Bad news Hoosiers...

Ahhh....the good ol' Cincy Flames tourney.  Probably the biggest money grab in the history of travel ball tournaments.   They are still doing it.   They are using fields over 2 hours away from team hotels.  Our last time there we had a 10:00am game an hour east of our hotel.   3:00pm game over 2 hours the other direction, meaning an hour back to our hotel after the second game. 

@Buckeye 2015 posted:

Ahhh....the good ol' Cincy Flames tourney.  Probably the biggest money grab in the history of travel ball tournaments.   They are still doing it.   They are using fields over 2 hours away from team hotels.  Our last time there we had a 10:00am game an hour east of our hotel.   3:00pm game over 2 hours the other direction, meaning an hour back to our hotel after the second game.

Well.. everything is a money grab isn't it? The convenience store you go to in the morning, your bank, the hospital you visit or your doctor, Amazon. Almost everything you do on a daily basis is meant to separate you from your money.

So it's their fault that there aren't hotels close by? Are you insinuating they should have built the facility closer to hotels, or they should have built a hotel closer? They provided an opportunity to play baseball at a fairly high competitive level. As a team it was your decision as to take advantage of that or not.

Yes.  But I do remember that the Cincy Flames tournament was particularly aggressive about documenting whether you were using their hotels.  The year I was the team hotel coordinator (years ago), someone called me and wanted to know where every single member of our team was staying (which included RVing, visiting friends or family, using points at other hotels, etc.).  To give them credit, the rates they had negotiated with the hotels were pretty good.

Cincinnati is a great city, and there are some interesting things to see in Ohio, as you are driving between all those fields and your hotel....

We had some great baseball experiences there, too.

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

Found this pic on a hard drive I almost threw away. At the Cincy Flames summer tourney. It wasn't one of the A list tourneys at the time, but it was still a big deal. Lots of very good teams. We made it to the finals against a team from AZ made up of no small amount of MLB players offspring or close relatives, like Roger Clements nephew. Ran out of pitching. Lost by some stupid score like 20-10. None the less one of the two greatest teams my son has been part of, right up there with ISU's super regional team last year. Just a group of hardnosed southern Indiana boys who took names and kicked ass.

Is that the whole team?

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

Well.. everything is a money grab isn't it? The convenience store you go to in the morning, your bank, the hospital you visit or your doctor, Amazon. Almost everything you do on a daily basis is meant to separate you from your money.

So it's their fault that there aren't hotels close by? Are you insinuating they should have built the facility closer to hotels, or they should have built a hotel closer? They provided an opportunity to play baseball at a fairly high competitive level. As a team it was your decision as to take advantage of that or not.

My point was more that there is no reason to have 800 teams playing in town on the same weekend if you have to make teams drive 4+ hours a day to play 2 games.

@anotherparent posted:

Yes.  But I do remember that the Cincy Flames tournament was particularly aggressive about documenting whether you were using their hotels.  The year I was the team hotel coordinator (years ago), someone called me and wanted to know where every single member of our team was staying (which included RVing, visiting friends or family, using points at other hotels, etc.).  To give them credit, the rates they had negotiated with the hotels were pretty good.

Cincinnati is a great city, and there are some interesting things to see in Ohio, as you are driving between all those fields and your hotel....

We had some great baseball experiences there, too.

There is that. We ran into that playing Super NIT and other tournaments. I guess the question is, is it a money grab or what a host needs to do to make it all worthwhile.

@RoadRunner posted:

Is that the whole team?

Pretty well. We would pick up players here and there. That was the core. Almost every kid on that team were very good two-way players, but it did hold us back. We could make it to Sunday in almost every major tournament we played, but mostly the semis would be it. We would just be out of pitching.

@Buckeye 2015 posted:

My point was more that there is no reason to have 800 teams playing in town on the same weekend if you have to make teams drive 4+ hours a day to play 2 games.

So, you are saying they should have cut off entry even if a team were willing to drive 4 hours plus to play? And you do realize 4 hrs puts you renting hotels in Indy and Dayton.

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

Pretty well. We would pick up players here and there. That was the core. Almost every kid on that team were very good two-way players, but it did hold us back. We could make it to Sunday in almost every major tournament we played, but mostly the semis would be it. We would just be out of pitching.

