The Secret to Public High School Success

Just being "lucky" enough?  Have you also noticed that the same schools tend to be "lucky" with some degree of regularity and the same other schools tend to be "unlucky" regularly?

That's because the "luck" is otherwise known as development.  Good programs will typically develop players, certainly to include and prioritize pitching.  If a coach/staff properly identify incoming players as good P prospects, two or three years of development efforts can keep a steady diet of studs in the rotation.

Then, things do tend to snowball.  It is not unusual for families with aspiring studs to find those school districts with reputations for developm... I mean luck.  And, conversely, they are less likely to move out of those places and less likely to choose the private school route.

I'm not discounting the occasion when there is some luck involved when a stud moves into a school district.  But, more often, there's more to it.

If you look at high school programs over time the same ones seem to get “lucky” repeatedly. They're always in the top half of the conference. They’re the well coached programs. The coach knows what’s going on within the school district before the kids hit high school. He may even have influence over the middle school program.

Conversely, the same unlucky programs tend to be in the bottom half of the standing every year.

Infrequently, a stud pitcher doesn’t leave for a private and puts a weak program on his back for a couple of years.

I do think that the public school reputation and history has a factor  - in that it will stop the kid from going to the private school.  But, I have seen the reverse a few times...where the stud pitcher goes to the private school because his public school option is a baseball nightmare.

@Francis7 posted:

I do think that the public school reputation and history has a factor  - in that it will stop the kid from going to the private school.  But, I have seen the reverse a few times...where the stud pitcher goes to the private school because his public school option is a baseball nightmare.

That will be us soon! We are zone to a school and we’re looking for better competition. Had I known I would off bought a home in a better baseball community. Zero room to grow or get challenged. The nightmare is you cannot change unless you move. I love my home just don’t love the community around it. Oh well live and learn.

@Francis7 posted:

I do think that the public school reputation and history has a factor  - in that it will stop the kid from going to the private school.  But, I have seen the reverse a few times...where the stud pitcher goes to the private school because his public school option is a baseball nightmare.

The new coach at our high school first year was when my son was in 8th grade. He was a middle school teacher. He heard another kid and my son were being recruited by a couple of privates. There were a couple more kids who would have been candidates to head for Catholics even if not recruited. The coach started having lunch with these kids once a week. My son told me the coach always talked about how they could be an new era.

For my son the high school was already dominant in soccer and basketball. He was sold. From my point of view his gifted program was as good as the academics at one offer and better than the other. Everyone in his class stayed.

When we chose the school district it was for its academics. It’s highly regarded. At the time (kids were five and six months) the high school was a doormat in every non country club sport (four CC’s within the district boundaries). When my daughter was in middle school a new AD was hired. Over time he hired rising star assistants from other successful high school programs to be head coaches in all the doormat sports. By the time my son was in high school every sport was very competitive.

Hi:

I've found that in my area the best HS programs are those that have deep, well run Little League feeder programs. The best players go off to play elite travel ball but return to the HS to play (not a ton of private schools locally, most in DC). But it's the depth that's added by decent ballplayers that likely won't play at the next level that know how to play the game the right way. This is the case with 2 sister high schools. My son's has terrible Little League programs; rival school a few miles away has the best in the county. Guess who is in the running for state title every year and who can't field a JV team? Even a tiny school in the boonies produces state titles and a few DI players every year. Guess what? Their Little League teams are always great and sometimes go deep into the playoffs.

I think HS coaches really need to pay attention to the feeder programs to succeed. You'll have a handful of really good travel ball players each year, but having soccer and football players that barely played ball plugging holes isn't a recipe for success.

I understand that Little League/Babe Ruth/Legion struggle nowadays because of the travel ball industrial complex, but these leagues are still very important to winning HS programs. I think this is very underestimated around here and maybe nationally.

What is your definition of success?

My 3 sons attended two very, very different high schools when you factor in socio-economic data.  All 3 of them got to pick their public high school in our county based on academic interest and location.   My two oldest kids had a new high school baseball coach every year and is known locally for football and thuggery along with a separate pre-engineering specialty center within the high school.   My youngest son's high school is an extremely well coached baseball powerhouse that almost always go far in the post season.   They were loaded with talent every year.

Success definition aside, the secret to high school baseball is focusing on your own development, repetition, diversifying into travel baseball or other forms of summer baseball to improve player tools and exposure.  High school coaches can help, but it starts with the player's desire to constantly improve.   When you get 4-6 like minded constantly improving individuals per graduating class, you've got a shot at having a pretty good team.

JMO.

@BaseballDad72 - personally, in my town, our district HS has not been strong. And, I think the town travel program has a hand in it. Year after year and age after age, it's been situations where dads ran the teams to make sure their sons always got playing time. And, in many cases, the sons were not strong players and they never got better because they never had to earn playing time.

