---
url: https://nklittleleague.nl/en/veilig-sporten/respect-the-game
taal: en
titel: Respect the Game
onderdeel_van: Veilig sporten › Respect the Game
---

![Players shake hands down the line after the game.](https://nklittleleague.nl/img/nkll-2026/honkbal-team-21.webp)

# Respect the Game

Play ball!

Little League's sportsmanship programme. No extra rules, but a way of looking at things: respect for the opponent, the umpire, the game and yourself.

## The opponent

Without an opponent there is no game. You play against each other, not at each other.

## The umpire

An umpire is a volunteer who makes decisions in a split second. Sometimes they get it wrong. That is part of the game.

## The game

You keep to the rules, also when nobody is watching. And you leave the field tidy.

## Yourself

You may be gutted by a strikeout. You do not throw your bat, and you are back in it when your team needs you.

![Two baseball players hug after the game, one still wearing his catcher's mask.](https://nklittleleague.nl/img/nkll-2026/honkbal-omhelzing-na-wedstrijd.webp)

Fun · sportsmanship · respect

## Why this programme exists

Little League has been playing with children since 1939, and has learned in that time that a youth tournament is as much about the sideline as about the field itself. A child who gets jeered stops playing baseball. An umpire who gets torn apart does not come back next year.

Respect the Game is therefore not a separate rulebook but the tone in which we run the tournament. The concrete agreements are in the [code of conduct](https://nklittleleague.nl/en/veilig-sporten/gedragscode).

### Little League International

Respect the Game comes from the Little League organisation in the United States and is used worldwide, from a small field in the Netherlands to the World Series.

[More about the international organisation](https://nklittleleague.nl/en/over/internationaal)