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Reply to "how hard do I have to throw to go D1"

joes87 posted:
Gavin crowley posted:
RJM posted:

Your velocity is great for your age. How tall are your mother and father? Given where you are now if it's affordable your parents and you should look into the New England Ruffnecks.

s. And I am very familiar with the Ruffnecks, they have an amazing program, but my age group's team is better. For some reason 14u Ruffnecks aren't as great as the others, although they are still a great team.

Gavin, I highly suggest you open up another thread asking about what things are important in a travel team.  I just looked at the Ruffnecks website and they have an extensive list of Alumni as well as a pretty impressive program setup.  Im not sure if all these folks were brought up through the program or just played there for one year and left.  

There is a world of difference between a good travel team and a program that is built to get kids in front of college recruiters.  Over the years my son played for a good travel team.  One that won many tournaments and was the team many teams did not want to face.  We left the program for one that folks did not consider as good but really knew how to get the kids recruited.  Thing is the second program had many players superior to other programs.  They approached how the played the game differently.  In addition they spent a good portion of their season playing in games as opposed to tourneys.  Those games were setup in such a way that they drew many college recruiters.  The other teams did not see this and only saw the team in tourneys at the end of the season, games in which we did not necessarily play to win but played to improve and get our kids recognized.  

If you found the Ruffnecks alumni list then it should list the years they played in the program.  Both my sons are alums of that program.  Unlike some other area teams, they only field one team per age group and the kids play the entire season.  Some clubs have lengthier alum lists but they count kids that may have only played a single weekend or very few games, and/or they run several teams per age.  I wouldn't say which approach is better, just pointing out they can be very different.  Ruffnecks guys are with the program all year, often starting with fall ball the previous fall, then winter workouts, then the lengthy summer schedule.  They build a great deal of comradery and many friendships that both my boys enjoy years after being done with the program.

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