2 stud pitchers will win district in Texas, not state. Our hs team has ridiculous talent every single year and has not won state because the coach never develops the other guys. Those two pitchers will pitch complete games as often as possible, even if it’s a blow out. When they get to state they need relievers and guys that haven’t pitched all year get thrown out there and we lose. Our district has tons of former pro athletes and the kids are usually good. Mix in a reputation for D1 kids and they are fed with talent year after year.  They currently have 2 P5 commits that have barely stepped on the field as seniors.

How many games in a year are you playing?  We play 34 games.  That includes a tournament.  That tournament involves 3 games in 2 days.  Also, Typically, that is at the end of a conference week where 1 and 2 have pitched.  If 1 pitches in the tournament, then they miss the first conference game of the week.  We were blessed to be able to run out a 1 and 2 who were really good.  Typically our 3 and 4 would be at least a 2 at other schools.  I know some of you live in states that have 18 games per year. 

our town/city has 3 public hs and two very strong little leagues. we're also fairly affluent and smack dab in the middle of the catholic league which is one of the stronger leagues in norcal. that means our public schools should have really talented teams but they lose a ton of talent to the privates.

In addition, where my older son and now younger son go is a hoops/football/track school, not a ton of baseball interest historically at the high school. They play about 20 games a year plus the state playoffs. It’s a tough go especially for younger son who is still 14 and is on the varsity squad. Should be playing JV to get reps but there isn’t an option.

We had a LL and a CR feeding our high school. The LL went to states when my son was eleven and twelve. The CR was below average. In high school the kids didn’t care anymore. But there was animosity between parents that still existed at the high school games.

Our school plays about 35-40 including some post season.  Our tournaments are almost always pre district and he will play more pitchers in those.  Once district starts it is usually just the two.  

@baseballhs posted:

2 stud pitchers will win district in Texas, not state. Our hs team has ridiculous talent every single year and has not won state because the coach never develops the other guys. Those two pitchers will pitch complete games as often as possible, even if it’s a blow out. When they get to state they need relievers and guys that haven’t pitched all year get thrown out there and we lose. Our district has tons of former pro athletes and the kids are usually good. Mix in a reputation for D1 kids and they are fed with talent year after year.  They currently have 2 P5 commits that have barely stepped on the field as seniors.

I see this all over in the HS programs in DFW and it boggles my mind. You can only go so far with 2 stud pitchers. And when you have 2 more that might be almost as good (and sometimes better) that get no meaningful innings…..well that’s just bad coaching.

I'm curious about this choice to go public or private.  Do these people who are choosing between public and private get scholarships for the private schools?  I thought that was only for super-stud athletes at really rich schools (I read the LeBron autobiography).  If we had wanted a private school, the cost would not have been an option for us.

@anotherparent posted:

I'm curious about this choice to go public or private.  Do these people who are choosing between public and private get scholarships for the private schools?  I thought that was only for super-stud athletes at really rich schools (I read the LeBron autobiography).  If we had wanted a private school, the cost would not have been an option for us.

My son was offered 50% to two privates. He was going to be required to play at least baseball and soccer (ultimately D1 prospect in both). The baseball teams were loaded with talent. The soccer teams not so much.

Money wasn’t part of the decision making. The gifted program in his high school was as good as the academics in one private and possibly better than the other. They also had athletes repeating freshman year.

In baseball the high school offered the chance to make varsity as a freshman. It was less than likely for players to start at these privates before junior year. Juniors were mostly eighteen.

My son played 17u with some of these school’s players. His high school couldn’t have beaten these teams. But, they were good enough to win their conference twice and make states once.

Some private schools are more aggressive than others. Some will try to build a stacked team of studs while others will only take a couple of studs to make sure there is room for the non-scholarship kids to play.

As RJM mentioned, sometimes playing 2 sports will help.

This thread brings up a question: how many HS programs out there DON'T do any development in the fall?

Son's HS does very little fall development at all. If you aren't playing fall ball or on your own program, you're encouraged to come to 4-1s with the hitting coach once/week. No fielding work at all. Otherwise, you show up the first day back from winter break ready to go. Coach would do a summer team in June that practiced on Tue, then played 3-4 games Fri-Sun. Just 4 or 5 weekends. Then you're on your own till next January. The top talent normally didn't play on the summer team at all.

As far as I (and son) know, this is a rarity. Most of his friends/summer teammates have fall programs at their HS that are "voluntary", if not mandatory.

One public school in our classification (and county) is consistently a state and/or national force, and seems to do so with homegrown talent. They normally send 1-3 players into P5 or the draft. Few (if anyone) are recruited into their program. Our school is a step below them in terms of success (coach came out of the aforementioned program), but we still seem to finish top 2 in the region nearly every year.

