Polk County’s next baseball coach will have new rules around pitch counts to deal with when the 2017 season begins.

The North Carolina High School Athletic Association approved new guidelines Thursday specifying how much work that high school pitchers can see per day. The rule came after the National Federation of High Schools announced earlier this year that all associations would be required to add new rules regarding pitch counts.

The new policy states:

• Maximum pitches allowed per day is 105. A pitcher will be allowed to finish facing a hitter if he reaches 105 pitches during a single at-bat.

• If a pitcher throws more than 76 pitches in a day, he must have four calendar days of rest before pitching again.

• For pitchers throwing 61-75 pitches, three days of rest are required. For 46-60 pitches, two days. For 31-45 pitches, one day.

• A pitcher throwing 30 pitchers or fewer can pitch again the following day, but must have one day of rest before pitching again no matter how many pitches are thrown.

• The state championships are exempt from the mandatory days of rest, but pitchers are limited to 120 pitches for the best-of-three series.

The rules apply to both varsity and junior varsity games.

Longtime Polk County head baseball coach Ty Stott announced his resignation last month.

Among other rule changes approved Thursday by the NCHSAA:

• The number of teams qualifying in each cross country regional will now be the top 25 percent of entries rather than four teams. Thus a region with 24 teams, for example, would qualify six teams rather than four. The state meet will still have 16 schools competing.

• Playoff seeding will now be done based on the 1-32 ranks instead of using the 1-8 ranks after teams are broken into subregions.

• Football coaches can now either opt to hold spring skill development sessions with all players for 10 days in May or work out with 21 athletes per day throughout the offseason except for dead periods. Schools must pick one option by Jan. 3 and notify the NCHSAA.

– article submitted by PolkSports.com