RJM posted:There’s important factor Bobby is overlooking about going from high school to pro ball. A kid from our high school made this mistake.
When an 18yo signs and goes to pro ball over college he’s competing mostly with 21yo and 22yo men who came from college ball. Unless the kid is a stud and a reasonably early physical developer he’s increasing his odds of failure. The 18yo is up against it not only physically but in maturity.
A kid from my daughter’s high school years signed out of high school as a 7th round pick. His other option was a HA ranked D1. He was 6’1” 170 competing against men. After it was over he told me it was a huge mistake. He said aside from being physically overmatched, he was homesick and lacked the maturity of others. He wasn’t old enough to hang socially with most of his teammates. He got to the point where he found a private place to cry every night.
After three years of sub .200 and way too many errors he was released. He could have been one year away from his junior year draft year. He would have already played in a CWS.
This is good info... here’s the thing. I started this conversation about baseball development. It was not started to say education wasn’t important but about loss of playing time and its affect on development. Was probing to see if other creative methods to help kids get better grades without hurting development would come out. I wanted to see where we are in that regard. Seems to me that we do lack creativity in this regard. I suppose that’s why stand and deliver movies are so popular...
So... is a kid like this better off NOT playing HS and concentrating on grades while playing spring travel (which is usually only weekends). Is he better off doing that because he doesn’t have practice every day and can focus on tutoring or whatever? Does this hurt his prospects for being drafted or sought after by Colleges because “there are questions about him not playing HS”?
I suspect (I can be wrong) the same people who are getting riled up about my presumed focus on baseball over education (which is wrong), are the same folks that would ask; “why isn’t this kid playing for his HS team, is he selfish, a non team player? Etc.”