Many of you lamented losing the ability in 2007 to enter your own team availability data directly to the website. The reason this was done was that the old forms were confusing to some members and as a result, we were not getting accurate information for a good number of teams. Solution: The website forms for collecting team availability informatio... read more

Tournament Manager (TM)Piece-by-piece, over several years, we have been assembling an online tournament management capability. (1) We have an online tournament board listing all tournaments available through ENYTB. Basic pre-tournament information is available as well, including a tournament contact person, entry fees, awards, field directions, and... read more

Many times our protocols on player restrictions don't get followed because telephoning a fellow manager to request a release for one one of his top players is not a fun thing to do. Beginning in 2008, years will be able to request player releases via the website. Roster Players - When you use ADD PLAYER to add a player from another team's roster to... read more

The Free Agent Claim function has been available to teams for several years but in the past, this search function has been limited to free agents actively seeking new teams i.e., players listed on our Free Agent Board. Beginning 2008, this function will provide teams with access to ALL free agent player's that are age eligible for their teams. Beca... read more

2007 was a banner year for ENYTB in many regards but if there was a disappointment, it was with schedule reliability. ENYTB has always enjoyed an excellent reputation for schedule reliability but the league experienced a noticeable decline in 2007. Schedule reliability is of crucial importance to member satisfaction. Much time, effort and resources goes into bringing two teams together for a scheduled game. When teams cancel league games, and especially w/o adequate advance notice, they do their opponent a great disservice and therefore, the league. · Game cancellations reached a record high in 2007. · Teams have become increasingly lax about notifying their opponents of game cancellations in a timely manner, including both forfeits and requests for non-weather postponements. · Teams also have become increasingly lax about scheduling make-up games in a timely manner and keeping their online schedules current, resulting in numerous disputes about forfeits, especially near season's end when teams are jockeying for post-season tournament berths and a single forfeit can be the deciding factor in whether your team makes the post-season.*********************************************************************Schedule reliability is the hallmark of any good league and it is absolutely essential that this league maintain its excellent reputation in this regard. The league goes to great lengths each year to provide every team with a customized schedule – teams tell the league when they are available to play and the league ensures that all of their games are scheduled during those times. Many teams need to put more serious thought in their availability ahead of time. For example, there is little excuse for not looking at the school calendar and planning around proms, final exams and graduations, etc. Managers should also check with their spouse re: confirmations, weddings etc. that will require their attendance. These events should not be last second surprises.After the schedule comes out, the league provides teams with a “grace period” - a second bite at the apple if you will – where each team is given the opportunity to rearrange its league schedule BEFORE the season begins. Again, the less reliable teams fail to take advantage of this opportunity. ALL teams should immediately distribute their early schedule to their families and get their feedback. This is a golden opportunity to perfect your schedule for all known conflicts just prior to the beginning of the season. Once the season begins, you lose this opportunity. You can still request a postponement from your opponent but he is not required to give you one. The only postponements guaranteed once the season begins are weather postponements. That an increasing number of teams didn’t even feel an obligation to provide their fellow member with timely notification of game cancellations demonstrates a lack of plain common courtesy.To ensure timeliness of notification, managers must be proactive and routinely ask their team before or after every game if anyone will be absent for any upcoming games. This look-ahead should always include all remaining games but especially those scheduled to be played within the next 7 to 10 days. This task could even be delegated to a parent.Lastly, not surprisingly, the less reliable teams also tend to be least likely to keep their online schedules current. By not keeping their online schedules current with scores, postponements, forfeits, make-up games, etc. teams make it virtually impossible for the league to effectively administer forfeits. In the case of tournament qualifying games, the proper determination of forfeits is essential to the integrity of the league because it directly affects standings and hence, which teams are awarded berths in post-season tournaments. Bottom-line, and it cannot be stressed too much, schedule reliability and keeping your online schedule current is a requisite of membership in a large travel league such as ENYTB. We schedule 4,000 games for 200 teams scattered in a radius of 100 miles. That requires a fair amount of reliability on everyone's part. This league is committed to doing its part to address this problem but we know we can't do it alone - we need every person in this league who is responsible for their team's schedule to make the extra effort on the front end to ensure that they have done everything possible to maximize the likelihood that their team will be able to play all its games as scheduled. Teams that give me their schedule availability as though this is the first time they have given the subject any thought scare me. WHAT IS SCHEDULE RELIABILITY?