Buckeye 2015 posted:Also, a lot depends on the HS you attend, the league you play in, etc. My son never had one college coach come see him in HS, heck, I can count on one hand how many college coaches I saw at his games his entire HS career. We are in a small town in an area that other than 1 HS doesn't produce D1 players. The D3 schools in the area are just ok. If you're a starter in HS and an average player, you can play college baseball within 45 minutes of home if you want to at one of these schools. The options for summer ball for a HS kid are 1) travel ball with no quality organization within 75 miles 2) Legion which is awful in this area other than 1 team 3) Acme, which is a month long season that is played by HS teams....incoming freshmen-juniors. It's glorified LL in most cases....again, except for a couple schools that take it serious (our HS wasn't one of them). I can guarantee you that my son would never have ended up at D1 if he hadn't played travel ball. I know it's not like this everywhere, people need to determine based on their own area and HS program
I agree with you 100%. Travel ball is a necessity if you hope to play at the college level. Question is, at what level of team? We are in Pittsburgh, PA. Not a baseball hot bed either. my son played for the same travel team from summer after his freshman year until he graduated this spring . played in a local league that was pretty good for this area. went to 2-3 tournaments a year, usually one in philly area, one in Raleigh NC area, and one in Michigan or at Ohio State. the cost was $500-$700 a year depending on tournament fees. I wouldn't consider this team an elite team, but we usually had 2 or 3 D1 commits, and just about everyone else was D2/D3.
So, we didn't go the "Elite" national level team route, a good friend of mine's son did ( they live in Pittsburgh as well) played for a nationally well known organization for 2 or 3 years. He ended up committing to LSU, my son ended up at Coastal Carolina. Both kids had a number of offers. I guess this just reinforces that there's no one single path. If you don't have the time, money, or inclination to travel all over the country, then it's not necessary. I'm not knocking it by any stretch, but was wondering if the competition is all that much better on a regular basis? Is the investment worth it?