What if that's not the goal? Or at least, not the priority. By 14 maybe you need to sorta have your sights there, but _under 14_? ...meh.
I'd be interested in what percentage of the girls this coach thinks aren't better at the end of their their season compared to the end of their previous season. I bet it's close to zero, if not zero.
Neither of my girls was/is interested in playing in college. My younger one enjoys playing and loves the camaraderie, but her favorite thing is to say "what kind of loser would I be if I didn't have softball? I would literally be doing nothing with my life." The drama of it makes me laugh, but at least she appreciates that she's bettering herself in some capacity.
I can't even get her to like the idea of teaching pitching lessons after high school. She would be making straight cash at $40 or more per hour and setting her own schedule. She has no idea how awesome that would be for a college student living at home.
As for your second point, I think there's a big difference between whether they improved vs how much they improved. In our program, the better natural athletes will improve at a faster rate just via team practices. The other kids improve as well, but not much. It drives me nuts when either of those types of player doesn't work at all in the offseason. They show back up, and we're a small program so we really can't afford to turn anyone away with tryouts.
Our hitting last year was better, but we still only had five girls bat over .300. Two of them will be gone this season, and they both hit .400+. So now we need to make up for them, which means we'll need like three more .300 hitters. I think my daughter will end up being one of those, but where will the others come from? We have a couple other potentials, but ultimately there are several on the team who could fill those spots if they even spent once a week hitting off a tee in the offseason.
But they don't think that way. They just play when it's time to play, and then get frustrated all season when they start varsity and can't even hit .200. Other programs have kids who can all hit .300 and are competing for varsity slots with openings that expect a .350 hitter to fill it. Kids who work in the offseason competing with other kids who work in the offseason. We just don't have that luxury right now, so we hold two practices a week from June until the start of spring practices...all open/optional sessions. Of the 14 or so we expect in the spring, we average 5 or 6 at open sessions, and it's usually the same kids. Most of the others are doing no other sports or extracurriculars.
This winter will be 3x per week in the batting cage. That's our situation. We need more than improvement from season to season--we need drastic improvement. Those are the kids we want, and really it's more that we need parents who are like-minded and care about the team's overall success.