How many games, practices?

Depends on the players. My son is all baseball, all the time, but many of his friends play other sports, so baseball is only a spring/summer thing.

So for 2B, let's see...this might be kind of extreme because he/we are fanatics.

HS practices start in January, and the season begins in February. They'll practice 5 days a week and play 30 games or so, and the season ends in May. Generally, the weekend right after the HS season ends is when the travel season starts, with the first tournament around Memorial Day. They'll have formal practices 2-3 days a week, and 2B likes to take grounders and hit into a net in the back yard every day. They'll go to several tournaments - BCS, WWBA, ProspectWire - over the summer. Then usually after East Cobb in July, there's a break of 2-3 weeks, and the fall season starts. They'll still practice 2-3 days a week, but the tournaments are weekends instead of weeks. Our fall season ended in September. As long as it was still light out when I got home from work, he still wanted to hit and take grounders out back. Beginning in mid-October, it's strength, agility, and conditioning workouts, college camps, and preparing for PG underclassmen at the end of December.

That's a lot!

How does it work for the baseball-only player in the Northeast?

When I was coming through high school ball (2001 grad), I only attended 1 showcase and the whole concept seemed fairly new. Top 96 turned me down and it seems like they'll take anybody willing to pay now.

Training in the Northeast has the obvious challenges of cold weather. It is impossible to head out to the backyard or a local field for swings or take fungos all winter. (We had 9 inches of snow last week and the temp been in the 20s...)

In the northeast, high school ball starts in March - usually indoors in the high school gym or at indoor facilities until the snow is gone. The season is 18 games plus playoffs with three games per week (M,W,F) and practices on the off-days. It seems that more teams are practicing on one weekend day as well.

After high school is summer baseball, with Legion, Junior Legion, Travel/AAU teams taking over. When I played legion, we played 40-50 games, but now they are lucky to get in 30. (Budgets are tight and players now pay a fee, which my age group never had to do.) The 15U age seems to be the cut-off age for AAU teams - parents and players begin to re-evaluate the value of the instruction, competition, etc. Legion plays games throughout the week but rarely practices. AAU usually plays doubleheaders on the weekends and practices during the week.

Fall baseball starts at the end of August and goes through late October and sometimes into November if the weather holds out. Fall baseball is pretty much exclusively on the weekends and there are rarely practices.

Indoor facilities are relatively quiet until after the holidays, then in February/March everybody remembers baseball is coming and you can't get cage time.

It seems that your schedule is similar to a college schedule up here. Fall practices/workouts starting in late August, followed by a 2 or 3 week break. Off-season skill-specific workouts (hitting, infield, pitching, catching, etc.) and S&C programs through Nov/Dec. Christmas break (lift on your own at home), team practices in January (continue S&C) and start playing in February with trips to warmer climates. Then summer ball after the school season ends, a break in August....


Questions about your HS season. You said they practice 5 days per week. Do they practice before night games? How many games do they play per week?

quote:

Questions about your HS season. You said they practice 5 days per week. Do they practice before night games? How many games do they play per week?

Sorry - I was unclear. Practice before the season is M-F, but during the season, no practices before night games, but they do take infield-outfield and BP. For away games, they will get early dismissal to go to the cage for BP, then will get on the bus to go to the game. Some schools in our area practice on Saturdays, but ours doesn't. At least not right now - we have a new coach so that might change, but I doubt it.

Generally there are 2-3 games during the week, and we have a couple of games on Saturdays. There is a pre-season tournament in which we'll play probably 3 games in 3 days, then there will be a spring break tournament with probably another 3-4 games.

For all of the schools in our area, there is a player fee. Ours is $400, but others are as much as $900.

With AAU, it's pretty much the same as for you - our team folded after the 14U spring - the coaches didn't want to do it any more. But that fall 2B was invited to try out for his showcase team, and the rest is history, or at least history in the making.

There is a facility here in Gainesville that may be kind of like what you run. The guy who runs it is a former UF player, and I think his bread and butter is the younger players, although he and 2B's travel coach have partnered on the 16U team for the past year or so. He has travel teams that play in AAU, USSSA, Triple Crown, and other tournaments beginning at 10U, plus they have memberships where for a monthly fee, players can come in and lift or use the cages any time the place is open. Here is the website:
http://www.gatorballtraining.com/

In Miami it's baseball season 12 months a year. Fall ball starts right after the 1st week of school in Mid August. Most S. Fl high school teams participate in a fall ball league. Practice is probably 2-3 times a week with one game on a week night and usually a double header on Saturday. Fall ball goes until Thanksgiving ending in a tournament, usually local during the week of Thanksgiving break.

After Thanksgiving there is NO organized practice with the HS team, but most continue to have "voluntary" practice which is really mandatory. The two week break for Christmas/New Years the kids are on there own and expected to practice.

The regular season starts today Jan 18th with tryouts (a joke really but the schools require it) then its 5 days a week of practice until league play starts in Mid February. 2-3 games a week are normal for Varsity. Spring break our team usually goes to Sarasota for a 4-5 day tournament. The season ends in Mid May which leads right into summer ball.

Summer ball runs from Mid May until (in some cases) the middle of September.

So to answer your question.... in Miami it's baseball 365.

The following schedule is what my son did while in high school: Jan 10: team practiced 5 day's per week @ 6:00am (to cold outside)
Feb. 1: 1st day for official practice outside and the team would practice 6 day's per week
March 1: Play games M,W,F and have practice on T,TR,SAT
Spring Break: team would take a 1 week trip to Florida where they would play 5-6 games
Last Week of May: State Tournament (team qualified 3 of his 4 seasons)
June 1-July 31: Summer Baseball: Team would play a 55+ game schedule and practice 1 day per week (One season they played 15 straight day's)
Sons Summer Schedule:
7:30am-10:00am Strength & Conditioning at school
3:30pm Batting Practice
5:15 infield
6:00 Game 1
8:30 Game 2
August 1: Football (2 practices per day)
No Baseball in August & September
November: Would start to throw & hit on the weekends until football was finished