3and2Fastball posted:I'm not familiar with the Ruffnecks, but one thing I can tell you is with top flight Travel Programs, oftentimes their 14U and younger teams are only pretty good, mostly because families don't want to pay top dollar for travel ball prior to 15U. Then at 15U the best talent comes out of the woodwork to try out
The best Travel Program in the Wisconsin/Illinois border area is Hitters. They had two 1st Round MLB picks and one 2nd Round pick from just their 2017 class alone, along with a bunch of D1 commits etc etc.... relatively easier to make their 9U-14U teams. Extremely difficult to make their 15U/16U/17U teams. I would suspect that many of the top programs are like that nationwide. Go somewhere that has a track record of getting players signed or drafted.
Very familiar with the Hitters program. My comments earlier about the best program for recruiting not necessarily being the best travel program were in relation to the team my son played on. They are a "companion" program to the Hitters down here in the western suburbs of Chicago. We played the Hitters a lot. Spent a good portion of my summer and fall weekends up at Nash park for the better part of a couple of years. My son's program and the Hitters are very similar, in fact those kids that don't play HS ball here play for the Hitters during the HS season as the WI HS season is played in the Summer.
These programs do not play in the normal summer tourneys here in Chicagoland or Southern WI. Instead they are playing against each other most of the season. When it comes to tourney time these programs may not stand out as a power program, as they have not played in and won a lot of summer tourneys. In addition they are used to managing the game in a different way and will sacrifice a win if they know it will get the kids more exposure.