I'm interested in hearing opinions on this. My daughter just accepted a position with a 16U A team - we have been very excited about the team. the coach said there were 7 returning players (they are moving up from 14U A to 16U A this year) and that they were recruiting 4. Great! Well it turns out that there are 8 returning players and they added 5 to the roster. Not so great. Roster is now 13 players. 12 would have been okay, but 13? We are not feeling positive about this change. I thought I'd post to get others' thoughts on this roster size for this age group.
16U A team Roster size
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I checked the rosters for 16U A teams in my state (that was a good idea) and found the following. This does help put it into some objective perspective. Still have mixed feelings about it (again, it was a change from what we were originally told) and not sure I'm convinced it will be a good experience.
13 person: 4
12 person: 3
11 person: 3
15 person: 1
13 person: 4
12 person: 3
11 person: 3
15 person: 1
DD #1 was on a 16u TB team with 11 players. They often struggled to find 9 players for a game/ scrimmage/ tournament. One time they had a scrimmage double header scheduled, and only 9 players were available, including 2 pitchers. One pitcher broke her hand in the first inning of the first game. They finished the game with 8 players, and had to cancel the second game of the scrimmage, since they had no more pitchers. DD was an outfielder, a 14u player on a 16u team, and that was quite a challenge for her. More at-bats, though.
DD #3 was on a 12u team with 13 players. That sometimes caused problems with too many girls on the bench, but other times it was great. For example, if DD #3 came in as a relief pitcher in the 5th inning, the coach could sit her and one of the catchers during the 4th, so they could warm up to be ready in the 5th. Also, there are often conflicts, and having 13 players made it much easier to deal with conflicts. Fewer at bats, though.
DD #3 was on a 12u team with 13 players. That sometimes caused problems with too many girls on the bench, but other times it was great. For example, if DD #3 came in as a relief pitcher in the 5th inning, the coach could sit her and one of the catchers during the 4th, so they could warm up to be ready in the 5th. Also, there are often conflicts, and having 13 players made it much easier to deal with conflicts. Fewer at bats, though.
JJsqueeze
Dad, Husband....legend
What is wrong with 13 on any team? One girl gets injured, another is sick, you need at least 3 pitchers and 2 catchers, presumably 1 out of 3 of the pitchers is specialized at 16u to where she is not going to play another position when she is not pitching and may not bat. 13 is a good number. Sure the bottom 3 will see significantly less playing time, but isn't that always the case?
- Feb 7, 2013
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My DDs 12u TB team has 13 players which I think is fine. It's a long season with lots of friendlies and tournaments.
My concern is that the coach "lied" to you and said there would be 11 and now they are carrying 13. Not a good start to the season IMO.
My concern is that the coach "lied" to you and said there would be 11 and now they are carrying 13. Not a good start to the season IMO.
- Nov 29, 2009
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13 players is on the small side at 16U. How many of them are strictly pitchers? How many are strictly catchers? What does the schedule look like? Will the team play a lot of games? They are one or two injuries short of having the season end up in the toilet.
With 13 players on the roster they have to compete for playing time. That's what happens in HS and college. Perform or sit. If your DD can't work harder than the other player who wants the same position she will sit. With 8 returners she will have to. If you remove your DD from the team it lets her know it's OK to run away if a challenge becomes too great.
When my DD played HS there were 18 kids on the roster. She was one of 3 pitchers. She outworked and out-pitched the others and was the #1 for her varsity career. The same in college. She pitched better than the other girls to be the #1 all 4 years. In travel ball they routinely had 15 kids on the roster. You need to have a talk with your DD and present it as a challenge that needs to be overcome at every practice, workout or game. Get in the habit of out-hustling her teammates. It will show on the field during the games. Taking a defeatist attitude towards the situation is setting your DD up for failure.
It's time for her to put her big girl spikes on and take charge of her playing career. Sit back and let her go. If she is REALLY motivated to play she may amaze you.
