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Website Functions

Intro To Website Navigation and Functionality - "The Quickie Primer On Where Things Can Be Found, What They Do and How They Work" at League Info > FAQ.

Each type of user - club owner/reps, team managers/coaches and players - has a different level of access privilege.

Club Level e.g., Club Owners/Reps

Owners have full read/write access to all menu items, including exclusive access to the OWNER HOME area, where all information on each of its home fields is maintained, including field availability, directions and a Master Field Use schedule. The Master Field Use schedule shows all scheduled games for all league teams assigned to that field (even teams owned by a different owner) as well as any "unreserved" field time. Each Master Field Use schedule is updated automatically as league teams update their online schedules. When such teams postpone or cancel a game in advance, and enter the change on their online game schedule, the Master Field Use schedule makes the field time available again. Similarly, when a game is rescheduled or added as new, the field time is automatically reserved on the Master Field Use schedule. The Master Field Use schedule can be a very useful management tool for field owners with several teams using a single field. They can be used to confirm umpire assignments and grant teams' in-season requests for field time, provided each team using the field keeps its online game schedule up to date.

OWNER HOME includes other important functions as well.

• It allows the club owner/rep to add/revise contact info for himself as well as any manager/coach for any of his teams.

• It maintains a record of the login codes for each of his teams.

• It provides a consolidated record of each club's total league registration bill as well as a billing record for each of its teams with links to the itemized invoices of each individual team (the latter is also available in TEAM HOME).

• The system automatically emails game reports created by each team in TEAM HOME to a list of newspapers selected by its team owner in OWNER HOME.

Each club owner/rep also has master access to all information and website functionality for any of its teams. For example, when a user signs in as a manager or coach or player and clicks My Schedule, the system brings up the schedule for his team only. When a user signs in as a club owner/rep and clicks My Schedule, he has access to the schedule for each of his teams. Because of this master access capability, it is convenient for club owner/reps to always sign in under their club level codes, rather than any individual team codes they may have.

Every league member, existing or new, must activate his franchise with the League Director and identify its teams for the upcoming season (activation). Thereafter, it is each club rep's choice whether he or a specific staff person on each individual team will be responsible for providing the League with all other team registration information. (It is strongly recommended that the person with the responsibility for providing all registration information also maintain the team website throughout the season e.g., enter changes to game schedule and roster as well as scores, player stats and game reports.)

TEAM LEVEL e.g., Team Managers/Coaches

Team managers/coaches have full read/write privileges for their own teams but they are not allowed into the OWNER HOME area and they are not allowed to release players. (Only the franchise owner has the authority to release a player, consistent with our league Constitution and By-Laws.)

Team managers/coaches enter all required registration information through the "Required Info" menu and all information pertaining to regular season activity is entered/viewed through the "Main" menu by clicking (TEAM HOME.

The REQUIRED INFO menu allows each team to add/revise the contact info for its manager, coaches and business manager or other contact person (REQUIRED INFO > TEAM INFO > COACHES). Each team should designate a primary contact person. Usually it will be the manager or a coach. That person should be linked twice, once in his coaching role and once as the team's primary contact. It is the primary contact that will be contacted first by the league or other teams for any business such as schedule confirmations and/or changes.

Team registration is paperless. REQUIRED INFO > REGISTRATION > OPTIONS/FEES provides each team with a customized list of registration options. Each club rep must make sure that each of his teams has made its registration selections prior to April 1. The best way to do this is to have the person responsible for making these choices attend the age division meeting for that team, where all registration options will be thoroughly explained. Once a team's registration choices are recorded, a team invoice, with payment record, is automatically created (REQUIRED INFO > REGISTRATION > INVOICE). When payment is received by the league it shall be recorded on the team invoice and fully paid teams shall be marked as such, automatically, on the team activation board.

Following registration, each club must provide its League Rep with a team availability schedule for each of its teams i.e., its "no play" dates/times (no later than April 1). The League Rep will enter these data to a website calendar to represent each team's availability for scheduling purposes. Until the league schedule is officially released, teams will be able to view this calendar but not edit it. Once the league schedule is officially released, this edit capability is enabled, and teams will be able to edit their availability calendar themselves. (See League Info > Program Info > League Intro (Scheduling) for a discussion of the rescheduling "grace period" and rescheduling rules/restrictions.) Teams also have the capability to update their online game schedules for postponements/reschedules etc. (Schedule, found in Team Home). Online team availability, field availability and game schedules are used as input to other website tools, such as the Master Field Use schedule noted above, and the PICK-UP Game tools. The results for both depend on accurate availability (team and field) as well as accurate game schedules for all teams. Thus, these schedules should be kept current throughout the season.

