So...are you still happy with your TB Team?

[chrispots]

Not happy with our choice at the moment. Coach just berated her for what seemed like 10 minutes in the middle of a game over an admittedly very boneheaded decision on Sunday. But this was after a game where she pitched us to a win by getting 8 Ks and giving up 2 hits. No mention of the good pitching after the win, but real quick to pull the trigger and call her stupid and dumb when she makes mistakes on D. DD is checked out now and does not want to play for him and wants to take a break for a few months, which I am fine with, but I want her to confront this situation and not just take her ball and go home. So we are sleeping on it for a few days while spring break is shutting everything down and we will figure it out next week when practice resumes.

JJ - I feel your pain...

DD1 is ready to check out...with the coach's daughter plays SS and doesn't cover bases (or gets there late because she's quafing her hair) and then yells at my DD for the throw...DD1 looks at him like "WTH" and I bark out "are we really watching the same game?"

Having these other opportunities presented to her (they called us, I didn't call them) is really what is keeping DD1's mind in a good place...CP

 

[chrispots]

wow, I guess I should be happy when only one or two girls miss practice. not sure of your cost to play on this TB but to give a little idea of what happens around here, Pittsburgh. we pay 1k to get on team and have to do 2 fundraisers, night at the races $25 per ticket, we need to sell 4. we also do a raffle, 10 tickets at $10. for this we get a field outside before weather shuts us down. once a week and one for sure hitting session at our facility and have the option of first come first serve on a few unspoken for spots. when the weather goes bad, we get 2 hours in a field house per week and same hitting as before. we also do a 10 week D-1 training at the same field house in addition to our 2 hour indoor fielding and hitting. we usually get one or 2 girls that miss prior to March due to second sport but attendance is pretty good after basketball season. don't know if our org is big by others standards but we have 8 team with an average of 11 girls per team. I have 2 dds that play softball for two different orgs and both are very close in cost, fundraising and training opportunities. we also get two camps early on, octoberish, with two well known folks. one hitting CB and one fielding with HK. CB comes in monthly but there is an extra charge for anything after the first camp. hope this helps you gauge how your org is doing.

Damon,

Pretty big organization...~450 girls between 31 rec, 11 TB and the 3 showcase teams. Cost is comparable to yous and we do similar fundraising. We however do NOT have a field house for all teams to use however there are tons of places to rent space from. My 12U team had no problem getting space in a larger indoor venue when I was able to get Missouri's Corrin Genovese to run my 12U practice.

I just feel the HC''s lack of commitment bleeds over into the team's lack of performance...CP

 

[Frenchy101010]

My 9yo picked her team last August, She was happy, My wife and I were happy til about a month ago when the schedule was put out to all the parents. Keep in mind this is a team that moved from Rec/ 2 travel tourneys last season to a full travel tourney schedule for this season. 6 tournaments, 20+ travel league games, 9 scrimmages scheduled, great schedule, when this was passed out to all the parents, Parent 1 suzie cant play this weekend, Parent 2 we are not playing in that league, Parent 3 that's easter Saturday she cant play that day, Parent 4 suzie can't play she has to go to a graduation where nobody in her family is graduating, on and on and on. When it was all said and done they were down to 4 tourneys, 4 tourneys! This team also only had 9 players. So when one girl didn't play they would have had to pick up a rec ball girl for the weekend.

So I called the coach, he said no problem they were going to add even more tourneys, and I asked where are you going to get the girls to play? No answer. Then he said since your daughter is one of our top 2 pitchers when she doesn't pitch she will not play the field, and I said what? That was when I said we are leaving. Couldn't imagine getting to Sunday, and the #1 pitches and my daughter sits, while a rec ball ball girl who hasn't put in the time all winter, went to lessons both hitting and pitching gets to play cause the coach is scared for the pitchers to get hurt. I wander if he has told the #1 pitcher parents yet.

As soon as I made the call to another organization telling them she was available they offered her spot. She chose the team with the 10yo's instead of the 9yo's. After 4 practices with the new team, she knows she has to work even harder now cause these girls all have a year, and some have a year and half on her. They are playing 10 tournaments, have 11 girls, and when she doesn't pitch she will be playing somewhere in the field.

She had never played OF til last week and that was and will be the #2 thing she will have to work on after pitching. I forgot that tracking a fly ball in the OF is a lot harder than SS or 3B, LOL. But like pitching, she knew how hard that would be, she worked hard and is pretty decent now after 7 months. She will just have to put the work in again. In a month she will be okay.

 

[JAD]

Players are free to change TB teams, but I will warn you that players can get a reputation for "team hopping", and that reputation can make it difficult to find a new team (it gets tougher as they get older and play at higher levels). 98.2% of the time it is the parents wearing rose colored glasses regarding their DD's abilities who dictate the change. There are a couple of good players in our area who have been on multiple teams over the years because the coaching staff is tired of putting up with their parents. DO NOT be that parent!

 

[Easton33]

Not sure how anybody could be happy with a coach who uses pick-up players and has his own players sit. I personally find that to be about as Bush League as it gets and also believe it is unethical to the point that I'd be aggressively shopping for a new team.

That coach has no interest in his girls. He's in it for himself.

