This article was originally published by the Camarillo Pony Baseball Association on their website. It has specific references to the Camarillo Pony Baseball Association but you can substitute any league's name and the article retains its intent.

Mark Malloy at malloy@cmp.com has very graciously agreed to let us re-publish it on our website and adjust it to reflect our leagues.

The Camarillo Pony Baseball Association Home Page is located at http://www.cpba.org . After you read this article you should visit their site. Mr. Malloy is mailing a copy of a guidebook they use at the first of every baseball season. I hope to publish a few more of their excellent articles from this guidebook in the future.
 

 

TEAM MANAGER GUIDELINES

Congratulations & Thanks for Being Here!

Program Objectives

Conduct Required

Team Manager Responsibilities

Approval of Coaches Procedure

Game Schedule

New CPBA Rules

Post Season Tournament

Fields

Uniforms

Call Your Players

Sponsor Banners

Getting Help from Parents

Umpires

Field Prep Days

Team Equipment

Practice Schedule

Questions or Problems

Congratulations & Thanks for Being Here!

Congratulations on having been selected as a team manager for the 1997 season. Thanks for attending the team managers meeting, and for volunteering so much of your time to give the youth of our community the benefit of your knowledge, leadership, and enthusiasm. The quality of life for our children depends upon the effort we as parents are willing to provide. Your contribution to the community is greatly appreciated by everyone in this room.

This season CPBA has made an unprecedented investment in improving our facilities-about $30,000 on just three of the fields. These improvements are the result of a lot of effort from a few dedicated people. But just as important as this volunteer effort, is the fund raising efforts critical to financing these upgrades. This year we will forsake the traditional candy sale fund-raiser for a Bat-A-Thon event. We believe it has much greater potential to contribute to our program both in terms of fun in participating and from a financial perspective. We must have your enthusiastic support for this to succeed. Make sure this message gets delivered to your parents during your preseason meeting.

PONY stands for Protect Our Nations Youth. CPBA's two league system for boys over nine years of age is there for safety reasons. Safety must always be a primary concern and should never be compromised for any reason.

We are not here to produce major league ballplayers, or to win championships. This program is geared towards developing kids both physically and emotionally into healthy, responsible adults. The program's objectives and the conduct required to reach these objectives is described in Article II, Section A & B of the CPBA Constitution:

Program Objectives

"The primary objective of the CPBA shall be to implant firmly in the youth of the community the ideals of good sportsmanship, honesty, loyalty, courage, and reverence. The objective will be achieved by providing a supervised baseball program. The attainment of exceptional skill or the winning of games shall be secondary to the prime goal of molding ethical adults."

Conduct Required

"All Members of CPBA shall be guided by this Constitution, Bylaws, and most importantly, common sense in conducting themselves in such a manner as to bring credit upon themselves as well as to the program. Emotional conduct which praises good play or demonstrates positive attitudes is encouraged whereas conduct which stresses negative attitudes is unacceptable and should be corrected immediately. Examples are:

a. Publicly finding fault with umpires, managers or any other individual who is attempting, to the best of his ability, to make this program effective. Constructive criticism is acceptable when submitted through the proper channels.

b. Harassing batters, pitchers or any other participant.

c. Instructing players to take action which would be considered unethical or unsportsmanlike ."

Team Manager Responsibilities - are found in the CPBA Bylaws Article III, Section C:

General Responsibilities & Behavior Standards of Managers

1. Basic managerial responsibilities include:

a. Teach each player the game of baseball and the meaning of playing together as a team.

b. Teach each player the meaning of good sportsmanship by precept and example.

c. Develop, to the best of his or her ability, the athletic skill of each player on the team.

d. Organize the parents of the players of his or her team to carry out work necessary for the teams function. These job assignments are typically those of Coach, Assistant Coach, Scorekeeper, Assistant Scorekeeper, Telephone Coordinator, Equipment/Uniform Coordinator, Field Representative and Team Mother/Father.

e. Provide a qualified scorekeeper, except in Shetland & Pinto leagues, for each scheduled game and be responsible for the submission of game scores to the League Commissioner.

f. Maintain discipline at all practices and games for the players, parents and spectators of the team under his/her jurisdiction.

g. Publish a practice schedule and notify parents of canceled practices and games. Pre-season practices may not exceed 3 per week.

h. Ensure parent participation in keeping areas around bleachers and dugouts clean.

i. Maintain a summary of player participation; i.e., game, innings played, at bats, etc.

j. Maintain order in the dugout by having a coach, or self in the dugout at all times.

k. Layout the field when designated as home team in the league schedule.

l. Clean up the dugout and field at the conclusion of the game.

m. A manager or coach may not manage more than one team during regular season play.

2. The Manager shall also be responsible to:

a. Assure that equipment in their possession is in serviceable condition.

b. Be accountable for his or her teams equipment, which will be made available to the on a specified day and which must be returned within one week after the end of the regular season. Failure to comply will constitute grounds for a assessment of a fine levied upon the manager.

c. Notify their commissioner if an umpire is late or does not appear to work a game.

3. The manager, to exhibit proper behavior in the CPBA program, must:

a. By precept and example demonstrate good sportsmanship at all times.

b. Discipline team members when it becomes necessary in such a manner as to bring about the desired response without attacking the team members character.

c. Never imply, directly or indirectly, by action or comments that any particular player was personally responsible for the win or loss of a game.

d. Never solicit votes for a tournament team playing or managing position prior to the tournament team selection meeting.

e. Never discourage or recommend against a player volunteering to play on an associate organizationĘs team when such a move could serve the CPBA's goal of balancing teams.

