IS TRAVEL BALL leaving people/players/rec & school behind...OR...

[Vertigo]

When my DD made the basketball All-Star team when she was in 4th grade the best player was a 3rd grader. I later found out that 3rd grader had a May 2005 birthdate and my daughter had a late August 2005 birthdate-- so she was almost 3 months older than my daughter but a grade behind. That best player is now a sophomore in high school playing basketball on a very good high school team with a couple D1 scholarship verbal offers. So parents are definitely holding players back for athletic advantages, not just due to mental maturity within a month of the cutoff date.

Agree that it does happen - but before starting K I would think (hope) it is more for mental readiness vs physical maturity for sports purposes.

 

[Vertigo]

I tend to see it a lot at my kids’ private HS where kids have left public school, reclassed, and still get 4 seasons of varsity since we don’t follow the public school state-sanctioned rules.

 

[_MIA_]

My DD has a perfect birthday for school ball (early Sept) but not good for TB (coupled with her playing up a year..) She is in 6th grade and during her Fall MS sball season she had kids on her team who had just finished 10U softball (2010's) and she was currently first year 14U..

 

[Cougars]

My daughters have mid August bday's. They are HS juniors right now. If they had been born 2 weeks later, they would be soph. If I had a "reset" button, I would have held them back before starting school and they would be soph. Not simply a sports decision, but I think they would have been in better position for everything kids deal with growing up.

 

[radness]

The demise of rec ball is mostly due to being more options than there used to be. Like I said, kids have always sought out the best place to play...there are just more shiny objects now then there used to be.

best answer/guess as to why and where people will spend their time.

Glad you recognize people will just write a check and join a travel ball team over helping rec ball and community service.

 

[Rolling Hard]

The vast majority of softball is facilitated by volunteer work!

Herein lies part of the problem. Well intentioned volunteers (rec coaches) that no very little knowledge or worse they think they know it all, leading/teaching the young 6 to 9 year old's poor hitting and throwing mechanics and after 3 years of poor habit building it is very difficult to change or develop proper mechanics. I know you want them to have fun at this age and I say learning proper mechanics is fun! If you were lucky enough to have quality coaching in the early years your chances of playing later on in HS and/or college is greatly increased.

 

[Cougars]

best answer/guess as to why and where people will spend their time.

Glad you recognize people will just write a check and join a travel ball team over helping rec ball and community service.

It might be different at the top end of travel, but the overwhelming majority of travel ball is volunteer too though. I have no way of checking this, but if you counted all the teams in the country, from the top of the top, all the way down to the worst 'C', I'd guess 80% are volunteer coaches? That % might be really low????

 

[_MIA_]

Single mom from Chicago works two jobs and makes 40K a year. Whenever she has free time she goes to the field (if there is one to go to..that is an entirely different issue which is more solvable..)

With regards to bolded, drove by the fields (in a public park) I have been practicing with my kids since they were little today, the only non-school fields in Norman with dirt IF, and saw signs posted on them that said “No practicing. Police will be called”

The fields are now run by a private entity which manages the local rec softball and baseball leagues, the one my DS plays in. I contacted them to see if I could pay for some sort of permit to practice with my damn kids...No answer of yet (they had no phone number..only an e-mail) If I cannot I have no idea what I am going to do. Very upsetting. Maybe I can get permission from DD's MS coach to use that field to work with them? I just need it for fielding..there is another park which we can use to hit (doesn't have an IF).

 

[Gambler Bob]

This is what I believe is crushing rec softball or rec sports in general.

1- C- Level softball. This is basically rec softball with a different name to it. People may not like this answer but in terms of talent they are very close.
2- Soccer, lacrosse, volleyball, or any other sport. Nothing wrong with playing those sports, just stating that there are a lot of other options to choose from.
3- Dance, and cheerleading. Nothing wrong with these activities either. From what I see, many of the girls that participate in dance or cheerleading are incredible athletes or could be incredible athletes if they spent their time playing sports. The competitive cheerleading season is just as long as travel softball.

 

[CrazyNani]

In my neck of the woods the best players (mostly travel ball kids) play for their HS teams. TB typically will go dark during school ball season, so you either play for your HS or you won’t be playing until the HS season is over. Typically, mid-June.

Rec level here ends at 12U. LL tries to have junior/senior teams so they will merge with other LL if numbers are low. There are more than enough non-travel players at the HS age but it just seems that the interest in SB isn’t there for a HS rec team.

I do agree with Pattar as well. There might be a lot of talent who play for the lower level (more affordable) travel teams who might never reach their full potential because they can’t afford to travel across the country every summer/fall. They are the kids who are truly left behind. They want to play, they have the talent, but can’t afford the dream.

What if they're not shootin' for D1? It seems to me that there are opportunities to play in college if one wants to; they just might need to set their sights a bit lower and work harder to promote themselves if they aren't on the more prestigious teams.