I refer you to this opinion piece which appears to contain more facts.

What a privilege it would be to play against him. Just think if your 9 year old could get a hit off Jericho even after trying many times. It would be something your child would remember and feel proud of for many, many years.

this reminds me of the teenagers who want to play basketball with the 10 y/o's so that they can be the star.

When I was in little league I sometimes faced pitchers much bigger and stronger than me, who threw hard enough to terrify. I have no idea if it was 40 or 140 mph, but the pitches might as well have been laser beams to me. The struggle was good for me, and my parents had the good sense to help me practice and grow through the situation. That doesn't mean getting better at baseball, it means learning to persevere through a little adversity. This league is 'instructional,' but life lessons are more valuable instruction than baseball lessons. When parents react to their child facing a good player by demanding that the player be banned or promoted out of the league, instead of taking advantage of a teachable moment, it makes me feel sorry for their kid.

Childhood isn't just about having fun, it's also about shaping character. The message this league and some parents are sending to these kids is: 1) we don't believe in your ability to compete with the best, so we have to intercede for you, 2) when someone outperforms you, just have them punished instead of trying to rise to their level. That's probably not the end of the world all by itself, but it's a bad sign as to what ideas are being inculcated to young people in our culture.

You can download the rules at Cal Ripken Baseball

For the Rookie League, ages 8-10, kids can pitch, but are limited to at most two innings per game.

My opinion is that if it is a developmental league, then the emphasis should be on letting as many kids pitch as is practical, and to enforce a low inning or pitch count limit. Also, the idea of keeping scores and standings for a developmental league is counterproductive.

From the Incredibles. Dash: You always say 'Do your best', but you don't really mean it. Why can't I do the best that I can do? Outside the Beltway links to a story about a little league pitcher who's too good. Nine-year-old Jericho Scott is a goo...

This is essentially what the baseball and softball leagues do in our town, if a child is proficient beyond the skill level of his/her age peers.

It is actually quite rare that you end up with a player who pitches that fast, and even though he hasn't actually hit any batters, that doesn't mean it may not happen, and they could very well be concerned about lawsuits. It also may be that some parents are complaining out of competitiveness too-I serve on the softball board, and know that at times competitiveness can lead to bickering over a scapegoat rather than the actual problem.

However, it is pretty obvious this child pitches at a skill level well above his peers-the best and most fair solution would be to have him jump up a level, or encourage him to try out for a competitive league where you will have fewer of the kids who are beginners or whose parents signed them up and they do not want to be there.

This issue has been totally misrepresented as groupthink liberalism, in fact, while it is rooted in liberalism, its actually good old fashioned assholes doing what assholes always do, it may have been made more egregious by the locale, northeastern liberal assholes are easily, by far the biggest assholes and this incident should be a lesson to all, its a microcosm of what real liberalism is, these same assholes are demanding you pay for their healthcare...yuk yuk.

If this is 'developmental', how do the other pitchers on this kid's team get to develop if he's the only one doing the pitching?

Nevertheless, lately I've been hearing more and more stories about parents and coaches "redshirting" players - holding them back a level or two to allow them to dominate a league, when they should be playing at a higher level.

*goggles*

You have to be shitting me. Why the ^%$# are people that stupid and callow allowed to breed?

I can't express how much I hate the trend of treating kids as adults or as mere extensions of the parent's ego. Whether it is the relentless sexualization of young girls or the manipulation of kids to earn accolades that flatter the parent's vanity it is pretty much just child abuse and should be treated as such.

Mother &^%4ers.