Teenage Girls, Softball and Bullying

[sluggers]

There are some posts about young ladies having some trouble on HS softball teams.

Could some of the women give me some insight into the thinking by the girls "being mean" to teammates? What causes that behavior? Is it simply bullying?

Is the problem that HS coaches simply don't know how to control it?

If one boy taunted another boy on a HS team, and the coach found out about it, both boys would be running two hours a day after school. But, it seems that if a girl taunts another girl, the coach talks with everyone, pats everyone on the head, and then assumes everything is OK.

My own kids experienced some of this stuff, but both worked through it after considerable tears. Basically, my kids loved sports so much that they would put up with the a**holes on the team just to get a chance to play.

Any thoughts?

 

[SBFAMILY]

My dd went through it her Freshman year in high school. She was the only Freshman playing on Varsity and it was one girl. It amounted to one kid and Jealousy. This girl had this issue in other sports with other girls and I blame her parents. She was immature and didn't know how to handle conflict. It was ignored at first by the head coach but was handled when other kids stood up to her and then he talked to her. She would cry each time the coach would say anthing to her. Sad to think parents put this much pressure on a kid. They are the type that the kid can't do anything wrong and the coaches are always wrong.

 

[Coach-n-Dad]

guess mine was lucky. Only frosh on Varsity and got piles of respect. Only 1 girl didn't like her but never acted out.

 

[Coachmom]

My kid went through a similar thing as SBFamily. Only it was not varsity it was JV.
But since my DD was the only travel player on a team of rec ball allstars she had some drama to deal with.
She is a pitcher that took the spot of little miss rec allstar. Her parents were not happy and showed it at every game.
The kid created cliques that literally ignored my DD throughout the entire season, in spite of the fact that my DD attempted to resolve the problem on several occasions. I finally held a meeting with the coaches but I'm not sure it resolved anything.

It got a little better during last years sophomore season but still some animosity.
We are looking forward to this year to see how it all works out.

Girls are petty jealous little creatures and if you do not reign that in, it can hurt a team. Because my kid is also a very social person and wants everyone to like her, she was very hurt by the drama. Her skin has gotten thicker over this but I know it still hurts.

 

[PEPPERS]

My daughter mentioned that a number of the girls on her current HS team don’t like the coach, a new coach. It’s I’m quitting, or I’m not playing next year my daughter advises that this gets her down. They have a good team and are doing well and the coach seems to be a good coach, and my daughter likes the coach. The old coach was better is most of the complaints she hears.

My daughter has not experienced bulling most negativity, some finger pointing if a player messes-up and jealousness which include boyfriends, cars and etc. My daughter says she is the one everyone tells their problems to so she hears it all. These problems can ruin a good team.
The one thing that I advised my daughter was worth the entire camp she attended at Alabama was the statement they made below.

“The sooner you learn that live is not all about you the happier you will be”.

 

[InsidePitch]

We had some 12 YOs bullying the 11s for doing everything the coach asked. DD was glad to leave that team at the end of the year even though the 12s would have to move on for next year.

One girl Ok, two girls Good, three girls and someone is crying.

 

[Bishop]

I'm seeing a pretty good sample of this kind of thing on our middle school team.

Short stop and second base have a 7th graders starting. 3rd has a 6th grader starting. There are 8th graders on the bench.

Needless to say some of the 8th graders who are riding pine are less than pleased that younger players are starting and they are not. I coached the younger kids during the summer and one of them belongs to me so I may well be a little biased. Being as objective as possible, I feel the coach has made the correct choice. The younger players have made fewer errors, have higher batting averages and on base percentages, fewer strike outs with more plate appearances than the older kids with thier tails in a twist. From a straight stats point of view the younger kids are executing better. The grumpy, whiney attitudes from the older players probably isn't helping thier campaign for game time either.

So far there hasn't been much more than belly aching to friends and parents about how unfair it is. 'I'm an 8th grader! I should be playing not those little kids!' A well developed sense of entitlement is alive and well in some young ladies it seems. No real bullying or hazing or out right harassment has happened yet. Though the bellows from the bench players is getting louder the closer we get to post season and the more likely our chances for a run at the state championship become. I'm keeping my eyes and ears open for any sign that the unhappy lot start any of that. I'll be at the coaches front door in 10 minutes to have a chat if it crosses the line from whiney little girls to harassment or bullying of littler girls.

 

[RichK]

My DD is in her senior year as a 4-year varsity starter on a small, but good Catholic school team. She didn't have any problems with older girls, I think in part because when she was a freshman they played some older girls at key positions that probably weren't as good as some incoming girls. But they'd been with the team through the lean years and the coach wasn't going to just bench them for freshman.

I actually didn't have a problem with this. I know there's a lot of talk on this board about competing and winning spots, but on a four-year varsity team giving some level of preference to veterans isn't always the worst thing and can let younger players -- even better younger players -- ease into a spot while preserving the "team" concept.

I think there's more to winning a spot on a team than having the best raw talent.

That said, I do know girls who have been bullied or made to feel bad for playing up at our larger local high schools. It can be a bad situation, but the ages are just too different and it's not surprising.

Truth is, I think in MOST sports -- feel free to correct me if I'm wrong -- particularly on the boys side, there usually aren't freshman or even sophomores as good or big as upperclassmen. In softball, though, it's very likely that a well-trained 14 year old travel player will be as good or better than any player on a particular varsity team.

Sorry to comment not so much on the bullying, I guess, but the playing time dynamics that often lead to it...

 

[softball_chic_12]

I was the varsity starting catcher as a freshman last year. I had many issues. The only senior girl wasn't happy that i was getting tons more playing time than her. Another girl was jealous that I got chose over her for the spot. but there was no way she could get the spot because she was out for most of the season cuz she had issues with her knee. And I think she was jealous that the coaches worked more one-on-one with me than her. A junior was jealous because I was playing on varisty and she wasn't. But she also hadn't played softball in years. I think a lot of it is jealousy. They would talk behind my back, say I suck at softball and I don't deserve the spot, and they even got my family involved by talking about them!!! I was so furious. And my friends on the jv team weren't sticking up for me. and I felt out of place at varisty because I didn't really know any of the girls. and all of those girls had been friends for so long. But i knew they were better friends than the ones I called friends on jv. Once they caught wind of what the other girls were saying, they told her to be quiet. They stood up for me. And that meant a lot for me because a lot of the girls on varsity were pulled up to varsity as a freshman. they knew how hard it is to be there and how stressful it can get.

 

[Bishop]

I actually didn't have a problem with this. I know there's a lot of talk on this board about competing and winning spots, but on a four-year varsity team giving some level of preference to veterans isn't always the worst thing and can let younger players -- even better younger players -- ease into a spot while preserving the "team" concept.

I think there's more to winning a spot on a team than having the best raw talent.

Totally agree that play time is the cause of bullying in these situations.

The quoted part there is interesting to me, but I don't want to hi-jack Ray's thread. Any chance you'd be willing to start a new one and elaborate on that and define more clearly what constitutes raw talent and what the other characteristics that should factor into line up determination? I think I'd like to disagree with you but I want to make sure I understand your points before I start throwing my opinions around. Any one taking bets on me ending up with my foot in my mouth again?