Difference Between D1 and D2 Baseball

Largely the difference is roster size unlimited in D2. Creates many many  follow on problems. As the coaches cannot possibly practice, develop, and improve the additional extra 50 to 60 players on some rosters over the 35 actually kinda necessary and needed.

D2 will load the roster up with most anybody bringing a tuition check along.

Depth of pitching is different. D1 is loaded with pitcher spots 6 thru 18 that can walk the bases loaded but manage to escape 50% of the time with under 3 runs scoring. In D2 the escape ratio goes down to 20% of the time without 5 runs scoring.

At a nearby D2, one day watching a showcase for a friend, sitting down line by cage.......... D2 recruit on a tour and doing the one allowed workout....... Takes some infield, adequate......comes to cage for swings, coaches tell him to take 10 off tee.... recruit swings and misses first 5 then shanks next 5...remarks "I haven't hit off tee in 3 years and laughs"....recruit eventually leaves with player for campus tour....coaches hang at cage and discuss recruit. And I fall out of my chair hearing what I heard:

Well that was awful, yeah but he says he can pay full tuition, and we do get a bonus for recruiting more students now, but dang we already have 12 middle infielders recruited for the JV team, what would we do with him? Beats me, but lets offer anyway and see if he comes and pays.

Disgusting.

@Showball$ posted:

Largely the difference is roster size unlimited in D2. Creates many many  follow on problems. As the coaches cannot possibly practice, develop, and improve the additional extra 50 to 60 players on some rosters over the 35 actually kinda necessary and needed.

D2 will load the roster up with most anybody bringing a tuition check along.

Depth of pitching is different. D1 is loaded with pitcher spots 6 thru 18 that can walk the bases loaded but manage to escape 50% of the time with under 3 runs scoring. In D2 the escape ratio goes down to 20% of the time without 5 runs scoring.

 

Not all D2 schools over recruit. Many carry rosters of 35-40 players. If you want to play D2 baseball, and you are smart, you go to one of those. 

@old_school posted:

D3 is limited to 6 days a week in season, 4 hours on nongame days, lifting time is not included in the 4 hours....it is still plenty busy. 

When you consider all the “optional” working out there isn’t much difference. D1 conferences tend to cover wider geography. Players spend more time in the bus.

Yes the final published rosters are usually 35 to 45.

And of the 20 loosely within my area........... there are 2 massive offenders around the 100 player mark in Fall, 15 are in the range of 60 to 80, and 3 are in the range of 50 to 60.

None are at 35 to 45.

If you are smart, you go to the one that is paying you guaranteed full tuition. Because the rest is subjective up in the air guesstimates and faith that the truth is being told.

@Showball$ posted:

Yes the final published rosters are usually 35 to 45.

And of the 20 loosely within my area........... there are 2 massive offenders around the 100 player mark in Fall, 15 are in the range of 60 to 80, and 3 are in the range of 50 to 60.

None are at 35 to 45.

If you are smart, you go to the one that is paying you guaranteed full tuition. Because the rest is subjective up in the air guesstimates and faith that the truth is being told.

 

 

Sounds like you are in the wrong area

@adbono posted:

Not all D2 schools over recruit. Many carry rosters of 35-40 players. If you want to play D2 baseball, and you are smart, you go to one of those. 

I was researching some D2s in the south for one of my son's high school teammates, and I was a little shocked at how large some of the rosters were and also the size of their recruiting classes last year.  When I combined that data with the fact that some of these schools had graduation rates of less than 50%, I decided they were probably a very poor choice for most kids.  You'd have to be very sure you were going to play as a freshman and be confident in your academic abilities before going to a school like that.

@LuckyCat posted:

I was researching some D2s in the south for one of my son's high school teammates, and I was a little shocked at how large some of the rosters were and also the size of their recruiting classes last year.  When I combined that data with the fact that some of these schools had graduation rates of less than 50%, I decided they were probably a very poor choice for most kids.  You'd have to be very sure you were going to play as a freshman and be confident in your academic abilities before going to a school like that.