(1) Except for weather postponements, playing ALL your league games AS SCHEDULED. (2) When that is impossible we expect teams to provide their opponent with timely notification. This means as soon as possible and not the night before. As a rule of thumb, notice of a weekend cancellation should be MORE than a week in advance. For weekday games anything less than three days is a travesty. Your opponent may be able to reschedule a game into the vacated slot if he is given enough lead time. And even if he can't, he can let his families know so they can make other plans. (3) Keep your online schedule current at all times. This means if you play a game as scheduled, enter the score. And if you aren't going to play a game as scheduled, update its status ASAP, e.g., postponed(other) or forfeit. If the game was rained out, postponed(weather). And when your have a postponed game, get it rescheduled ASAP and get the game rescheduled online.If you do 1-2-3, you have met your obligations, it's that simple. And don't forget about the extra planning effort on the front end BEFORE you submit your team availability - an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. In the final analysis, the responsibility for whether we are a reliable league rests with each of you. However, there are things the league can and will do to induce more reliable behavior from our member teams.In some situations, the league’s postponement/reschedule protocols have proved inadequate. Those protocols are being thoroughly revised/extended for 2008. An even more important factor, however, is the lack of enforcement by the league of its own rules on schedule reliability. For example, the league has not enforced its rule limiting the amount of time a team has for entering its scores, postponements, reschedules etc. to the website. The league also has not enforced its financial and other penalties for forfeits. These rules, if enforced, would provide teams with a strong incentive to adhere to their schedule and to keep it current. Not to make excuses, but these rules and penalties haven’t been enforced because of the significant expenditure of administrative effort and resources required to oversee 4,000 league games. Previously, the magnitude of the problem simply didn’t justify the required resources. The experience of 2007, however, has changed that. The league is making the improvement of schedule reliability and online schedule management its number one priority in 2008. The most important change we can make to improve the current situation is to improve our existing protocols and enforce the penalties we already have on the books. The revised protocols are currently under development and will be available when we begin our winter meetings. Nonetheless, the flavor of what can be expected is presented below.*****************************************************************BEGINNING 2008, ENYTB SHALL ENFORCE ALL APPLICABLE PENALTIES FOR “PASSED” GAMES and NON-PLAYING FORFEITS*****************************************************************The lesson of 2007 was that we can no longer expect compliance w/o enforcement. To be effective, people must know that enforcement is certain, swift and even-handed. Last year 10% of all scheduled league games were weather postponed and another 25% were forfeited or postponed for non-weather reasons and made-up. Altogether, that is well over 1,000 games or an average of more than 20 games per day. It would be a full-time job and then some to administer such a program manually. Since this league does not have the manpower resources to commit to a manual program of enforcement, it shall administer all controls through the website as part of the normal schedule updating process that is required of each team. -------------------------------***************************************FORFEITS and FORFEIT PENALTIESWhat Every Team Needs To Know***************************************(1) When it is impossible to play a league game as scheduled, for reasons other than weather, teams have two options and one or the other must be done in as timely a manner as possible: (a) the offending team may request a discretionary postponement from their opponent; or, (b) the offending team may inform their opponent that they will be forfeiting the game. (2) It is extremely important that all club reps ensure that their teams understand that the leagues non-playing forfeit penalties shall apply equally to ALL league games.· ALL games originally scheduled by the league are considered league games, regardless of whether the game is tournament qualifying or not.· Non-playing (first pitch not thrown) forfeit penalties shall apply equally to ALL league games, regardless of whether the game is tournament qualifying or not.· Pick-up Games are NOT considered league games even though they may involve two league teams. The difference between a pick-up game game and a league game is that pick-up games are scheduled by the teams and league games are scheduled by the league. Forfeit penalties do NOT apply to pick-up games.· League games that are postponed and rescheduled by teams are still league games.NOTE: Playing forfeits (first pitch was thrown) are never penalized.In the past, teams have wrongly assumed that non-tournament qualifying games were optional because they were referred to as “extra” games. This is NOT the case. If a team asks the league for a 30 game schedule, the team is expected to play all 30 games, not just their tournament qualifying games and whatever other games that might be convenient. Most teams in this league want to play their full schedule for reasons that extend beyond standings points and tournament qualification. The number one reason is that they are here to play baseball, and when they request X number of games and are scheduled X number of games, they expect to play X number of games. Seems reasonable to me.NOTE: The only exceptions to this rule are explained in Sections 9.9 and 9.10 of the ENYTB Constitution.NOTE: NO harm-no foul rule. Where both teams have no interest in playing a league game, a non-playing forfeit is NOT assessed. This shall apply to tournament