Tagged With "Travelball"

I will start out by saying I understand everyone's baseball journey is different from thee other. with that being said, I support a player choosing to stay and play for their respective high school. There are now other avenues for these young people to play at the next level. But none are currently recognized as much as high school baseball is here in the USA. I have 4children, all play or played high school sports. The experience I had with my oldest son, is invaluable to me today, as my...

Sounds like you fully recognize the intangible values of a kid playing baseball with his high school friends. I understand your thinking that he may not develop or advance his skills much playing with his high school team. But I live in OC as well and there is no chance that he will not get to experience great competition and kids in his school and on the opponents that are not just as driven as kids on travel ball teams. Sure there are some kids who are just not that serious but they will...

I appreciate your reply. I meant to say my son's travel ball coach lets me sit in the dugout during games and practices and yes, coach a player when needed be. To where as the high school coach don't even want to say hi. Like I said it's complex, we are more comfortable in the travel ball realm as opposed to the high school environment. my son wouldn't be in this situation if not for his current travel ball coach. His travel ball coach is an authoritarian compared to a softer frosh high...

My son didn't enhance his skills on school teams or travel teams. He did it with all the extra work he did away from both teams. It was a work ethic that first showed up in LL. Imagine going to the LL field four miles away when the Ripken field was within walking distance. He wanted to know every bounce on the field playing short. He wanted to know every caroom of the backstop when he caught. This escalated to hitting line drive gapped after gapped and balls straight over his head until he...

I read all the time that travel will replace HS but yet all the drafted and top college Players Play both HS and travel. there is enough time after the HS season to Play travel. from a skill developement perspective HS ball is probably not needed but if I was a college Coach I would be worried that a Player who doesn't Play HS has a complicated personality/parents. I understand Club ball can be more comfortable but what I have heard college ball is even worse than HS ball when it Comes to...

I love high school ball, the coach is no better then average or below, the team commitment isn't where it should be, some of the kids tend be lazy (because the coach allows it) but at the end of the day it is just about winning, no recruiting, no colleges, no batting 12 kids in a line up, no throwing a pitcher you don't want to because a school is there to see him...just baseball.

Hitting4dudes, thanks for the effort in the post. It's good to read about other families journeys. Like you said, everyone's journey is different. At 12U, I specifically looked for an org for my son that did not let dad's in the dugout, assist at practice, or talk about playing time to the parents. Hopefully it has helped him for whatever adversities he faces in HS, whether sports or school.

"At 12U, I specifically looked for an org for my son that did not let dad's in the dugout, assist at practice, or talk about playing time to the parents. Hopefully it has helped him for whatever adversities he faces in HS, whether sports or school."...Go44Dad We actually set that as our rule when NTGson was first recruited to play 8U Travel....He's now pitching for a D-1 dream school (academic and career first/baseball second). He played at the highest level of Travel he could attain, played...

Yeah, I'm with go44. Hitting4dudes - love your pride, enthusiasm and involvement with your son. Glad you posted. Glad to hear your son is a hard worker and making nice progression. But, be careful with the "dad in the dugout" aspect. I am a HS coach and I purposely take a little bit of a stand-offish approach with parents and have clear rules that they are to be nowhere near the dugout. This starts immediately with our JV level. It's HS. It's time for these young men to learn to handle their...

daddy in the dugout frequently doesn't end up well for the player

I'm with Cabbage. My youngest is a HS senior who is a 4 year varsity player on 2 teams. Other than discussions about injuries, I've yet to have any kind of conversation about him as a player with either coach. Same with our eldest son.

Another for a hands off attitude towards the HS coach. We happen to be friends with his HS coaches. My wife is an administrator in the district my son attends. We socialize with his coach from time to time. I have had all of 1 conversation with the coach. It went something like this. Coach, "Hey joes87jr had a great game". Me, "thanks, hey wanna beer".

cabbagedad nailed it. Travel programs and HS programs have learned to co-exist very well. Hell, it's actually a good thing being that the travel programs can spend a little more time on their pre-HS aged players during that period. If you are in an area like OC, I would imagine your team, even if not a great team itself, sees at least 2-3 solid to very good HS teams each year. I have taken a back seat in coaching my son for a while now. We still go and get our work in, but that is...

My son plays in a high school league that has a lot of talent. College players on each team. He plays summer and fall ball in a league where most of the players will play at some level in college. The over all talent base is higher. They travel to PG events and other showcase tourneys around the country. He has many friends on BOTH teams. We always end up having kids over or picking him up from a teammates house. That being said, it would be very tough for me to say that it is less important...

Every ones input is greatly appreciated and I feel like all of you are like coaches in your own regard. You guys know your stuff! I want to clarify something, I have no desire to coach my son. Input and problem solving is all I am pretty much doing with him these days. Between his HS and club team, he has plenty of coaching and practice. Secondly, I guess I put it the wrong way, I don't want to be in my son's HS dugout, it's high school. All I was trying to say was, my son's club coach who...

Maybe he doesn't want dads in the dugout because he thinks that causes other dads to think he is favoring your Kids because you hang out in the dugout. this is not about your qualification as a Coach. you might very well be qualified for it but HS is just different than TB. TB is an activity were parents pay to Play their kid. even if your TB Coach is better than the JV Coach which very well might be true a TB Coach still doesn't face the same pressure by other parents and School politics.

Are you referring to the rule that during the season of the sport, an athlete can't play for both his high school and an outside program? It seems to work pretty well for baseball, with all of the travel programs shut down Feb - May . . . and at least in SoCal what's generally considered the strongest high school baseball in the country . . .

I like that CIF rule. It helps prevent the sort of arm abuse that too often happens in travel ball.

... and also helps preserve the quality of the game at the last/highest level where it is still pure baseball - not a business and not designed as a means to the next level.