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First, it would depend on the age of the kids. 7 and 8 year olds to me is different than high schoolers. I have no issue with "Mercy Rule" type situations for young kids. They're in a developmental stage. Yes, you want them to realize sometimes you can lose, and lose bad, and have to pick yourself up. However rarely do I see Mercy Rules where if you're losing by 2 its over. By the time it gets up by 10 runs, or 50 points, or something like that, you've learned that lesson already. Letting it go on the full game just increases the likihood that the kid may get completely discouraged and leave the sport earlier than is good for them.
However, high schoolers, I don't agree with a Mercy Rule notion and feel differently about it.
I think its bad sportsmanship to intentionally "run up the score". By that I mean....
In Football. If you're up by 40 at the half and its clear you're better than this team and you keep your 1st team in, you're throwing bombs on 1st and 2nd down, you're doing trick plays, you fake a punts, you fake a spike and instead throw a touchdown as times drindling, etc....yeah, that's poor sportsmanship. That's nothing but showboating.
If you however put your 2nd team in and run the game like usual, or even just run it a bit more conservatively, but are still putting up points I don't have any issues with that.
Basically, I'm not expecting you to go out there and take a knee every single down of every play for the rest of the game. That is honestly more of an insult to the other team than going all out. I'm just saying on the flip side don't treat it like its a 7 point game with the season on the line and you have to pull out all the stops.
Same kind of thing with basketball. Don't keep all your starters and your star player in there. Take some two's instead of three's if you can. Don't drive into the paint over and over again when you know you can do it at will. But don't just throw the ball to them and go "here score" each time.
If it starts becoming a closer game, then sure, ramp it up like you know you can and take the game back. But most likely if you're first team is that heads and shoulders ahead of them you're second team isn't going to be completely skunking it up.
So essentially, with youth, I think a slaughter rule is a good thing. For high schoolers I think its poor sportsmanship to purposefully and intentionally try to run up the score, but don't have an issue with them playing the game conservatively and still scoring points.
This actually reminds me of a HS football game I heard about sometime last year I think where a team won 90 to something. It seemed really bad at first, but the coach has his 2nd string in and was doing nothing but running it up the gut every single down, and was still punting and field goal kicking as you normally would. So he wasn't TRYING to run it up but at the same time wasn't having his kids take knee's the whole time. I have nothing against that and think that's good sportsmanship, both towards your team and towards the opponents.
However, high schoolers, I don't agree with a Mercy Rule notion and feel differently about it.
I think its bad sportsmanship to intentionally "run up the score". By that I mean....
In Football. If you're up by 40 at the half and its clear you're better than this team and you keep your 1st team in, you're throwing bombs on 1st and 2nd down, you're doing trick plays, you fake a punts, you fake a spike and instead throw a touchdown as times drindling, etc....yeah, that's poor sportsmanship. That's nothing but showboating.
If you however put your 2nd team in and run the game like usual, or even just run it a bit more conservatively, but are still putting up points I don't have any issues with that.
Basically, I'm not expecting you to go out there and take a knee every single down of every play for the rest of the game. That is honestly more of an insult to the other team than going all out. I'm just saying on the flip side don't treat it like its a 7 point game with the season on the line and you have to pull out all the stops.
Same kind of thing with basketball. Don't keep all your starters and your star player in there. Take some two's instead of three's if you can. Don't drive into the paint over and over again when you know you can do it at will. But don't just throw the ball to them and go "here score" each time.
If it starts becoming a closer game, then sure, ramp it up like you know you can and take the game back. But most likely if you're first team is that heads and shoulders ahead of them you're second team isn't going to be completely skunking it up.
So essentially, with youth, I think a slaughter rule is a good thing. For high schoolers I think its poor sportsmanship to purposefully and intentionally try to run up the score, but don't have an issue with them playing the game conservatively and still scoring points.
This actually reminds me of a HS football game I heard about sometime last year I think where a team won 90 to something. It seemed really bad at first, but the coach has his 2nd string in and was doing nothing but running it up the gut every single down, and was still punting and field goal kicking as you normally would. So he wasn't TRYING to run it up but at the same time wasn't having his kids take knee's the whole time. I have nothing against that and think that's good sportsmanship, both towards your team and towards the opponents.