Even STANDINGS (found in TEAM HOME) could be computed incorrectly if teams don't update their online schedules. This could happen if two teams were scheduled to play more than the minimum required number of times and the games were played in a different chronological order than they were originally scheduled. All games will count as must-play games, in chronological order, until the must-play requirement is satisfied. All remaining games will counted as extra games, or exhibition. Thus, if games are postponed and played out of order, it is essential that they be postponed and rescheduled on the website. It is the responsibility of each team to record all its postponement/reschedules to avoid this error.

During the regular season, it is each team's responsibility to enter its game scores and player stats (optional) game-by-game. Each game on its schedule includes a link for entering scores and player stats as well as for edits. Teams can even add their practices or games with non-league teams to their online schedule if they wish (select add new game and write in "Practice" or the name of non-league team). Schedule updates, scores and player stats are all entered in MAIN > TEAM HOME > SCHEDULE.

Registration is not complete until a team has entered its roster online. Teams w/o at least nine players on their online roster by May 15 shall be discontinued from the League. AABC registered teams must print the official AABC roster form (completely filled in) from the website, and submitted it to the League Office with all required signatures (player, parent and manager). The League must receive each team's signed AABC roster no later than May 15 and before its first played game. A copy of each player's berth certificate and a copy of team insurance must be submitted with the AABC roster, or, if the team is not AABC registered, w/o the roster. Returning teams can have their prior year's rosters and coaching staff carried forward when their teams are activated. When initializing a roster from the prior year, the team may elect to release individual players that will not be back in the current year. Teams can also add new players to its roster(s) after the current year's roster has been initialized. Teams also may add players to the league's Free Agent pool and they may claim players from the pool. Claimed players are automatically added to the team's online roster. Teams should not claim a player until the player has made a commitment to join the team. Team rosters can be printed on the official roster forms of each sanctioning body. Stats can not be entered for any player not listed on the team's roster.

GAME REPORTS, TEAM MESSENGER and the DIVISION MESSAGE BOARD are all located in TEAM HOME, along with SCHEDULE, PLAYER STATS and STANDINGS. A further word about STANDINGS. Each divisional winner receives a berth in a sanctioned national championship tournament series (NCTS). The number of berths available to each division is posted at the top of each standings. Teams can be in as many as six divisions (including wildcards) competing for berths in a as many as three NCTS. Each team's full set of divisional standings is presented on a single page and each individual standings has a link to all necessary information on the applicable NCTS.

********************** The remainder of this section will discuss the remaining password restricted capabilities available to members and other full access website users.

All of the content in both the FRONT PAGE and the LEAGUE INTRO sections is accessible for public viewing. However, there are three functions on the FRONT PAGE that are password protected.

• Open Tournaments/Sign-up - these tournaments are sponsored by either ENYTB, its members or its registered non-members. To sign-up for an open tournament, non-member teams need to be registered with the League.

• Open Tournaments/Sponsor - members and non-members can announce/manage their own tournament on the ENYTB website. This feature includes an online sign-up capability for tournament entrants. Non-members need to be registered with the league and purchase a dedicated tournament code to obtain his service. Members need to purchase a dedicated tournament code to use this premium plus service as well. ENYTB sponsored tournaments will use this feature as well.

• Hosting ENYTB Events - the league needs fields for sanctioned and other tournaments that it hosts. The League pays all game expenses (umps and balls) and the field owner provides and maintains the fields, keeping whatever concession revenues are generated. A similar opportunity exists for regular season play on Opening Weekend. Because members are increasingly interested in these partnering opportunities, ENYTB will introduce an online bidding system in 2005 to fairly share these opportunities with all interested parties. Proceeds from these auctions will be dedicated to the League's Tournament Hosting Fund. Non-member teams need to be registered with the League to bid. They also would need to have the League Director enter its field(s) in the league's field database beforehand. Preference in bidding is given to members unless there is a significant difference in the quality of the facility offered and/or the amount bid.

The other main area of the website is INSIDE THE LEAGUE and it is password restricted in its entirety. Its tab reads LOGIN until the user is signed in. INSIDE THE LEAGUE provides full access users with an unparalleled suite of interactive tools to facilitate every aspect of league participation and/or enhance each team's total baseball experience.

INSIDE THE LEAGUE is personalized to each owner, team and player via the user's login codes (separate user ID and password required for each). Each owner and team is provided its own home area on the website. All information unique to that owner or team's participation in the league is entered and/or displayed in its home area. This includes everything from online registration and scheduling, to rosters, game scores, standings and player stats.

Login to the website requires a pair of codes, a user ID and a password. The user ID uniquely identifies each user as an owner, team manager or player/other. Each of these user groups has a different level of access privilege. Owners have the highest level read/write privileges, including exclusive access to the Owner Home area, where all field information is maintained. Owners also enjoy master access to any of its teams' website pages (explained below). Team managers have extensive read/write privileges as well but not quite as extensive as owners. Players/other have read only privileges.

