Snohomish coach accused of throwing game wants rule change

The Snohomish coach criticized and punished for allegedly asking his team to lose a World Series game might have some people in his corner as he fights to change the rules.

Professional sports teams rest their top players all the time, so doing so during a softball World Series might be understandable.

“In any organization where you’re playing league sports, and you have the ability to rest your players for a championship game or playoff game, you do it,” Terry Hollimon told co-host KIRO Radio’s Tom Tangney.

Whether it’s professional basketball, baseball or a Little League tournament, coaches are bound to pull their best players at some point, Hollimon explained.

“You rest your best players and get them ready for the big game,” he added.

But that’s not how officials with Little League International see it. The coach of the Snohomish Little League team was accused of intentionally throwing a game during the softball World Series to eliminate what he believed to be the toughest competition.

Under tournament rules, the league has a tie-breaking system based on run ratios. Because of the rule, Snohomish could have lost 30-0 and made the semifinals, coach Fred Miller told the The Daily Herald. But if Snohomish lost 3-2, they would have been eliminated.

The way things went with Snohomish losing 8-0 and not recording a hit against North Carolina, Iowa, in a three-way tie, was pushed out of the semifinals. That is, until Snohomish and Iowa had to play a game to decide which team advanced to the semifinals. Snohomish lost and was dropped to the consolation bracket.

Miller is now asking for Little League International to change the tie-breaking rule that led the coach to become the target of criticism this week, the Herald reports.

Despite the national attention and request to change the ratio rules, Brian McClintock, the league’s director of media relations, told the Herald there are no plans to change the rules.

But was it appropriate for Miller and his team for being punished for what they allegedly did? If Hollimon’s theory is true, then the coach did nothing wrong.

So it’s OK to play to lose? Tom asked.

“I wouldn’t say play to lose, but if I could rest my players I would,” Hollimon responded.

Either way, Miller doesn’t deserve the vilification, a former player told KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson.

He “gives all his time to the community,” Kylie said. “Doesn’t deserve what’s being thrown at him.”

Miller coached Kylie for soccer, softball, and basketball. She told Dori he has two children, which Miller dedicates as much time as possible to.

When she heard about the allegations against Miller, Kylie didn’t believe it.

“He’s such a competitive person, so I knew there was more than what was being said,” she said.

There’s no doubt Miller is competitive, it’s the reason people believe he had the team intentionally blow the game, Dori responded.

There’s another way to look at it, however. By pulling his star players, Miller was giving some girls that hadn’t played much more time to be on the field, Kylie said.

“They were still trying,” she said.

And it’s unlikely Miller was the only one building a strategy around the tournament rules, Kylie said of the coach’s strategy.