qualifying games provided no 3rd party team is disadvantaged from winning a tournament berth as a result of the game not being played. To effect this outcome, any such games should be left on the website w/o postponement or scored. After 7 days, the game will automatically convert to a PASSED game. There is no penalty for PASSED games other than the loss of standings points for both teams if the game is a tournament qualifying game. As mentioned above, games NOT scheduled by the league are exempt from ALL league rules re: schedule compliance, including forfeit penalties. Therefore, teams that want the flexibility of being able to cancel games w/o penalty should schedule those games themselves as pick-up games. EXAMPLE: Assume two teams, both wanting to play 35 games: one requests 35 league games and is responsible for 5 non-playing forfeits; while the other requests only 25 league games and schedules an 10 additional “pick-up” games with other league teams on its own, and forfeits 5 of its pick-up games. Two teams, same number of scheduled games, same number of forfeits. The total fines and penalties would be quite substantial for the team with ALL league games (as shown below) whereas the team that played only 25 league games and forfeited only its pick-up games would have no fines or penalties. In this example, everyone benefits. The team is better off because it avoided all fines and penalties. The league is better off because it avoids disgruntled members. And the teams that want to play all their games are better off because the league has not paired them up with an unreliable team. As a result, they avoid disgruntled families and the risk of losing players or even their whole team. Once a league gets the reputation for canceling games indiscriminately and with little notice, the reliable teams will stay away. That is the reason for this memo and our new emphasis on schedule compliance. (3) Penalties for Non-playing Forfeits:The league prefers that teams provide their opponent AT LEAST a 7 to 10 day advance notice on all non-playing forfeits and discretionary postponement requests. The fines for non-playing forfeits with late notification are greater but for the purposes of fines, late notification is defined as less than 3 days before the date of the scheduled game. 1st NPF this year ……3 days notice – warning #1……………………….less than 3 days notice - $502nd NPF this year ……3 days notice – warning #2……………………….less than 3 days notice - $1003rd NPF this year …… 3 days notice - $100 fine----------------------------less than 3 days notice - $150 4th NPF this year …… 3 days notice - $150 fine---------------------------less than 3 days notice - $200 fine5th NPF this year ……Loss of ALL post-season tournament eligibility.6th NPF this year ……Team is indefinitely suspended from league participation.NOTE: Three non-playing forfeits in the same division shall disqualify a team from a berth award in that division unless all other eligible teams pass on the berth. Notice that for the first two forfeits, only a warning is issued, provided adequate notification is given. This allows for the honest oversight or unexpected development. Also notice that any team that forfeits a 5th league game, regardless of whether any of those games are tournament qualifying games, shall be disqualified from ALL post-season tournament eligibility. And a 6th non-playing forfeit of ANY league game shall result in the indefinite suspension of the offending team. In addition, whenever the offending team is the visiting team, it also shall be responsible for making its opponent financially whole for any reasonable and unavoidable expenses incurred as a result of this offense.All revenues from these fines shall be placed in an escrow account and 50% of this account shall be applied in to the cost of hosting sanctioned tournaments in the following year, thereby lowering league fees. The remaining 50% shall carry over to the next year and combined with any additional fines collected in that year and applied in similar fashion. It is assumed that once offending teams feel the pinch of these fines they will change their ways and this will not be a dwindling source of league revenue in successive years but we shall see.These penalties will be fully administered by the website. All league reps will be fully versant in the revised/extended schedule compliance protocols and will be available to assist members as needed. The league can't force members to play individual games but at least now, there will be accountability. This system should discourage habitual offenders and improve schedule reliability for everyone. At least that's the objective.

Gentlemen: Below are the 2008-2009 rates for Officials from 12 and under to College Levels. All tournaments are $5 per official more per game. The Assaigning fee is $4 per game. As is the past 1 1/2 fee for one official when two were scheduled. 1/2 fee for any weather related problem when the game is not started and no call before 1 1/2 h... read more

Last year, ENYTB began offering rebates to its larger club members based on the number of teams they registered as well as for registering multiple teams in the same age division. ENYTB is announcing six different rebates for 2008:(1) UABA Members - UABA includes Utica Area teams at 13U, 14U and 15U. With the creation of UABA, these teams are payin... read more

When an ENYTB club/team is activated, much of the website content that each club/team sees is customized to that club/team. Part of this customized content includes a registration page that is fully customized to each team. The availability of each ENYTB program is specific to team age and power rating. For example, NABF sanctioning is available to... read more

I recently attended both the PONY and NABF national meetings. Below is a list of important changes that will affect us in 2008.PONY(1) Player eligibility in all age divisions has been redefined as "And Under" i.e., no more age minimums. For example, 12 year olds can now participate on 13U teams. NOTE: This change goes through the Zone level. At the... read more