The system also uses the user ID to determine the franchise or team the user is associated with. For example, when a user signed in with a team or player code clicks My Schedule, the system brings up the schedule for his team. Owners have master access to all their teams. When a user signs in with an owner code and clicks My Schedule, he will be asked to select a particular team from the group of teams he owns, before its schedule is shown. Because of this master access capability, it is convenient for owners to always sign in under their owner codes, rather than their individual team codes.

A complete list of the many interactive capabilities available within INSIDE THE LEAGUE to member owner/teams as well as non-members with full access privileges follows:

• TOURNAMENT POP-UPS - showing the complete information for every individual sanctioned NCTS tournament and ENYTB sponsored tournament. These pop-ups can be triggered from three different website locations:
  1. the FRONT PAGE - found by clicking the menu button for SANCTIONED TOURNAMENTS. This is the only location where all such tournaments are grouped by age division and can be viewed all at once. This is an ideal view for teams when they are trying to decide what to register for as date conflicts between tournaments are easy to identify.

  2. INSIDE THE LEAGUE - found on each team's REGISTRATION page (Team Home). This list includes only those tournament options that the team is eligible to register for, based on its age and skill level.

  3. INSIDE THE LEAGUE - found on each team's STANDINGS page (Team Home). Each standings includes a link to the sanctioned NCTS earmarked to it by the League. Click this tournament berth link on any standings and a list of the tournaments for that NCTS appears. Click the individual tournament desired and its pop-up appears.

     NOTE: Similar tournament pop-ups are available for OPEN TOURNAMENTS (FRONT PAGE) sponsored by ENYTB, its members and its registered non-members.

• CUSTOMIZED REGISTRATION - ala carte style. Select only what you want from an online tournament option list customized to your team's age and power rating. This feature also creates an online team invoice and payment record.

• CUSTOMIZED SCHEDULING - includes website calendars representing team and home field availability. Scheduling software, developed and owned by Ed and Pete Frye, is used to develop customized schedules. Each team's schedule is available in its home area (My Schedule);

• MASTER SCHEDULE - users are provided with the capability to search and view the league's master schedule by field, team or date;

• SCHEDULE UPDATING - every team schedule includes a set of editing tools that allows teams to update their online schedules throughout the season for postponements, reschedules, cancellations and even the addition of new games and practices. Any opponent can be added to your ENYTB website schedule, even teams that have not been activated in the website. This is a great feature for a team that schedules its own non-league games and/or participates in more than one league. Such teams can now maintain a unified updated schedule in one place for all its players, coaches etc. to reference throughout the season. An additional feature is an automated Email-Alert system to notify both opponents as well as league officials, of any schedule updates as soon as they are made (registered teams only);

• LEAGUE ROSTERS - maintains biographical data on players, including photo, from year-to-year. Teams enter their own roster information. Teams also have the capability to edit existing data, add new players, delete players (release), make players inactive (deny a release), and claim free agents, including those listed in the League's Free Agent Pool as well as players released by other members. Also, includes capability to print updated team rosters on the AABC, NABF and PONY official tournament forms.

• PLAYER STATS - maintains game stats for individual players for every conceivable statistical category. Teams enter their own player stats. These stats are used to compile team stats as well as season and career totals for each player. All player stats are sortable. A league leader board also is maintained by season (summer, fall) each year;

• GAME REPORTS - teams prepare their own game reports on an online form. Reports are emailed with a single click to all local newspapers from a preset list customized to each owner. Player and team stats already entered in PLAYER STATS are available for use in preparation of Game Reports.

• GAME FINDER - a package of several powerful search functions that finds competitively matched opponents available to play extra games. One of these functions also finds all available make-up dates for postponed games. Also included is a bulletin board where teams actively seeking extra games can post their requests;

  Perhaps our most popular feature, this interactive search tool is easy to use and gives teams three different ways to find desired opponents for extra games. Let's say your opponent postpones or cancels an upcoming game with you and you still want your team to play on that date. You have two options. First, you can go to our Game Request Board, and search for other teams, members or non-members alike, of the age and ability you would like to play, that are actively seeking games on the same date. If there are none, you leave your request and another team may contact you. But you still have another option. You can search our team database to find all teams of whatever age and ability level you prefer, to find all such teams that are available to play and do not have a scheduled game on the date you are seeking a game. (Note: For these functions to yield accurate results, teams need to keep their online availability calendars and game schedules current throughout the season.) Finally, let's say you have played a team and it was a good match-up for both teams and you want to play them again or, maybe it's a team from another division that you aren't scheduled to play. Game Finder will find all possible available dates for your two teams to play based on both teams' availability, existing game schedules and field availability.

• FREE AGENT POOL - owners/teams can add players to the league free agent pool and owners have the capability to claim players from the existing pool;