 50/50 proposition at best for most kids, though.

But - catchers not catching pitches, infielders not covering bags? That's crazy talk.

We had a kid in our league.. Aaron something, he played for the Seals (the only team not named after a major league team, no idea why. They wore light blue unis. I was on the Cubs, we wore orange & black, both years I played in that bracket we played the Indians, who wore green and yellow, in the championship game), he had sort of a quasi-Tony Pena one leg out kind of stance behind the plate, and he had a CANNON. I always used to look forward to playing them so I could test his arm (in the rare event that I actually got on base).

EDIT: I remember the unis clearly but I'm starting to doubt the year breakdown... I know I played under-8 soccer so Pinto might have been earlier... yep, looked it up. Pinto is 7 and 8 year olds, Mustang is 9 and 10. So in my town of 23,000, we were essentially playing baseball with very few restrictions at 9 years old.

I have a really distinct little league memory of reaching first on an error, advancing to second on a different error, advancing to third on a third error, and being tagged out at home trying to advance on a fourth error. I don't remember what age this was, probably 9. But it was when we had reached the kids pitching stage, and this sort of thing didn't happen all the time. We had a no stealing rule, but other than that it was legit rules.

Seriously, though, did Little League used to start with older kids or something? I have a friend who's in his late 40's. He insists that from day 1 they played full rules baseball, with kids pitching and catching and stealing and everything. He claims that only the fast kids could steal because the catchers would throw out the slow runners. The pitchers all could pitch and there weren't too many wild pitches and if there were the kids could take the bases.

I'm not sure when stealing was outlawed in LL, but in the DC version (the Walter Johnson League), beginning in 1956 you couldn't move off the base until the ball left the pitcher's hand. That effectively eliminated almost all stealing without the need for a formal ban.

In brisbane/ssf the 6s play T-ball, 7-8s play coach-pitch, 8-9s have 40mph pitching machines.

Well, "real" Little league (that is, leagues sanctioned bu Little League Baseball, Inc.) is "real" baseball for 9-12 year-olds. In most leagues, most nine year-olds won't be good enough to play in the "major" leagues (just as not all HS freshman are good enough to play varsity), and the "minors" have a few more restrictive rules. But except for no leading off bases before the pitch (and therefore no balks), mandatory play, a re-entry rule, and a few safety things like no head first slides and no bowling over catchers on plays at the plate, it's basically just scaled-down baseball.

I'm not sure when stealing was outlawed in LL

Never, AFAIK.

My sons have both played Little League since they were eligible and it seems like the skills are matched nicely to the ages. Once the catchers are capable of both catching pitches and throwing out baserunners, they get full license to steal, etc.

My sons have both played lowercase little league in two different leagues, and my recollection is the same (though it isn't quite full license - as players can't take off until after the ball crosses home plate). The one difference between my older boy's experience and the younger one is they introduced kids' pitch at an earlier age at my younger son's (my son actually pitched for the first time a few months before he turned 7, but that was young for the league), though the kids' pitch supplemented the machine-pitch also offered.

And any league that keeps score in a T-Ball league game has a seriously bent system of rules.

I don't know if we're still talking about cat food, and I'm certainly not reading the rest of the thread to find out, but:

Our cat turned into a huge asshole when we started feeding him wet food, because it has to be hand-dispensed and he began to associate really any movement on our part with being fed, whereas we have an automatic feeder for his dry food. Somewhat amusingly, he appears to have shifted his association to watching the feeder = being fed, so for about an hour before the thing goes off he will stare it down, mentally willing it to feed him. But we always joke that he has Prader-Willi ("chain the fridge shut!"), so he might be a bit of an outlier--or just an asshole (or just a cat, which is the same thing, really).

So clearly there are different sets of rules, but I think it's obvious that there's no systematic "no kids ever allowed to lose a ball game in Little League" going on.

The "everybody gets to bat once per inning, don't keep score" that people complain about is only at the lowest level when the kids are just learning to play the game.

We had this debate in a previous Little League thread; I was basically told I was insane for my memory that we had all regular rules at 12.

So clearly there are different sets of rules, but I think it's obvious that there's no systematic "no kids ever allowed to lose a ball game in Little League" going on.

The "everybody gets to bat once per inning, don't keep score" that people complain about is only at the lowest level when the kids are just learning to play the game.

Where I played you had T-Ball from 6 to 8 where everyone batted every inning. But they did keep score.

9-12 was Little League, everyone in one league. Except they had tryouts, so not everyone got to play. (There was an alternate league that took everybody else.) Most 9 year olds did little but strike out and walk, it was too big an age difference. Usually all of the 9 year olds were sons of coaches, anyway. Not the best system looking back.

