11th Graders on JV Team???

I'd say thats normal. I see plenty of Jr's on JV teams. I dont see anything wrong with it. Its a good place for a player to get playing time who is either marginal in abilities or needs some development. In the schools I am most familiar with, the only levels which are grade restricted are Freshman teams and Seniors must play varsity only.

Other than that its where your talents put you. If your a sophmore and can play varsity you should be there.........if your a junior and need JV......thats where you belong.

If they are not yet varsity player caliber and want to play the game, why not?

I am sure the coaches have a method to the procedures

TRhit

Depends on the numbers and quality of varsity players. My sons '03 varsity team had 11 seniors, 2 juniors, 2 soph. In any other year the 6 juniors on jv would have been on varsity, but this was a heavy senior class. If they expanded the size of the varsity team they would not have gotten innings, or due to the numbers 3 or 4 would have been undeservingly cut. The down side, the jv team had 20 players. But they had enough to play inter-squad games during the week, split pt for jv games, and had extra coaching help, it ended up being very instructional. They will be a better team this year because of the amount of time they practiced on the jv field, and even bigger, was that they understood why they were on jv and led that team by example.

Talent should dictate where you play, not age, not politics. Many players need to learn where they fall talent-wise in sports. It is best to know the truth so they can work on improvement. High school can sometimes be a reality check for sports athletes and they can then direct their focus to some of the more important things in life, like being doctors, lawyers, teachers, nurses, engineers, etc.

Simply put, being on JV in the 11th grade is not the end of the world and should be viewed as such. The player should look at is a positive, he could have been cut. JMHO.

Knowledge is Power! Thank you Mavens and HSBBWEB!

You have to lookdown the road. As a coach if an 11th grader is playing JV there would logically be a senior in front of him and you project that boy to play the following season. Sometimes you roll the dice and see more of an up side. For pitchers it is an ideal situation for getting their innings in rather than not on the varsity. It is a fine line.For whatever reason It should never be at the expense of a player of more or equal talent from say 10th or even 9th grade.

As always, it depends on the situation. I have never done it in my career, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't. The only way I could see it is if the class below them is very weak with few numbers, and this kid may HAVE to play the following year or if he will be a key component the following year. Otherwise, you are blocking your sophomore of playing time.

It worked for my son (LHP). At the start of his Jr year, his team had plenty of pitchers (FB players get priority and the coach likes his pitchers to go the distance). Rather than sit and watch, my son requested to be moved down to JV to get innings. By the end of the season, the varsity coach realized his pitching wasn't as deep as he thought and that his FB players weren't automatically pitchers. My son wound up the closer on varsity. Would he have done that without the JV innings? Can't say, but I know the innings made him more comfortable on the mound.

Incidentally, his teammates knew that he asked to move down and why. At the end of the season, they saw the results and respected him for it.

A prevailing theme on this website re: college choices revolves around "fit". One of the components of "fit" is that it's better to be on the field playing at a smaller school than it is riding the bench somewhere else. You don't get any better sitting.

Let's draw a parallel with HS ball. Obviously, most HS players don't have the opportunity to select a school where they have a better "fit". They can't transfer to a school that might provide them with more playing time. If the opportunity exists for an 11th grader to get some meaningful playing time at the JV level (as opposed to riding the pines on varsity), then it benefits the player.

I've seen circumstances where, because of a large senior class, some juniors may not get their chance to contribute significantly until their last year. Our team had a couple of junior pitchers that weren't getting many innings with the varsity due to senior depth, rainouts, etc. They went and pitched with the JV in some weekend tournaments. It helped them to remain sharp, and it helped the JV program as well. Certainly it's important that freshmen and sophomores get development so that they can contribute in the future. But, it's not always a bad thing for some 11th graders to get some JV time.

Sometimes, a coach may not have much choice. In big schools, the Varsity team may be stacked with Seniors. There are many deserving Juniors at my son's school who should play Varsity, but there are several talented seniors as well. (the school is 6a, and over 3,000 kids)

Small school situation. Never had cuts before.

The numbers dictate that there will be cuts this year.

So you cut seniors? So Juniors/freshman will develop? Won't they develop anyway?

