What's Best?

Personal taste may vary. My son has done it for a few years and it has never been a problem. The teams need to be used to it. Most reload every year or so anyway.

We had what was a mediocre team for our area up through 14yo as we tried to keep it to fairly local players. One time after one of the pay for play teams in the area had broken up I got a call from one of the parents of that team's top player. I told the dad his son was welcome to play with us but that he probably wouldn't be getting the level of competition he'd get if he went elsewhere. Our kids got their playing time and the kid found a stronger team, has a good scholarship lined up and will probably be drafted in the first 10 rounds somewhere. Win, win as far as I'm concerned, although it would have been nice to have him hitting cleanup.

We did bring in players for one tournament stints at times but that was to keep from destroying arms or because someone was missing at a position.

We even had one kid go off to play for what they thought was a better program. The mom tried to cover it up so they could use us as a backup, then the dad told me the straight story. I just told the dad it was fine but our full time players would get first priority.

I don't think there's one right or wrong way to do it. The key is that the parents and players know exactly how the team/program approaches these things up front.

quote:

Originally posted by Doughnutman:
WKlink,
Have you never been to a HS or college where a transfer comes in and takes somebodies spot? Or someone who was a starter last year gets beat out this year? It is competition. 2 years ago we had a kid transfer in that was a catcher. A real good catcher. Everybody got bumped down one spot on the depth chart. Since he was a sophmore, a few never caught again. He has signed with U of A. We had a kid transfer out. He is a D1 early signee. I know he took someones spot out in Cali. We have three freshman starting on JV. They knocked some kids out of their spots and out of baseball. It is the same thing to me as flying someone in.

Baseball is about competition.

Yes, but I have never heard of colleges bringing in mercinary players to take the spot of established players for one or two games. I'm not talking about someone who transfers into a program and joins up.

This isn't high school, this is 12 year old baseball. These are kids that pay a pretty fair amount of money to be on these teams. Everyone here knows how much money can be spent to join up with some of these high level travel teams. To just kick some kid off to bring in a ringer is more than just wrong. If my son joined a team, if I spent thousands for him to play on this team only to be kicked off because some ringer was flown in from a town a couple hundred miles away I would be more than royally peed off.

One last thing and then I will get off my soapbox. About half of the people here talk about attitude and hustle. The signature blocks of many of our posters talk about hard work and putting forth that extra effort. What kind of message does it tell that kid, that kid that went to every practice, that kid that came early and worked late, who hustled on every play that his efforts are completely expendable when some coach finds some ringer that will just take his place.

You may think this is fine because your son is the replacement player and if that is fine by you I guess that is ok but my son would NEVER be on any kind of team like that. Baseball at the youth level is more about teaching teamwork and game skills than it is about strict winning and losing.

Wklink, I think your last post hit the nail on the head. These fly-in kids don't practice with the team and put in all of the work with the team, but yet they show up for the GLORY....GAME DAY!

I can see using a "fly-in" kid to pitch in a big national tournament because to win you've got to be "great-pitcher deep", but these kids are being flown in for league play (highly competitive league play...not LL). If these coaches are really interested in player development vs. national trophies they'd want to help the kids who are in the grind with them all the time to get better....that's not what's happening here.

ANYWAY.......I've made the decision to go back to our previous team because my son was truly improving last season when we played for them. My focus is on player development and I've not seen that so far with this other team. Thanks to everyone for their input on the matter.....you've helped me come to what I believe is the RIGHT decision for my son, and that's the best I can do for now.

My kids up thru U12 play(ed) rec ball along with travel. Many adults warned against this since they would pick up "bad habits" , poor competition, etc... They were right, the boys played a bit differently in those games, and had fun! Adults want/need to win far more than their offspring. All levels of baseball have their place, see what levels your child is comfortable with. As for loading up for U12 & below I'd suggest the coach write down on paper his moves and email to your friends (if they have any)and get a touch of perspective. Saw it a few years ago at the U10 level @ CDP. I doubt the coaches mommy was real proud of what her boy accomplished but I'm not in Socal so I can't really say.

