NCAA pulls in reins on revelry

The NCAA is bearing down on celebrations in college sports and the changes strike a little close to home for North Carolina baseball.

A new rule in baseball is designed to cut back on celebrations at home plate following a home run that does not end an inning.

It has long been a tradition for a player who hits a critical home run to get swarmed by teammates at home plate as a way of celebration. Now every player that dives into a home-plate dogpile in that situation risks ejection.

In fact" the clip distributed by the rules committee showing its rationale behind the rule contained a scene very familiar to North Carolina coach Mike Fox.

""The first clip I got of it" of the rationale behind it was of us in Omaha when Tim (Federowicz) hit the home run" Fox said.

To give a little context, the dogpile came after Federowicz's ninth-inning grand slam gave UNC the lead in last year's College World Series elimination game against LSU.

The clip was used because Federowicz's homer — and the ensuing celebration — came with only two outs in the inning.

The new rule will limit, if not eliminate, those kinds of celebrations. Yet Fox said that showing support for a teammate after a game-changing homer is a part of good sportsmanship, and that though he will abide by the new rules in 2009, he has trouble understanding them.

How do you tell your team to not get excited when one of their teammates hits a home run in the top of the ninth inning of the world series to essentially win the game for us?"" Fox said. ""Am I supposed to run into the dugout and corral them all before they run out to home plate? I don't know.""

The rules committee said in a press release last July that the celebrations" especially in a live-ball situation" can either obstruct the field of play or ""create an intimidating or potentially volatile situation.""

""I can control my team"" Fox said. And the last thing we ever want to do is to show up our opponent. And  I think the majority of baseball coaches feel the same.""

Likewise" college football is also considering celebration rules.

According to the International Herald Tribune Mike Bellotti the NCAA football rules committee chairman is seeking opinions from coaches about the possibility of making celebrations live-ball fouls.

As the rules currently stand celebration penalties are dead-ball offenses drawing a 15-yard penalty on the ensuing extra point kick.

If excessive celebrations were a live-ball penalty then points could be taken off the board if the play resulted in a touchdown.



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