Lurk: Keep the best players. Cut the rest. If you're not sure, keep the older player over the younger one. (If the younger guy has game, he'll be back next year, and he'll get lots more playing time in his summer team than on the HS team anyway.) Generally if you think an older player and a younger one are similar in talent, you'll get more perormance out of the older one.
That's my advice.

D'oh!

Bottom line for me is that you keep the players that can best help your team--no ifs and or buts

My son's team will have players that will possibly go on and play college ball that will be role players this year, as Seniors.

Lots of JR's on JV also.

What happens when you attend a high school with a group of very talented players.

This may be the unpopular view here, but I tend to side with the approach taken here in Charlotte, where juniors don't play JV ball except in exceptional circumstances. It is the high school coaches as a group that promulgated and self-police this approach. (We have no freshman teams.)

Their rationale is that the overwhelming purpose of JV baseball is to further develop those young players who seem to have the potential to play at the varsity level before they finish high school. The extension of their reasoning is that every junior on the roster prevents a freshman or sophomore from having access to that developmental time; and that it's unlikely that a junior asked to play JV ball is going to develop into a meaningful contributor before he graduates. Tough on the juniors, perhaps; but, better for the younger players.

quote:

Originally posted by Prepster:
This may be the unpopular view here, but I tend to side with the approach taken here in Charlotte, where juniors don't play JV ball except in exceptional circumstances. It is the high school coaches as a group that promulgated and self-police this approach. (We have no freshman teams.)

Their rationale is that the overwhelming purpose of JV baseball is to further develop those young players who seem to have the potential to play at the varsity level before they finish high school. The extension of their reasoning is that every junior on the roster prevents a freshman or sophomore from having access to that developmental time; and that it's unlikely that a junior asked to play JV ball is going to develop into a meaningful contributor before he graduates. Tough on the juniors, perhaps; but, better for the younger players.

That is why most schools around here have 2 JV teams and a Freshman team or two.

Never happen in our state

8th,9th,10th JV unless talented
11th,12th varsity only

Same here - no juniors on Varsity. Many kids get cut at that point, because they don't have the ability to move up a level. Unfortunately, we don't have freshman teams, so the spots on JV are as coveted as the varsity ones.

Some Div IV schools in Southern Cali do not have enough kids to field a Freshman Team. So they have to look into incoming High School kids and this means 7th and 8th grade Middle School Kids play on them. I know of a local school that is doing this. They have no other choice to field a team with incoming 8th and 7th graders. The same school also is having many Freshamn and Sophomore Kids play up on Varsity. Remember in CIF the 8th grade team is usually a club team. So they can pretty much select kids in the 7th and 8th grade.

many HS teams in Nevada only have one JV team to go along with the varsity. So it can be unfortuante, but some Juniors get cut.

I think that it would have to be a year by year decision for the coach.
If the coach has 10 returning seniors and really no place to put a junior who will help out his senior year, than JV is a great place to be. your the stud and you could be called up for injury or playoffs.
also if your a 4-5th pitcher you need innings to be ready for the playoffs. The EH

Under normal circumstances, I would say no. If they weren't good enough to make varsity as a junior, what are the odds they will as a senior?

There will always be exceptions, of course.

I don't think a junior on jv is good. If he isn't good enough to make Varsity, he shouldn't take a younger guy's spot and chance to become better. There are some exceptions, but IMHO it shouldn't happen.

My team has 14 seniors,who are all on varsity, so we only have enough room for 5 other jerseys. We also have 10 juniors. If all of our juniors were on varsity they would never get a chance to play.

Dogz, thats my point, every year is different for the coaches.
They are the one's who have to make those choices.
A junior not making the Varsity does not mean he cannot play ball. There just no room for him.
Better to play JV than not at all.

Hey Dottie...see you in a week-and-a-half?

You know, one of our son's teammates was on JV his junior year in HS. He then had an excellent senior season and made all-league in one of the best leagues around here...then getting the invitation to join the staff on The Farm.

It CAN be done!

At my school we only have a JV and varisty team. if you are a junior you either make the varsity or you are cut. over the years i've been at my high school there has not been a player that is on the edge that is a junior that is cut. most of the juniors that get cut wouldnt make the team as a senior.