Overview

Here's a quick summary of how the Summer Teams Database portion of the BaseballNebraska.com website works and what your role will be.

• The basic goal BaseballNebraska.com site is to promote interest in Nebraska high school baseball by providing a centralized location on the internet for each team's schedules, scores, rosters,  standings and tournament information. 

• To help accomplish this task, we have created a special section of the website known as the "Summer Teams Database."  This component utilizes a sports league management web application called League Lineup.  We formerly used the League Lineup application as our entire website, but now we "wrap" a larger website around this application. 

• BaseballNebraska.com does not have the resources or the manpower to independently collect the above-described information for each of the 100+ teams that we reporting on each summer.  In order to operate this site we must rely on a network of volunteer reporters such as yourself who will provide and upload information about their teams to the Summer Teams Database.  We appreciate your willingness to provide this service for your team, for BaseballNebraska and for Nebraska high school baseball . 

• As administrator of the website, I will assign each of you a password that you can use to access the administrative functions of the Database.  I will also provide training and other types of information and assistance through this companion website and will be available via email and phone to answer any questions that you may have.  (See link on Main Menu to Contact information.)  I will also be writing short feature stories and informational pieces on the rest of the  site that I think will be of interest to readers.  But I will depend on you to keep your team's information complete and up-to-date.  This is a site where a lot of people will have to do some work in order for the whole thing to succeed.  A lot of folks are interested in the site, and we want to deliver to them information that is accurate, reliable and up-to-date.

• The internet holds tremendous potential for telling the story of Nebraska high school baseball to enormous numbers of people.  It also holds tremendous potential for causing embarrassment and emotional injury if it is abused.  I am counting on each of you to exercise good judgment and professionalism in the performance of your responsibilities for your team and to consider at all times the potential effects of your words on the young players about whom we are writing.  Please observe the following at all times:

1.  Do not attribute errors to any individual player in your narrative summaries.  For example, rather than saying "the winning run scored when John Smith booted a routine grounder," say something like, "The winning run came home when Batter X reached on an error," or "The winning run came home on a ground ball that got through the infield."

 

2.  Avoid any comments that would be embarrassing or demeaning to opposing players, such as "The Turtles pounded the Frogs into submission" or "The Smurfs totally annihilated the Putties."   You've all read plenty of professional sports writing and probably have a handy supply of appropriate phrases stored in your brains that you can draw on to describe the outcome of the games in a fair and objective manner. 

 

3.  Avoid any kind of antagonistic or overly partisan remarks or comments, such as "The Trojans really showed the Skunks who the better team is."  Message Boards are full of this "my team is better than your team" drivel, but we aspire to be much more responsible and professional than a Message Board. 

 

4.  Get the facts right.  For upcoming games, be sure that the time, date, location and opponent are accurate.  And, please make sure to keep your schedule up to date as games change or additional information becomes available.  For games that have been played, make sure that the score and key highlights are reported accurately.  We want readers to be able to come to our site for reliable and accurate information.  

 

5.  At all times try to conduct yourself in a manner that will reflect positively on your team, this site and Nebraska high school baseball.

• Here are a few important technical matters that you need to know about to get started:

1.  The administrative rights that have been assigned to you give you the ability to do the following things:  (a) enter basic information about your team, such as coaches' names, team name, team website and similar information (b) enter information about the location of your home ball field, (c)  enter your team roster and include a brief profile about each player, (d) enter your season schedule and any changes or additions thereto, (f) enter information about any tournament that your team is hosting, and (g) to post scores for completed games,  write headlines and summaries about completed games and include box scores and individual stats from the games. 

 

2.  Please constantly review your team's information for accuracy and make corrections as necessary. 

 

OK, that's the big picture.   Thanks again for agreeing to help out.

 

The first step is to how to log on to Summer Teams Database.  Please click on the "Lessons Link" from the Main Menu.

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