The one thing that I KNOW both teams do is play tough competition from the start of the season onward. There will almost never be a run-rule blowout (and if there is, it will come as a surprise). Both coaches are only focused on region play and beyond. Whatever it takes to sharpen the team for that is the priority. We see plenty of teams in our classification that play nonentities, giving them plenty of soft wins, but not prepping them for a team that can challenge them in the box or on the mound.

Here we have baseball class. It is double blocked so they have it everyday, last class of the day so it can seemlesy blend into practice after school. Beyond that, they have a “voluntary” practice after school  where the coach can’t coach but sits on a golf cart and watches, and they know what to do. We also have a month of fall ball with mandatory practice and scrimmages.

@Senna posted:

This thread brings up a question: how many HS programs out there DON'T do any development in the fall?

Son's HS does very little fall development at all. If you aren't playing fall ball or on your own program, you're encouraged to come to 4-1s with the hitting coach once/week. No fielding work at all. Otherwise, you show up the first day back from winter break ready to go. Coach would do a summer team in June that practiced on Tue, then played 3-4 games Fri-Sun. Just 4 or 5 weekends. Then you're on your own till next January. The top talent normally didn't play on the summer team at all.

As far as I (and son) know, this is a rarity. Most of his friends/summer teammates have fall programs at their HS that are "voluntary", if not mandatory.

One public school in our classification (and county) is consistently a state and/or national force, and seems to do so with homegrown talent. They normally send 1-3 players into P5 or the draft. Few (if anyone) are recruited into their program. Our school is a step below them in terms of success (coach came out of the aforementioned program), but we still seem to finish top 2 in the region nearly every year.

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It used to be that Virginia public high school baseball coaches weren't allowed to do official practices or instruction when baseball was not in season.   I suspect it is the same now.  My three kids went to two different high schools.   The expectation at my youngest son's school was that JV players better be playing Fall baseball (if you aren't playing another sport) and improving your game.  So a parent would have the key to the field to run practices and coach games.   We played other teams in our district.   I was fortunate to be that parent for two Falls seasons.  There was no involvement by the Varsity Coach although from time to time he would ask me how it is going.  Varsity players were typically playing with their travel teams in the Fall.   JV and Varsity players were expected to go to "open gym" in the winter to weightlift with the team, and many players went to local baseball academies for 10 weeks to shake the rust off and get ready for tryouts and the season

My two oldest son's played Fall baseball with their travel team all 4 years because there weren't enough kids to field a Fall high school baseball team.   Most other baseball players busy playing football.  My two oldest son's took a few months off after the Fall travel season and then started up again in early December with a local baseball academy for a 10 week program that magically took them right to baseball tryouts.

So, to answer your question I think there are lots of high school programs that offer supplemental opportunities in the Fall to improve skills like my youngest sons team.  Then there are the kids that have to take matters into their own hands to further develop in the Fall as my two older sons did with their travel teams.

Zero organized development in the fall. I actually like it better as my son can work on the things he needs to work on. I have seen some high school programs that are highly organized and their players do get better in the fall. I wouldn't mind that scenario.

the value of the summer and fall programs isnt to get the top players in shape.  it's to get reps for the bottom half of the roster that otherwise may not be doing any baseball activity.  an added bonus is that the coach can mentally formulate the cuts and positions so he isn't trying to figure things out during the three weeks between tryout start date and first game.  Coaches aren't supposed to be involved but anyone who tells you that they aren't paying attention probably also has a bridge to sell you.

I do think a successful program will attract some incoming talent, but I can’t imagine that being in the top 5 reasons to pick a neighborhood.

I won’t begin to guess the ratios, but I think these factors play into consistent public HS powerhouse programs.

• HC has credibility and everyone buys into the program (or they leave). Fundamentals are solid and the sum of the individual talent is way less than the team output (bad coaching creates the opposite).
• Affluence - (availability of external training and parental time/effort)
• Status of program – desire of the athletes to be part of a legacy (the player, team, school, and community care).
• Luck (genetics gets 90+ and 400’+)

I would say 2 and :3 are way bigger than 1 and 4.

Jucodad nailed it. Good coaching will keep the good neighborhood kids and attract the better players from the surrounding area. It also eliminates some of the benefit of driving across town to the private.

We have a local public HS that has 4 former MLB pitchers on their coaching staff. They have a planned routine and schedule for every pitcher on the team. This year the team ERA is about 1.00. There have been several pitchers who transferred in over the last few years. Now they are getting position players too. The other public schools continue to get raided by the privates.

In my area it comes down to how many players on the team play select. The higher caliber the player the better.

No HS fall ball, or HS summer ball, no middle school teams to feed into them. Rec ball fizzles out due to lack of players after 12 so no real opportunities unless you are on a travel team until you get into HS.

Coaches can start working with players about 2 - 3 weeks before games start but I feel given the time and number of players on the team they can really only maintain the status quo