WBSC Academy: Licensing Programme for Softball Umpires now available
The WBSC today released the Licensing Programme for Softball Umpires, available in English for all WBSC members via the WBSC Academy reserved area.
Through the WBSC Level 1 Licensing Programme for Softball Umpires, users will receive an overview of the Official Softball Rules as well as the various umpire systems.
The course is broken down into nine video lessons, which are briefly described below:
Lesson 1 - The Game: It covers the requirements to have a legal game, how rules surrounding the scoring of runs, deciding on a winner Protests.
Lesson 2 – Playing Field & Equipment: It covers field dimensions and layout, special ground rules, legal equipment and uniforms.
Lesson 3 - Participants: It covers rules around all participants including players. coaches, umpires and scorers.
Lesson 4 - Pitching: It covers the requirements that need to be met for pitchers to pitch legally.
Lesson 5 - Batting and Base Running: It covers rules surrounding the on-deck batter, the batting order and batting requirements.
Lesson 6 – Batter, Batter-Runner & the Double Base: It covers more rules on the batter and the batter-runner once the batter hits a fair or foul ball.
Lesson 7 – Runners, Running, Interference, Obstruction & Award of Bases: It covers what runners may or may not do while on/running the bases.
Lesson 8 – 3-Umpire System: It covers the basic responsibilities of the umpires in a 3-umpire system, including positioning and rotation on batted or thrown balls.
Lesson 9 – 4-Umpire System: It covers the basic responsibilities of the umpires in a 4-umpire system including positioning ad rotation on batted or thrown balls.
For those seeking a WBSC Licence, this educational module is a mandatory step to receiving a Level 1 or 2 Licence and is a steppingstone to moving on to Level 3. In addition, other steps needed to receive a WBSC Licence include meeting the Fitness Protocols, passing an online Pre-Seminar Rule Quiz and attending an in-person evaluation session.
The Spanish version of the course will be made available in the future.
Last week the WBSC Academy unveiled the first Technical Commissioners (TCs) Licensing Programme for softball.