HS Tryouts...how much does the actual tryout matter?

As with most things related to HS baseball, there is a very wide range of circumstances for tryouts.  There is no "this is how it works".  That said, it is fairly common for HS coaches to have some level of familiarity with incoming players.  There are multiple avenues for the coaching staff to learn about and evaluate those players.  Sometimes, in bigger programs, there is a PE baseball class or some form of preliminary workouts.  Often, coaches know which local travel teams or instructors those players are involved in.  There are often off-season workout options. Even with kids transferring in, it is usually not a secret to the coaches when the transfer has a decent skillset.  So, rarely is the tryout day/s itself the sole evaluation tool when coaches make decisions, particularly with bigger programs.

Regarding your Gamechanger comment, as a former HS coach I never referred to any form of pre-HS stats or data as a gauge for anything.  I did utilize many of the other resources I listed above.

@cabbagedad posted:

… Sometimes, in bigger programs, there is a PE baseball class or some form of preliminary workouts.

I also believe the baseball class (PE) was used to evaluate especially the incoming freshman.  Possibly the upperclassman too.  Probably not the class in general, but when they started intrasquad scrimmaging, I’d guess it was helpful.  

First the setup in our school district …

One large middle school, one large high school. The high school is at the lower end of enrollment for 6A (largest classification). They’re currently eligible to drop to 5A but have no desire to change. There are 7th grade , 8th grade, freshman, JV and varsity teams.

The “players” on the 8th grade team skip freshman ball and go straight to JV. Kids who don’t make the 7th and 8th grade teams make the freshman team along with the 8th grade team dead weight and stall there.

The varsity coach starts tracking players in LL and Ripken all stars and 12u travel. He runs a practice or two per year for each middle school team. He shows up at a couple of middle school team’s games.

Tryouts are a formality. One kid was assigned to JV as a wake up and hustle alert and reassigned to varsity on opening day. He started the second game on the mound.

My son proved he was the pick for his soph year varsity shortstop playing for the school fall ball team. The fall ball team is geared towards younger players attempting to prove themselves. Some players exposed themselves.

Each year for three years a friend and I nailed the opening day roster. This doesn’t mean we agreed with the coach. But we knew who he liked. Given the team came in second and won two conference titles over our son’s three years it was hard to argue with his picks.

Regardless of playing a winter sport or not players were expected to be in midseason form on day one of tryouts. Until my son stopped playing hoops it meant doing his baseball workouts in the 5:45am sessions.

@ILoveBaseball04 posted:

Some odd things have happened on the route to HS tryouts and that leaves us wondering...how much of high school tryouts actually come down to the tryout itself?   

Particularly when dealing with a very large high school with teams at every grade or nearly every grade, a couple of things seem obvious at this point - the coaches have community contacts they can tap, the kids all have a footprint having played for various (often local) teams at this point (and Gamechanger to the extent one trusts it ), and how often have coaches already seen various kids lifting, participating in camps, and open workouts...

Curious what experienced folks think about this.

In the case of my two oldest sons, the high school tryout was a significant event.  My oldest sons were going to go to a specialty high school on the other side if the County.   The baseball coaches (and players) had no idea who they were and what they could do until tryouts.  Our county allows for 8th graders to try out for JV High School. 

My youngest son had the challenge of trying out for one of the two most loaded programs in the County.  The school is a mile up the street from our house, and had a successful/knowledgeable  Head Coach.   He did have the advantage of attending open gym for weight lifting, and running.   Participation in open gym was optional, but attendence was kept so that gives you an idea of how optional it really was.   Because of his older brothers, he was somewhat of a known quantity. 

In their case, the high school tryouts did come down to the tryout itself which is what it should be.

JMO.

At our HS, there are summer camps for elementary through middle schoolers, open fields in the summer and fall for whoever wants to come, including 8th-graders, and winter workouts from Jan-Mar.  All optional, all organized by the HC, so it meant that he had a pretty good idea of what he had when the "tryouts" happened.  Only 9th-graders and up played on HS teams, I guess performance at tryouts might have impacted which team you played on.  I can't imagine someone just showing up cold at tryouts, except maybe 3-sport athletes and then they would be known quantities anyway.