Completely disagree. You know very little about the situation from post. If they only have 9, coach wants to go in with 10, pickup player needed. It is poor etiquette to pickup a player and not play her. That is Bush league. Around here if you pick up a player and don't play her kiss your chances of picking up another player good bye. If a girl is going to come out and help your team compete for a weekend, then she should play. The other players should sit because if it wasn't for this new player your girls may not have had the opportunity to compete at a higher level at this tournament. Granted, 12 girls show and you use a pickup player is poor coaching but that was not clarified in post. A lot of TB parents have issues with the role of pickup players they just see it as taking playing time away from other girls. Unfortunately that does happen but the pickup player you use today could be the eventual roster add that makes your team better tomorrow. Standing rule on my team is if I have to use a pickup player, they are playing every game regardless of who I have to sit. To add insult to injury, if I am forced to use a pickup player, the parents of the team will be paying for her to play while their little Sally is on the bench. I don't pickup often but when I am forced to, these are the rules. Think about it, if you are using a pickup player on tournament weekend and only have 9 rostered, one of your regulars will be sitting or your pickup player will be. Do you want to be the coach that picks up a player just to ride pine, the coach that went to a tournament with only 9 and was knocked out early because of injury, or the coach that picked up a player and played her because she made his overall team more competitive and went further in the tournament while having to alternate benching a regular?

 

[Easton33]

But to original post, Happy, Happy, Happy with our girls. Finally got a tournament in and after just 28 hours at the park we won!! (No pickup players needed)

 

[softball88]

Very happy with our travel team and coach. He has coached my daughter 4 out of 6 yrs in tb. She's a better overall player.

 

[3bmama]

I am pretty happy with my daughter's team. They are 10u. Registered C in the fall and after doing really well were moved up to B. I can see the girls getting better. I can also see the coaches working towards having more knowledge as well, I know that doesn't happen everyday. I appreciate the coaching style they use. Tough but not obnoxious, while remembering to praise as well. My only gripe is that we aren't playing still for several weeks. Most teams are rough in the early tournaments, most teams will have already worked that out before we start.

 

[Little Angels Softball]

The only complaint I have is playing guest players majority of the time in order to have players from your own team sit on the bench 80% of the tournament.

Completely disagree. You know very little about the situation from post. If they only have 9, coach wants to go in with 10, pickup player needed. It is poor etiquette to pickup a player and not play her. That is Bush league. Around here if you pick up a player and don't play her kiss your chances of picking up another player good bye. If a girl is going to come out and help your team compete for a weekend, then she should play. The other players should sit because if it wasn't for this new player your girls may not have had the opportunity to compete at a higher level at this tournament. Granted, 12 girls show and you use a pickup player is poor coaching but that was not clarified in post. A lot of TB parents have issues with the role of pickup players they just see it as taking playing time away from other girls. Unfortunately that does happen but the pickup player you use today could be the eventual roster add that makes your team better tomorrow. Standing rule on my team is if I have to use a pickup player, they are playing every game regardless of who I have to sit. To add insult to injury, if I am forced to use a pickup player, the parents of the team will be paying for her to play while their little Sally is on the bench. I don't pickup often but when I am forced to, these are the rules. Think about it, if you are using a pickup player on tournament weekend and only have 9 rostered, one of your regulars will be sitting or your pickup player will be. Do you want to be the coach that picks up a player just to ride pine, the coach that went to a tournament with only 9 and was knocked out early because of injury, or the coach that picked up a player and played her because she made his overall team more competitive and went further in the tournament while having to alternate benching a regular?

It looked from her original post that her team had enough of their own players as multiple players were sitting 80% of the time in favor of the pick-ups.

I know that I don't want to be that coach who picked up players and sat my own solely to make my team more competitive or just to go farther in a tournament. It is my job to get my own players ready to do those things.

I also make a commitment to players when I pick them for the team that says if they come to practice and do the work they will get to play just as they make the same commitment to me. I do not want to be the coach who breaks my end of the bargain just so I can maybe win another game or two or get a better trophy on my resume.

In 15 years, I can still count on one hand the number of times I've used pick-up players. Each time it has been as an insurance policy for an injury-depleted team that was able to field nine players and I added a tenth so we could continue in case of yet another injury. The pick-up player has always understood this and I have never had a problem finding help. Each time, my own girls play the majority of the time but do rotate with small stints on the bench so the girl helping us can get some reps. Having all nine girls sit two innings during a five game tourney nets them about 95% play time and manages to get the pick-up girl about 60 - 70% play time. Nobody needed to sit 80% of the time and certainly not multiple players from my own team.

I can see no valid reason (for me, at least) why pick-up players should play all the time and multiple players on one's own team should sit the bench 80% of the time. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on the proper use of pick-up players, which is fine as there are many ways to skin a cat.

 

[Easton33]

Players plural, could mean different players each game not more than 1 player per game. You are attributing all bench time to 1 player and the post does not say that. Like I said earlier, not enough info in original post.
It is great that you don't have to use pickup players occasionally. That may also be the reason why your views are what they are. If you had to use them a bit more often (let's say you only rostered 10 girls for a season) you would probably use them more often and would change your perspective after the pick up player pool dried up for u. If the girl is a good ballplayer and you play her a limited amount of time, don't count on seeing her back next time you need 1. I run a short roster, 10 girls, I do this to ensure maximum playing time throughout the season for all my girls and occasionally I will need to use a pickup player. Larger rosters won't see the need for pickup players as often. I guarantee more playing time per season with just 10 and an occasional pick up vs a team that rosters 12 and sits 3 every game. It's just math. Just a different perspective but I think our difference is largely based on how we interpreted the post. 1 specific player sitting the whole tournament so pickup could play vs several girls sitting (rotational) throughout the course of the tournament.