Generalizations are only accurate to a point. What you have described is not an attractive situation - but what you have described isn’t the way it is everywhere. There are large rosters and large recruiting classes at many schools in all college classifications - D1, D2, D3, NAIA & JuCo. There are also schools at every classification that don’t over-recruit. There are also schools at every level that offer unique academic opportunities. Granted it takes some work to find them at the JuCo and D2 level.  But just because you & Showball$ don’t know about  them doesn’t mean they don’t exist. 

@old_school posted:

D3 is limited to 6 days a week in season, 4 hours on nongame days, lifting time is not included in the 4 hours....it is still plenty busy. 

Yeah, for sure.  Major commitment for any college baseball player.  

@adbono posted:

Generalizations are only accurate to a point. What you have described is not an attractive situation - but what you have described isn’t the way it is everywhere. There are large rosters and large recruiting classes at many schools in all college classifications - D1, D2, D3, NAIA & JuCo. There are also schools at every classification that don’t over-recruit. There are also schools at every level that offer unique academic opportunities. Granted it takes some work to find them at the JuCo and D2 level.  But just because you & Showball$ don’t know about  them doesn’t mean they don’t exist. 

I'm not saying its everywhere or that other situations don't exist.  I wasn't trying to argue with anyone.  I was just sharing what I had found while researching some of these schools.  And who says I don't know about them?

@adbono posted:

Not all D2 schools over recruit. Many carry rosters of 35-40 players. If you want to play D2 baseball, and you are smart, you go to one of those. 

Indeed.  Son played for WSSU (D2) in 2015 (they dropped baseball a few years later).  Roster was only 28-29 players with about 1/3 of the roster from JuCo's (son was a JuCo transfer) and only 4 from out-of-state (again, son was one of those).

@Showball$ posted:

Largely the difference is roster size unlimited in D2. Creates many many  follow on problems. As the coaches cannot possibly practice, develop, and improve the additional extra 50 to 60 players on some rosters over the 35 actually kinda necessary and needed.

D2 will load the roster up with most anybody bringing a tuition check along.

Depth of pitching is different. D1 is loaded with pitcher spots 6 thru 18 that can walk the bases loaded but manage to escape 50% of the time with under 3 runs scoring. In D2 the escape ratio goes down to 20% of the time without 5 runs scoring.

 

At a nearby D2, one day watching a showcase for a friend, sitting down line by cage.......... D2 recruit on a tour and doing the one allowed workout....... Takes some infield, adequate......comes to cage for swings, coaches tell him to take 10 off tee.... recruit swings and misses first 5 then shanks next 5...remarks "I haven't hit off tee in 3 years and laughs"....recruit eventually leaves with player for campus tour....coaches hang at cage and discuss recruit. And I fall out of my chair hearing what I heard:

Well that was awful, yeah but he says he can pay full tuition, and we do get a bonus for recruiting more students now, but dang we already have 12 middle infielders recruited for the JV team, what would we do with him? Beats me, but lets offer anyway and see if he comes and pays.

Disgusting.

 

Why is this disgusting?  If that player and his parents accepted the offer, then they got exactly what they wanted.  

Now I agree that is not something I would do, or encourage my player to do, but if you can’t hit a ball off a tee but you want to roll the die, to see if you can play college ball, then you better bring something to the table.  Sounds like all this family could bring was a full tuition payment.  Sounds like what a lot of these families do in travel ball.  

 I have seen plenty of teams that bring in a player that is not at the same level as the rest of the team, but they bring a heavy pocket book and pay expenses that other families can’t pay.  

You might not like it but it will always happen until families and players are honest about their real talent level.

ATH I think your last sentence is exactly why a board like this exists and why youth baseball is big business. And I have said similar things about being realistic so I’m not arguing, just thinking out loud. IMHO, baseball is one of the hardest sports to be realistic about.