We had this debate in a previous Little League thread; I was basically told I was insane for my memory that we had all regular rules at 12.

That's because the position that you could lead off and go with the pitch at Little League distances is, in our minds, simply untenable. On standard LL-sized fields, no catcher could ever throw out anything but the absolute slowest runner under those rules.

That was why you got tagged insane.

We had this debate in a previous Little League thread; I was basically told I was insane for my memory that we had all regular rules at 12.

This isn't how I remember it. I think you recoiled at the very idea of t-ball or adults pitching, even at age 7 or 8. And, regardless, most of the people on this thread are saying that they had regular rules ... except for limits on basestealing, which I think was a particular point of contention on the previous thread.

That was why you got tagged insane.

I know for a fact at 12 we had all rules because I remember our coach saying he was going to protest a game because he felt the pitcher balked in trying to pick off a guy on third base. I distinctly remember the kid leading off and just standing there when he got picked off.

Before 12? I'm pretty sure we never played by softball lead off rules but can't confirm. Pretty sure we played t-ball in first grade, and certainly no leading off then. We never played coach pitch or pitching machines. By fifth grade we played the dropped third strike rule. And we never at any level had prohibition on diving or sliding.


Maybe...just maybe we could lead off, but not steal. Cause I don't remember ever stealing any bases until high school and didn't play between 6th and 10th grade.

I don't know if we kept score in first grade, but afterwards absolutely.

I think the league I was in started allowing stealing (like for reals) around 10 or 11. I remember being twelve when I learned to throw from my knees as a catcher and I'd been throwing for a year before that. I only remember the 12 y.o. thing because I learned to throw from my knees but my pitchers didn't learn to duck until a few weeks later when I caught one of them in the ear with a throw. It took a while for coach to convince them not to duck after every pitch just in case after that.

I know for a fact at 12 we had all rules because I remember our coach saying he was going to protest a game because he felt the pitcher balked in trying to pick off a guy on third base. I distinctly remember the kid leading off and just standing there when he got picked off.

And what we said, and will continue to say, is that a league that allows leading off and stealing at conventional Little League distances is unworkable (unless you want every walk/single to automatically result in a runner on third two pitches later).

I suppose it may be possible (though I'm still skeptical) at really high-level travel ball events, but not at the local league level.

If you were playing in a league that allowed leading off/holding runners (including the balk rule)/stealing at age 12 or less, you weren't playing on a conventional LL field.

If you were playing in a league that allowed leading off/holding runners (including the balk rule)/stealing at age 12 or less, you weren't playing on a conventional LL field.

I don't think there's any problem with leading off if a strict no stealing rule is in place. I don't remember any one trying to steal on the catcher either. I DO remember my coach wanting me to steal after being walked (trot to first, turn and just keep on going) they sent me back. I think the umps said the ball was dead for some reason. My coach wasn't happy with the ruling.

I also remember getting nailed at home on a WP that didn't roll far enough away. Pretty sure I had a lead.

You have to remember, there are some pretty big kids by age 12. Even by little league standards.

you weren't playing on a conventional LL field.

Maybe. Maybe it was more of a 'sandlot league'. We did have two girls on our team. and the school stopped fielding teams at 6th grade (none for 7-8th). Also the school wasn't in the school system, so we played rural schools on the outskirts of town.

I DO remember my coach wanting me to steal after being walked (trot to first, turn and just keep on going) they sent me back.

That's a legal play under current Little League rules. Again, I'm talking about Little League Baseball, Inc. Lots of kids play organized baseball that is governed by different national organizations (eg -- Cal Ripken League) and may have slightly different rules. Lots of local leagues aren't even affiliated with any national organization, and play under their own rules. And of course, lots of local league officials (and coaches and umpires) don't bother to know the rules and enforce them properly.

I have a hard time reconciling the notion that kids aren't playing sports competitively enough with what I've actually witnessed as a parent. Sure, at the lowest level, they do not keep score. But as soon as that's over, winning becomes the number 1 priority of at least 1/2 the teams in the league. Coaches scout kids and try stack their teams with the best ones. Then they use aggressive strategies to run up the scores on their opponents. What you end up with is teams full of very skilled kids--coached by the most knowledgeable and competitive coaches--romping on teams full of kids who signed up for a rec league to learn a new sport.

And this is not isolated to one sport. It's every sport that my kid has tried and I've heard from other parents that it happens in other towns as well. If anything, kids sports are still way, way too competitive at the lowest levels.