My son didn't have any trouble playing LL, LL all-stars and travel when he was eleven and twelve. In LL I would ask him after LL games if his hits were LL hits or LL all-star/travel hits. It kept him focused on hitting properly.

This was a great original question. About the only advice I could give is to find the situation that helps the kid continue to develop a passion for baseball.
If your kid gets jacked up to go to practice, has his uniform on 3 hrs before you leave the house, want's to play catch or hit balls all time, you probably got the kid in the right place. It's not hard to figure out whether they like it, they'll tell you without ever saying a word.

I likethe topic and the original question. Option 2 is the clear choice. The only thing that bothered me is the part about getting to play a certain position. Often looked at by parents as the better positions (SS, C, P, CF). Teach your kid that there are no better positions. You need all nine to win. You will also learn that as the kids get older and stronger, corner outfielders get as many, if not more balls than SS. The lesson is that it is a team game and that the more flexible you are as a player, the more value you add to your team. This becomes very true as you enter high school. You may be a career long C or SS but if the senior captain and league MVP occupy's that position, chances are you are not going to see much playing time unless you are versatile player with versatile skills. My kid plays SS and has since 12yrs old. Looking back, I wish he had played more outfield and gotten more opportunities to practice fly ballls. To this day, it is the weakest part of his game. Just my opinion. Good luck!!!!

quote:

Originally posted by Metropop:
This was a great original question. About the only advice I could give is to find the situation that helps the kid continue to develop a passion for baseball.
If your kid gets jacked up to go to practice, has his uniform on 3 hrs before you leave the house, want's to play catch or hit balls all time, you probably got the kid in the right place. It's not hard to figure out whether they like it, they'll tell you without ever saying a word.

I agree, It's all about passion and fun at this age. Play on Option 2,he is not going to lose any of his God given talent

quote:

Teach your kid that there are no better positions.

At 13U I put together a travel team you could call an all-star team of the LL district. I targeted twenty top players from the district and got thirteen of them. They were all pitchers, catchers, shortstops and centerfielders. After having them introduce themselves to each other and saying what position they wanted to play I said, "None of the positions you want are available. We have nine positions on that side of the white line and four more in there (the dugout). Any position out there (field) is better than any position in there (dugout). And if you want to start on varsity soph year at your high school you will increase your chances if you can play left or right field. Usually the upperclassmen get the other positions."

in my opinion. from 12 to say 15, people usually dad's ) get hung up on playing 50-60 games. i think kids have a much better chance of getting better by having 4-5 practices a week and a double header or 2 on the weekend.

more AB's, more fly's,more grounder's etc. at that age you can't beat good practice. not very glamorous though.

quote:

Originally posted by 20dad:
in my opinion. from 12 to say 15, people usually dad's ) get hung up on playing 50-60 games. i think kids have a much better chance of getting better by having 4-5 practices a week and a double header or 2 on the weekend.

more AB's, more fly's,more grounder's etc. at that age you can't beat good practice. not very glamorous though.

It's very difficult to secure a practice field for four days a week. In travel it's even harder. The community sees travel as a threat to the rec programs. I secured a field from the school district for two days a week. When the Director of Facilities (also the Jr Legion coach) found it was a travel team he made new rules, returned our money and tossed us off the field. Don't suggest suing for breach of contract. By the time it would get to court the season would be over. I got use of the field through a back door. The director was more interested in not allowing a travel team to use the field than the money we were willing to pay the school district for it's use.

Very true RJM.

We have some private fields here that select teams can practice at but there is competition from softball leagues and local pony and cal ripken teams as well. We get about three days a week here but we also compete in the local PONY league as well.

I'm late to this but the biggest thing getting around the travel ball circuit at 11 or 12 is probably going to do for your son is let him see a bunch of curve balls and some extra velocity. You will see the same curve balls locally but they probably won't have as much wiggle in them.

If your kid pitches then the chances of getting his arm blown off skyrocket if you haven't set limits and aren't willing to walk away from coaches that don't get it.

IMO stay local about 2-3 hour drives max and maybe go to Cooperstown or Ripken during the summer as a season capper win a few and have fun.