Yeah I was thinking about the pitching. But hey, I guess all the guys came ready to play each game which is a good thing!

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

So, you are saying they should have cut off entry even if a team were willing to drive 4 hours plus to play? And you do realize 4 hrs puts you renting hotels in Indy and Dayton.

I’m not gonna try to speak for buck, but better tournament management and better communication BEFORE they take your $ would be a start.

@Buckeye 2015 posted:

My point was more that there is no reason to have 800 teams playing in town on the same weekend if you have to make teams drive 4+ hours a day to play 2 games.

The reason would be:   Drumroll…..money

@anotherparent posted:

Yes.  But I do remember that the Cincy Flames tournament was particularly aggressive about documenting whether you were using their hotels.  The year I was the team hotel coordinator (years ago), someone called me and wanted to know where every single member of our team was staying (which included RVing, visiting friends or family, using points at other hotels, etc.).  To give them credit, the rates they had negotiated with the hotels were pretty good.

Cincinnati is a great city, and there are some interesting things to see in Ohio, as you are driving between all those fields and your hotel....

We had some great baseball experiences there, too.

That’s because J got paid for every hotel stay.

@RoadRunner posted:

Yeah I was thinking about the pitching. But hey, I guess all the guys came ready to play each game which is a good thing!

Like I said, for a tourney like the Flames or a NIT we would pick up a couple extra pitchers. It didn't hurt we were an explosive offensive team. So Thursday/Friday we would run rule most teams, that helped with innings. That said, one could conclude that being a small team with two-way players playing bigger tournaments is a contributing factor to the kid getting TJ in college.

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

So, you are saying they should have cut off entry even if a team were willing to drive 4 hours plus to play? And you do realize 4 hrs puts you renting hotels in Indy and Dayton.

You don't know the schedule until after you have hotels booked.   We had an 8am game that was an hour from our hotel......then a 1pm game 2 hours from the first field......then another hour drive back to the hotel after that game.   They are using St Henry HS field now.  It's an hour and 45 minutes from the West Chester hotels where most of their bookings are.  That''s beyond ridiculous.

Well... I ran across an old photo on a HD I almost threw away and it brought back some very good memories. And the next thing I know I'm debating hotel rooms in Cincy. The internet has a way of sucking you in.

baseballdad;

Including the Goodwill Series event, the Area Code games and tryouts and the Texas Rangers camps, I have organized hotels, baseball fields, airline flights for over 10,000 HS players.

Please study the 5 words. WHEN?, WHERE? WHAT? WHY? AND HOW? before you commit your player or your team to any event.

BOB

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

Well... I ran across an old photo on a HD I almost threw away and it brought back some very good memories. And the next thing I know I'm debating hotel rooms in Cincy. The internet has a way of sucking you in.

Great memories and I’m glad you saved the photo!  

@SomeBaseballDad posted:

Well... I ran across an old photo on a HD I almost threw away and it brought back some very good memories. And the next thing I know I'm debating hotel rooms in Cincy. The internet has a way of sucking you in.

I've got some great memories from that and other tournaments.  When a team does well in a summer tournament, the long car rides seem shorter!

Where or if my son would play beyond HS was never part of the thought process until his HS junior year. Having fun was the primary driver, hanging out with the family and friends, visiting places and watching baseball – it was a blast!

USSSA, Triple Crown, Nations, Perfect Game and a ton of smaller ones – there were good and bad events, there were Sunday one and done’s, there were tough losses, bad days at the plate, in the field and on the mound, but there were no bad memories of the time we spent together.

Thankfully it was all about fun and not an objective! Money grab or not, if you made great memories, it was money well spent!

Thanks for reminding me I probably have a few hundred GBs of my son’s childhood photos and vids on hard drives in the spare room.  looks like a fun memory.  

Separately, I was just complaining about our tourney coordinators and how they could give a rats A about travel time, especially at the HS level.   PG, V Tool, PBR - they all do it.   I know the number of teams make it difficult but they put zero effort into making it reasonable on families, especially in the bigger tourneys.  Going to Dallas next week, 100+ teams and we play 45 minutes in one direction day 1, play at the home complex day 2, play 45 minutes in opposite direction day 3.  Not a huge issue except when you have to deal with metroplex rush hour.