Why? FWIW, here’s what I think:

1. Baseball is a game where money can even out the playing field for a long time. Better equipment. Lessons. Traveling and playing against better competition or on a better team. These can prop up a player and make him appear more talented than he is or give him more exposure giving him a false sense of his true ceiling. Rankedguy might show up to college #1 in the state and be shocked to lose out to an unranked kid who couldn’t afford to go to GA every weekend. Or to a kid who leap frogs over him once that kid has access to top notch equipment, coaching and training. Unranked kid was always better, but rankedguy just didn’t know it. 

2. Boys develop at vastly different rates. Best kid on my son’s Cooperstown team is nearly the same size he was at age 12. He was awesome at 12U but has been passed up in size, speed and power. THIS CONTINUES TO HAPPEN WITH BOYS WELL INTO THEIR 20s. At one point all the kids on the same Cooperstown team were within a couple of inches and 20 pounds of each other and all very near in present talent. Now there is an 10 inch, 60 pound spread and a similar spread in current ability. It is reflected in where they are all playing post HS but you would have been hard pressed to tell any of us that three years ago (the boys are 2019-2021s). 

3. In addition to unfortunate injuries, there is wear and tear. The relentless circuit that starts really young and focuses on measurable (IMHO) far to young means that some kids wear out their shoulders, their elbows or their love of the game meaning they peak and decline while others are ascending. 

4. There are a lot of really good players and baseball is a game of failure so sometimes it is just getting lucky that the team that needs a “YOU” sees you being the best version of you at the right time. 

5. Baseball recruiting always includes assumptions on projectibilty. Sometimes they get it right and sometimes they don’t.

6. The mental part. Doesn’t matter if you throw 98mph and have a perfect slider if you fall apart when one of your teammates makes an error. 

7. There is alway “that guy.” The exception that gives us parents hope. That’s probably the biggest one. The one kid from Canada pitching on Friday in the SEC, the 5’4” second baseman in the MLB, the submarine pitcher throwing 83 mowing down teams in the Big 10. Hard for us to be realistic when the fantasy is out there. 

It is easy for parents to focus on all the things their kid did that was similar to a an athlete going to Fancy University College without recognizing the thing they don’t do (on or off the field). We look to outside services or metrics or coaches to help us but, especially for parent who haven’t been through this before, it’s hard, especially when it is the fine line between, for example, top D2 and mid-to-lower D1.

I think this board is a great place of grace to get great, informed advice, but ultimately each family has to roll the dice based on what they know of their kid and the process and what they are willing to gamble.

Extremely well said Paula ! 

Great post PT! I was approached as a 13u coach by a player’s dad. The kid dominated LL and 12u throwing upper 70’s. But the kid was already 5’8” and dad was 5’4”. 

I was polite even though I had been warned the dad was a nightmare as a team parent. I was told he called pitches from the sidelines. I wasn’t interested in having the dad around. Plus I was looking for future high school prospects to develop. All but one player played college ball at some level. 

The dad asked me if pro scouts are at the 13u travel games. The kid was done with baseball when he was released from his high school program as a 5’9” JV pitcher throwing 80. 

It turns out the kid is a nice person unlike his father. My son became friends with him as an adult on the golf course. 

@RJM we all know that parent. And if we don't know them...we are them!! 

PT and Adbino

Great PT; you talk like a scout.

When I watch games the pro scouts would welcome my visit and questions.

Why scout down the left field line, why sit behind home plate, what are u seeing?

Do you watch the player walk from the parking lot, do you watch the parents?  Who is carry's the players equipment?

When I coach SSU [D-2] one year, I had 15 players and when I scheduled San Quentin prison for a game. I planned to play and the Warden called the morning before the game. "lock down" no game. Last time at bat, I wanted to hit one over the WALL.

Actually I did when I was in the Army and played at the New Mexico prison. Hit it over the WALL

and every prisoner said "i will get it"!!! True Story!

Bob

and every prisoner said "i will get it"!!! True Story!

Love it!

And thank you for the kind words. We are all works in process...I've learned so much on here already!!

@PTWood posted:

...ultimately each family has to roll the dice based on what they know of their kid and the process and what they are willing to gamble.

 

Great post. Regarding this analogy, the hitch is that some of us are rolling  for a seven and some are rolling for a 2 or a 12, and we may not know which we are.