Fall Ball

Taking off the fall is not a bad idea.  This is especially true if the fall baseball is sort of cobbled together - not much worse than paying for poor quality baseball.  Might be a good idea to get some practice/reps in for fielding and hitting, but there should be plenty of time ahead of the HS season to get back into the groove.  It can be a good time for individual training especially if the high school does not have a program in-house during the fall.

Thank you - I suppose the other option would be to play Fall Ball with another organization with a good team, but not sure that is necessary.  Son seems to be looking forward to time to work out and train on his own.

My son played fall ball for the high school program freshman year to nail down the shortstop position for soph year. They played one game on Sunday for eight weeks.

He played fall ball (four tournaments) after soph season because it was 17u and exposure tournaments.

Otherwise he was in the weight room when it didn’t interfere with varsity soccer.

I think it would be helpful playing fall baseball in the upper classmen HS years so to prepare for college fall ball.  

Fall ball in Northern California is at SSU with the College Coaches and SSU players providing clinics and instruction.

In addition,  the premier players are selected for a Pro Scout team. ONE YEAR, I coached the Cubs Scout team, which included several MLB players {one was Kenny Williams now President of the Chicago White Sox].

Games with other Scout teams and Sac City College.

Bob

I think it depends on his position and course load. I lean towards training and getting better. Maybe join a team for a couple games at the end.

My son always had a bunch of AP's so he had to choose fall ball or working out/training/getting better. Fall of his junior year he put on 50 lbs of muscle. Fall of his senior year he was busy with college recruiting/ writing application essays, and any time left over was working on pitching. Both years he came into pre-season practice in better shape than anyone on the team.

Prior to HS I would recommend playing other sports in the fall. Once you get to HS the situation will vary. If you are a HS that promotes multi-sport athletes, and you are capable in more than one sport, I say go for it. If you are at a large HS that has a competitive baseball program you may not have much of an option. Coaches in those programs expect serious players to be in the HS fall program. And many use the fall to make roster decisions and position decisions that will carry into the spring. So you can be at a severe disadvantage if you don’t play in the fall - unless you are a stud football player. Even before you get to HS it’s best to do some research on how your HS typically handles all these situations.

In our area, there was an organization that ran a fall ball program that played games on about 8 Sundays, mostly local, you could miss a week if you had something else (my son occasionally played a fall tournament with his summer organization).  HS varsity players often did play, so the level was like HS.  They allowed up to 5 players from a HS to request to be on the same team, my son was proud when he was asked by some of the upperclass varsity players to be on their team before he was on varsity, it was a good experience.  And it didn't cost much.

The HS coach ran optional fall workouts after school twice a week for players who didn't have a fall sport.  So that was good too.

I would note that both of these things were useful for HS baseball, not for anything beyond.  But that is not nothing.

For Northern players, my feeling is it is a must to play in the fall.  Warm weather players not so much because many of them are playing over 100+ games a year.  I could care less what the competition is like.  Fall ball is always lower competition than summer because some of the better baseball players are playing football.  Just the fact they are out long tossing and working on their games is a huge plus.  A northern player is lucky just to get 70 combined games between high school, summer, and fall.  I've read many posts on here in the past where kids were playing 125 games or more a year in warm weather climates.  I would never push a kid to play in the fall, but if they love the game and are healthy, would highly encourage it.   

Iowa plays summer high school baseball. Fall ball was when my son travelled and was seen. He loved the chance to play with some different guys than his HS.