Approval of Coaches Procedure - CPBA Bylaws, Article II, Section B, Paragraph #4:

"After managers have been approved, they must select a coach andalternate coach subject to the approval of the League Commissioner. In the manager's absence, the coach will be the acting manager"

Game Schedule - Should be available from your commissioner the first week of March. Due to our continued growth, Saturday games will now begin at 8am. All leagues (except Shetland which primarily plays on Saturday) play two games per week.

No new inning may start more than 2 ¼ hours after the scheduled game time. No exceptions, so help the umpires get the games going on time. Everyone is there to play a game, not to take infield!

There are many non-league games scheduled to help fill out the ten week season. Use these to experiment with players who would like to try new positions.

New CPBA Rules - Nothing new this year, last year these changes were implemented:

Player Ejections - A player ejected from a game after one verbal warning is suspended for the next game. See Bylaws Article V, Section G.

Substitutions - No player may sit out a third defensive inning until all players have sat at least one inning. An exception is made for a starting pitcher if he is still pitching. Bylaws Article VII, Section F

Post Season Tournament - in competitive leagues will be double elimination, with all teams participating. Focus your players on using the regular season for developing their skills so you have the best team at the end of the season.

Fields - PV 1 will be used by Pony & Pony Franchise. Care must be exercised to keep the grass in good condition. PV 2 & 3 for Colt, Bronco and Broncho Franchise. Mustang plays on the two fields along Eston Street, and Pinto 8 at the field next to Temple. Shetand and Pinto 7 will play at the backstops in the middle. No pregame batting practice at these backstops.

Uniforms - Shirts must be retuned to the league in good condition at the end of the season. Do not allow anyone to put their name on their jersey or wear it to practice.

Call Your Players - Notify them immediately if you haven't already that they are on your team. If any have moved, or are not going to be able to play, call Director of Players, Elaine Magner at 388-0829.

Sponsor Banners - This year we have purchased banners for each sponsor which should be displayed during games. Sponsors have paid $265 for the recognition that display of the banners provides. Please protect your banner(s) from damage so it can be used again next year.

Getting Help from Parents - You can't and shouldn't do it all. They won't help until you ask! Getting these jobs filled should be one of the primary goals of your preseason parents meeting.

Field Preparation - Stress the importance of you being able to supervise the boys during warm-ups and therefore you should not do the field preparation. Have your team mom schedule the job just like refreshments and snack bar duty.

Team Parent - Give her all the organizational duties like snack bar and field preparation scheduling, candy sale, and arranging for post game refreshments. You should be in the baseball business. This year we will be having a "Bat-A-Thon" fund raiser. It is VERY IMPORTANT that your team parent attends the Team Parents meeting on March 6 at 7:30pm. Call and remind them!

Scorekeeper - Scorebooks that will be handed out at the scorekeepers clinic March 11th at 7:30pm which is for both new and experienced scorekeepers. Someone should attend from your team.

Sponsor Liaison - Get someone who will keep your sponsor(s) involved with the team. Get them a copy of the schedule, invite them to attend picture day Saturday April 26 (each sponsor gets it's own picture). Let them know how appreciative you are of their support. Let your parents know it would cost them an extra $30 per child to play if we didn't have sponsors, so let's be supportive of those helping to keep baseball affordable.

Umpires - As participants in our program they deserve the same respect and support as you provide for your own players. Many of them are youth holding their first job. Just like players and managers, they will make some mistakes. Umpire rating forms are available in the snack bar and the umpire room so that we can recognize the boys doing an exceptional job and schedule them for more games. Complete the form after your game and turn it in at the snack bar. Poor performance and/or attitude by umpires will be addressed and if necessary the umpire will be dismissed.

If you have a problem with an umpire, notify your commissioner and/or Mark Cardella.

If you ever feel the need to keep arguing until you get the last word in, remember that if you or one of your coaches are ejected from a game you are automatically suspended for three games pending appeal.

Field Prep Days - Saturday Feb 15th we had field preparation day at PV on the Shetland and Pinto fields. This Saturday, the 22nd, from 9-3, we will work on the Mustang, Bronco, Pony, & Colt fields. This years rains along with gopher damage and 6 months of use by soccer teams have left the fields full of weeds, very rutted, and in need of leveling. Ask your parents to bring shovels, work gloves, and a wheel barrow if they have one.

Team Equipment - Will be available to be picked up Saturday February 22nd between 9am and noon. You will sign for it, and are responsible for returning all $600 worth of it and the uniform jerseys back in at the end of the season. Please do not let players abuse the equipment. We had to throw away almost a $500 worth of batting helmets because kids had picked at the foam padding. If umpires observe equipment abuse, it's an automatic ejection.

Practice Schedule - Your commissioner has the fields assigned to your league until the season starts. At the conclusion of this meeting you will meet with your commissioner to schedule practice fields.

After the season begins there is no practice field reservation system-it's first come first serve.

Do not practice at Monte Vista School which is reserved for the field hockey program or on any fields reserved for girls softball. Make sure you do not take another teams time slot and field assignment unless you have made previous arrangements. If there is a problem call your league commissioner, not the School District or Pleasant Valley Recreation & Parks District.

Questions or Problems - Your contact when you have any problem or question is your league commissioner. Don't be afraid to call them if you are not sure of anything. Chances are they have faced whatever problem you have before and he will have an answer for you. Let your commissioner or the board of directors be "the bad guys" if necessary. They have been specially selected for their thick skins!

Remember the definition of a good season is that each boy has a positive experience that contributes toward them maturing into adulthood. Good Luck.