On March 14 I attended an EVSTL Meeting with the executive board and the 14 other club presidents to vote on bylaw changes for next season.
Here are the highlights of what was passed:
1. Team membership requirements
A team must consist of a minimum of 6 committed players, to form a second team a club must roster a minimum of 16 players.
Ken Borle (the EVSTL president) also urged the smaller teams that struggle to provide sufficient numbers of lines to consider combining with another smaller team and or picking up other players from teams that have sit-outs that week or call up players from the next lower level. We should see improvements in the number of sit-outs this year.
2. EVSTL League Play – Move ups and move downs.
The EVSTL has established requirements that clubs should adhere to for player placement and is the responsibility of EACH CLUB to ensure that players are placed at a level that is appropriate to their skill level and fair to other clubs.
Mandatory move ups. A player that has won 75% of their matches and 55 % of their games when playing in line 1 and line 2 must move up at the end of the season. That applies to a player that has played at least 8 matches at their level.
An important note. If a player meets the percentages above but plays less than 8 matches at their level in lines 1 and 2, the players club will determine whether sufficient matches have been played to demonstrate if the player is ready for the next level.
Mandatory move downs. A player winning less than 30% of their games when playing in line 3 or below and who has not won at least two matches during the season will move down. Similar to the move-ups if a player meets the percentages above but plays less than 8 matches at their level in lines 3 and below, the players club will determine whether sufficient matches have been played to demonstrate if the player should move down.
By EVSTL Presidents vote. this does not apply to 2.0 players. They didn’t want to mandate players being forced to go back to 1.5.
Note: Clubs can move people up that do not meet the letter of the law if they feel they have demonstrated an ability to be competitive at the next level.
Example 1: A player has been dominant winning 75% or more but has only played 6 or 7 matches instead of 8. The club could move them up.
Example 2.The league said that players playing up do not receive credit for playing up and winning but that doesn’t mean that individual clubs can’t take those wins into consideration if they choose to.
3. EVSTL has established the dates for league play for next season. Play will start on November 4, the holiday break begins on December 13. Play resumes on December 30 and continue through March 7.
