Fair and fun for the kids. Easier for you.

Dugout Relief is a free app for youth baseball and softball coaches. Build fair lineups, track who can pitch, and keep season stats.

Open Dugout Relief See how a game day works

No account or app store needed. It runs in your browser, and you can add it to your home screen.

Coach baseball?

Pitches a day and rest days by league age, plus the last-batter and catcher rules.

Baseball pitch count rules

Coach softball?

Innings a day and rest days by division. No catcher rules, and no limit in Junior or Senior.

Softball pitching rules

Everything else is the same for both: fair lineups, printouts, game stats import, and season stats.

Who sits, who catches, who can pitch

Before each game, a coach works out who sits each inning, who can catch, and who can pitch on Saturday. Usually that’s a clipboard the night before, redone in the dugout when a player doesn’t show. The scorekeeper keeps score, but playing time and pitch counts (innings in softball) are up to you. Dugout Relief tracks them.

Set up your team

The first time you open it, Dugout Relief shows a sample team’s season: four questions a coach plans around, each answered on its Stats tab, then today’s game to try, from the lineup to the stats import. Nothing to set up first.

When you’re ready, pick your sport and division, then add players one by one, from a pasted list, or from a roster file (CSV). Mark who pitches and where each player can play, then add your games. Each team gets its own roster, schedule, and stats, and extra teams cost nothing. When setting up a new season, you can keep returning players and add new ones.

Your team home

Between games, Home shows your next game, who can pitch, and who’s behind on field time.

What else is on it

Needs a look: a short list of things to fix, each with its own button, like a game with no stats or an old backup file. Hide any you don’t need.
The season so far: your record and team batting.
When the schedule ends, a season wrap-up: the final record, playing time, pitching, and a player summary to print for each family.

Fair lineups

Build Lineup, in the Dugout, fills each inning and rotates the bench, catcher, and pitcher across the season. The checks flag anyone sitting two innings in a row or short of field time, and any empty position. A Behind tag marks players well under the team’s field time. Change any spot: the checks warn, never stop you.

The Dugout lineup on a phone, with the lineup checks open under the game bar — The checks say what needs a look before the game starts.

Playing time and the batting order

The Playing time card shows each player’s innings in the field, on the bench, pitching, catching, infield, and outfield, for the game and the season.

Suggest order drafts a batting order three ways: last game’s, top three to the bottom; table setters, then sluggers; or highest OPS first. The last two need stats.

How Build Lineup works

Pitches, innings, and rest days

Count during the game in the Dugout’s Pitching view: pitches in baseball, by league age, or innings in softball, by division. A warning comes before the next rest day and before the daily limit, and each pitcher shows when they can pitch again. Check the defaults against your league’s rules.

The Bullpen, the Schedule, and catcher rules

The Bullpen lists who can come in and how many pitches or innings they have left. A pitcher at the limit may finish the batter.
The Schedule shows who can pitch in each game over the next two weeks.
In baseball, rest is based on the count when the last batter came up.
Baseball catcher rules are checked too: catching four or more innings rules out pitching that day, and 41 or more pitches (21 after catching) rules out catching.

The Bullpen on a phone: four sample pitchers, each with pitches left today and a Bring in button — Baseball: who can come in, and pitches left.

The Bullpen on a phone with softball rules: four sample pitchers, each with 12 innings left today and a Bring in button — Softball: the same Bullpen, in innings.

Baseball pitch count rules Softball pitching rules

Plan pitchers for the next two weeks

Plan pitchers, on the Schedule, lays out the next two weeks: a row per pitcher, with their rest drawn until they can pitch again. Pick who pitches each game and how much, and see who’s ready later. A plan is never a record: real counts replace it as games are played.

How a plan works

Tap a pitcher under a game and pick how many pitches (innings in softball). Each choice shows when they’d be back.
Folded, the card is one line per game with who’s planned to pitch: the quick look on a phone.
During the game, the pitch card counts down to the plan, says when the pitcher reaches or passes it, and when they can pitch again. Daily limit warnings still come first.
If a long outing rules out a planned pitcher later, the plan turns red and says why.

Plan pitchers on a laptop: five sample pitchers by day over two weeks, planned pitch counts on game days, rest bars until each is back, and pitch count choices for one pitcher with the day they'd be back — Plan pitchers: who throws in each game, and what that does to rest.

Plan pitchers with softball rules: five sample pitchers by day, planned innings on game days, and inning choices from 1 to 6 for one pitcher, each with no rest — Softball: the same plan, in innings.

The pitch card on a phone during a game: 52 pitches against a plan of 50, and the note 2 pitches past plan: back Fri — Baseball: the card flags a pitcher past the plan.

The softball pitch card on a phone during a game: 5 innings against a plan of 3, and the note 2 innings past your plan — Softball: the same, in innings.

Print for game day

Print a coach sheet and lineup card for each game, and a one-page season summary for families. The coach sheet adds the field with who plays where each inning, a depth chart, cut-out batting order cards, and a big order for the dugout wall. Keep score on paper? The stats sheet gives your scorekeeper a box for each number, and the scorecard is a traditional scorebook with boxes for each player’s totals.

A printed coach sheet for the sample team: eleven players by inning, bench innings shaded, pitch counts and rest rules below — Every inning's positions, in batting order.

The coach sheet's field page: a baseball diamond with a box at each position listing who plays there in innings 1 to 6, and the bench by inning — The same lineup on the field, inning by inning.

See all five, with sample PDFs

On game day

Everything works offline, and most phones stay awake during a game. You can also add it to your home screen. Phones show one inning at a time; bigger screens, the whole game.