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Thanks for the feedback. We will take this as a good learning experience and motivator for DD. So far she has been very motivated and was a top performer on her previous team. This is a new team, higher level than she previously played, and older. But the coaches loved her at the tryouts and offered her a spot then and there after the tryout when they knew they had another one scheduled for the following week. We took that as a great sign and still do. Sparky Guy I think you have the right attitude and advice. This will get her exposed to what will eventually happen with high school (she's a freshman this year) and higher level teams as she continues to grow. In fact she's trying out for the HS field hockey team now and most likely will be put on Varsity (according to the coach who mentioned it to me today) and as far as I can tell from previous years, he keeps about 20 girls for his team (11 on the field in field hockey) - so she will need to start getting used to it there too!
This notion of competition and the best players earning their spots on the field, when does it kick in? This is an interesting topic and I like what everyone has to say. My DD will be playing her second year of 10u and we don't seem to do a lot of the 'best player gets the spot'. We seem to be more of a 'let's appease everyone so no one complains' team. Maybe this is typical and appropriate for this age level. The reason I bring it up here is because we are looking at only carrying 10-11 players (must sound crazy after reading the above posts). Honestly a few of us like the idea because we feel like it's less 'rotational' with less players. Maybe we're being selfish but shouldn't we want what's best for our DD's (trust me I'm all for her playing other positions occasional and even sitting out). My real concern is we just picked up a new girl who I feel is every bit as good as my DD and I believe my DD is pretty good. These two IMO have the best gloves with the best and most consistent arms and there seems to be no plan to put them in the infield SS/2 SS/3... At the same time. Again, maybe this is reasonable at this age and I'm interested in what you guys think.
Depends on how committed your families and players are. I've coached a second-year 12U team that had only 10 players. We wanted 11, but never found the right girl and stopped looking. I don't recall using a pickup player. Everybody was there. Softball was just what these families did every other weekend. On the rare couple of times we had only 9 (because of injury), we gambled and played w/ 9. The purpose of the team was to make each player as good as possible, and that meant they needed to play as much as possible.
As far as ''when'' does it get competitive, I'd say from the moment you become a travel team. I've never seen a travel team where you didn't earn your spot. That is, I've never seen a team where everybody was as likely to play shortstop as the next girl. So I'm not sure how you are defining ''best players earning their spots.'' On a college team, your best shortstop is playing short for every meaning inning of the season. Some coaches take that approach in 10U as well. When I coached 10U, I had a fairly set infield because I didn't think we could be competitive without it. But in retrospect, I wish I'd been willing to give more players the opportunity to play positions other than the ones that gave the team the best chance to win. I've since decided that it's too early to make judgments about what kids can and can't do at that age. The reason most girls can't play second base is because they've never been given the training or experience, not because they can't do it. I'd still have a primary shortstop, but I wouldn't feel the need to give her 98 percent of the innings there.
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DD #3's fall rec league starts their games in a few days. First practice tomorrow if the t-storms don't come in.
The local rec league (West Madison Little League) has had a lot of problems with softball enrollment the past couple of years. For 12u, they allow 10 players on the field (4 outfielders). There are 9 girls on the roster. Yes, sometimes girls sign up late, and so the roster may expand to 10 or 11, but it will be a bit dicey, esp. around Labor Day.
Fortunately, the league allows girls to "play up", meaning girls from lower age groups can play in higher age groups. However, that can be really rough. The 12u girls in the fall are usually 5-7th graders, which is a wider age group than usual. That means any girls playing up would be 4th graders or younger.
OTOH, DD #3 has played up for 14u a couple of times already. Once as a 5th grader and once as a 6th grader.
The local rec league (West Madison Little League) has had a lot of problems with softball enrollment the past couple of years. For 12u, they allow 10 players on the field (4 outfielders). There are 9 girls on the roster. Yes, sometimes girls sign up late, and so the roster may expand to 10 or 11, but it will be a bit dicey, esp. around Labor Day.
Fortunately, the league allows girls to "play up", meaning girls from lower age groups can play in higher age groups. However, that can be really rough. The 12u girls in the fall are usually 5-7th graders, which is a wider age group than usual. That means any girls playing up would be 4th graders or younger.
OTOH, DD #3 has played up for 14u a couple of times already. Once as a 5th grader and once as a 6th grader.
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