I agree with it depends. My son's HS has Freshman, JV and V baseball teams. It is a ~1800 student all boys parochial school that draw kids from all over the region and has competitive athletic programs. The Freshman  BB tryout usually involves >60 students and rosters 20. Rarely players are pulled up to JV or V.  My son went to their "summer camp" to "showcase" in front of his future coaches. The freshman coach did use the tryouts to better identify the backend of the roster. The studs were pretty obvious in size, speed, power, velo (pitchers) and pedigree (travel program). Lots of good kids were cut at frosh, JV and V.

As a high school coach for about 25 years and head coach at two different schools I can honestly say I'm about 95% certain who will be on the team before tryouts.

We do offseason workouts so I get to see them in the fall and winter before we even get close to tryouts.  I've seen how receptive they are to coaching and if they can make any changes we think they should make.  I tell these guys all the time that by coming to the workouts their tryout period is now several months long versus 3 days.  If the body of work over those months is good then I won't hold 3 bad days against them.  I cut a couple of guys who played for me last summer, came to 90% of the workouts all year but just didn't have it.  Great kids and they put the effort in but just didn't get to the point they should make it.  Not gonna lie it hurt because I really grew fond of them in that time.

If they play other sports (before they make the team ever) I'm talking to that coach to see how athletic they are and if they are coachable.  I'll come watch them play a game or two in that sport to see how they perform / act.

If they transfer in and I have a question about them I will figure out where they came from and email that coach to see what they say. 

But if a kid I've not seen stands out in tryouts then we will keep them.  It's still about the best guys making the team.

Isn't it better that a coach looks beyond the several days of tryouts and consider the player's track record (whether in a camp or the years in youth sports)?  I agree that there should still be tryouts to give the opportunity for a new kid or maybe a late bloomer to show what they got.  But there are kids that are just gamers with great attitude that won't necessary stand out in 2 or 3 days of tryouts, or for that matter, in half day showcases.

I understand but I also know if you give them 2 or 3 days and they can't show it then they  are not truly a gamer because they should walk in there in gamer mode.  I think most coaches know who their top 10-12 are and are just trying to figure out who will be on the bench or who could be someone in time.  The starters will normally separate themselves from the others.  Can anyone name a stud that was missed in tryouts?  We are really just talking the kids for the bench that will need help.  A true player will show it in 3 days if they are a true player.  You might have a kid who has potential that is missed but not a starter.  It is hard when you have a limited number of spots that you can fill.  Son had 80 kids tryout for basketball one year for 13 jerseys.  Right, wrong or indifferent many of those spots were pretty much filled when it started because of the past year and workouts.  The one dad who screamed the most had a kid who never came to workouts and was late for tryouts the first day.  He had 72 show up for baseball tryouts with only 14 jerseys for baseball.  After the first year, we raised money to get more uniforms so we could keep more kids.  The first year the 14th kid could only dress at home because we did not have an away jersey for him.

Parents who complain their kid got screwed are usually the parent of a marginal player. Of course, they see their marginal son as a better player than five other marginal players competing for one or two roster spots.

Sometimes these parents don’t see the coach is trying to fill a role with the last spot on the roster. Sometimes the role is player whose parents won’t be complaining to the coach and AD about playing time.

In my experience assuming the coach isn't brand new - not much.

- the process starts in fall ball and continues over winter. the rosters are pretty much made up already.

- assuming it is typical local school the coaches know these kids, what they are doing over summer and outside of school and have networks of people who report.

- the eye test i honestly believe most teams can be picked after a round of BP and some IO and of course watching the warm up....there may be an outlier here and there but for the most the first hour is about 90% accurate.

Around here, I'd say actual tryouts mean little.  We don't have Fall ball related hs events or baseball classes, etc.  But there are winter Captains practices, skills and workouts, as well as the legion teams are closely aligned with the HS.  But all of that is invite only, technically anyone can attend, but you have to be "in the know".  All it takes is asking the coach and you are invited or someone on the team tells coach to include you in communications about where and when, but for those parents or students who don't understand how it works, they would never know. Of course no guarantee you make the team just because you attended workouts, but without it, you are paddling up creak with a broken oar, I don't think any coach is going to put together a team based on 3 days of ground balls in a gym.

I can remember my nephews during their freshman year, telling me that the HS coach had called their Babe Ruth coach, to have him tell them not to worry, they were on the HS team months before tryouts.  The two coaches were related, and the boys had a pretty big reputation as baseball players and athletes in their town.  Whether it was right for them to be told, that's another issue all together.