Before the first pitch

Open the Dugout and pick the game.
Mark who’s missing, then tap Build Lineup. Tap any position to change it.
Tap Start game.

During the game

Once the game starts, a phone clears the screen for it. Lineup and Pitching move to the bottom, under your thumb. The batting order shows each player’s position this inning, up to 12 players without scrolling on most phones.

The bar at the top is the game’s line score: innings played shaded, the one in play filled. Tap Next beside it as each inning starts; in the last inning it says End game.
On Lineup, tap an inning in the bar to see who plays where in it.
Substitute a player, see the batting order, or save the game from the more options (⋯) menu.
Tap All tabs for the rest of the app, and Dugout to come back.

The Dugout on a phone during a game: the opponent, innings 1 to 6 and Next at the top, eleven sample players in batting order with their positions in inning 1, the lineup checks and Keep screen awake under them, then Lineup, Pitching, and All tabs at the bottom of the screen — During the game: the whole lineup on one screen.

Counting pitches or innings

If an assistant keeps the count, hand them the phone on Pitching. The pitcher on the mound gets a card you can read at arm’s length: the count, what’s left today, and rest days so far.

Tap +1 for each pitch. On Android phones it buzzes with each tap.
Undo fixes a mistap, including a Next inning tapped too soon.
To change pitchers, tap Bring in beside a name in the Bullpen.
In softball, tap Next inning and the inning goes to whoever pitched it.

The pitcher on the mound during a game: 45 pitches in large type with a pencil to type a count, 40 pitches left, 2 rest days so far, 3 this inning, how many more pitches add a rest day, a wide +1 button, −1 and Undo, and the Bullpen below — Baseball: big enough to read from arm's length.

The softball pitcher on the mound during a game: 3 innings in large type with a pencil to type a count, 9 innings left, no rest, innings 1, 2 and 3, how many more innings add a rest day, a wide Pitching change button, Undo Next inning, and the Bullpen below — Softball: innings, counted at each Next inning.

A game under way stays on the phone it’s running on until you save it.

Install it on your phone or tablet

Installed, it opens from your home screen like any app, full screen, and works at the field with no signal. There’s nothing to get from an app store.

Android

Open dugoutrelief.com in Chrome. If Chrome offers Install Dugout Relief at the top, tap Install. If not, open Chrome’s more options (⋮) menu and tap Add to home screen (or Install app).

When Chrome asks, pick Install, not Create shortcut: a shortcut opens in a Chrome tab.

Chrome's Install and create shortcut sheet, with Install above Create shortcut, which says shortcuts open in Chrome — Pick Install.

Samsung Internet, Edge, and Firefox have it in their menus too: Install app or Add to home screen. It keeps the team you set up in the browser.

iPhone and iPad

In Safari or Chrome, tap Share (under more options (⋯) on newer iOS), then Add to Home Screen and Add.

The installed app keeps its own copy of your team, apart from Safari. Install it before you set up your team, or move the team over with a backup file.

Game stats, from GameChanger or paper

Keep score in GameChanger? After the game, export its stats as a CSV and import the file for that game on the Schedule tab. You get batting, pitching, and fielding stats, and each pitcher’s count for rest days. Keep score on paper? Print the game’s stats sheet or scorecard for your scorekeeper and import a photo of it, or type the numbers in. Dugout Relief doesn’t score games or replace GameChanger’s messages and schedule.

What the import checks

A sample-team GameChanger stat import on a phone: the players it matched, a skipped row to check, and who pitched — Check who matched before the stats are added.

Four ways to bring a game’s stats in

Season stats to go over with players

Import each game’s GameChanger file or a photo of its stats sheet, or type the stats in. The Stats tab keeps your season record and puts the team side by side for the decisions you make: the batting order, how far each pitcher can go, and who has played where. Its Players view compares a player only with their own earlier games, so you can sit down and look at it together.

One sample player's batting season on Stats, Players: a plain-language summary, what's going well, a next step, and their last games against their first — One player's season, against their own games.

What the season stats show

Is it free?

Dugout Relief is free, and it always will be to use on your own device, with no account. If we add a paid account later, it will be a one-time payment, not a subscription. It will help pay for running and improving the app, and it may add a few extras. The free version won’t lose anything it has today.

Which leagues

Built-in rules follow Little League regular-season rules for baseball and softball, Minors through Senior. There are no settings for Tee Ball or Coach Pitch, or for other leagues and tournament rules. You can change the pitching limits on the Team tab to match your league. For every rule, the official source is Little League’s free Rulebook app (opens in a new tab).

Where your team's data lives

Your team details and game records stay in your browser unless you turn on online sync for a team. The app counts which features get used, never with player names or anything you type, and you can turn that off in the Usage analytics section of Settings.

If you clear this site’s browser data or lose your phone, you can lose your team. Download a backup file from Settings now and then; the app will remind you.

See the Privacy page for what we store, who handles it, and how to delete it.

Other devices and other coaches

To use a team on another device, sign in and turn on online sync for that team. The app encrypts it before sending, so we can’t read it. The team owner can then invite other coaches by email, to change the team or only view it. You don’t need an account to use the app.

How to sync and share a team

What it leaves out, on purpose

No team messages or RSVPs: keep those in your team app, email, or group text. No player ratings or tiers. And it never asks for birthdays, photos, parent contacts, or medical notes.

Tell us what you'd like to add or fix

Need something for your league, or found a problem? Email info@dugoutrelief.com, or send a message here, even with no signal: it goes once you're back online. You don't need an account; leave an email if you'd like a reply.

Version 2026.11.11-c04503e

Baseball or softball