Freshman UTL L/R was playing in 2/3 weekend series and some midweeks. Went 3/5 against one of the best New England programs and promptly broke hamate in the 9th inning of Sunday's game. After surgery yesterday, is eligible for a medical redshirt by one game, and now will focus on being 100% for summer in the PGCBL. Was playing unfamiliar positions to get bat in the lineup and was doing decent (.225) for a freshman.
This one story is something to share regarding freshman year experiences. This was my son's former school.
He gets there and he's one of only 3 catchers on the roster. Great opportunity as a freshman not to get redshirted. But, probably not the greatest roster management decision to deploy - especially in the fall.
Team has 5 AM lifts every weekday. Most of the time, the trainer is blasting their legs.
In the afternoon, it's team workouts. The other 2 catchers, who are juniors, come up with "injuries" (aches and pains, bumps and bruises) when it's time to catch bullpens. There's 22 pitchers on the roster and my son has to catch all the bullpens because there's no one else. It really sucks...but a freshman has to take his lumps. He's spending 3 hours every afternoon catching bullpens after blasting his legs all morning.
Now they start intrasquad scrimmages. And, anytime someone does something stupid, after the games, they have to run suicides on the hill until they puke. (Usually punishment because someone didn't run out a fly ball.) Coach tells my son: You're a catcher, when the team runs, you have to run in full gear including the helmet.
This isn't just once, it goes on for a couple of weeks. Blasting legs in the morning, bullpens all afternoon, running suicides in full gear. Groundhog day. Over and over.
Now, the kid's legs are shredded. Jello has more strength than his legs. And, finally, he says to the coach: With everything we're doing, my legs are shot. I'm not building anything. I'm just tearing apart what I got.
The coach's answer was "You'll be a better man for it when it's all over."
So, the kid keeps grinding and dragging himself through it. And, then he comes up with a shoulder injury.
To this day, I'm convinced the shoulder was the result of all that throwing on legs that were shot. I have no proof but I know he went to school with a shoulder that was 100% sound and 100% rested.
It's stuff like this that you might want to anticipate when your son is a freshman.
@camb3232 posted:Freshman UTL L/R was playing in 2/3 weekend series and some midweeks. Went 3/5 against one of the best New England programs and promptly broke hamate in the 9th inning of Sunday's game. After surgery yesterday, is eligible for a medical redshirt by one game, and now will focus on being 100% for summer in the PGCBL. Was playing unfamiliar positions to get bat in the lineup and was doing decent (.225) for a freshman.
Stupid question but I have to ask...what make and model bat was he using when he broke his hamate?
@Francis7 posted:This one story is something to share regarding freshman year experiences. This was my son's former school.
He gets there and he's one of only 3 catchers on the roster. Great opportunity as a freshman not to get redshirted. But, probably not the greatest roster management decision to deploy - especially in the fall.
Team has 5 AM lifts every weekday. Most of the time, the trainer is blasting their legs.
In the afternoon, it's team workouts. The other 2 catchers, who are juniors, come up with "injuries" (aches and pains, bumps and bruises) when it's time to catch bullpens. There's 22 pitchers on the roster and my son has to catch all the bullpens because there's no one else. It really sucks...but a freshman has to take his lumps. He's spending 3 hours every afternoon catching bullpens after blasting his legs all morning.
Now they start intrasquad scrimmages. And, anytime someone does something stupid, after the games, they have to run suicides on the hill until they puke. (Usually punishment because someone didn't run out a fly ball.) Coach tells my son: You're a catcher, when the team runs, you have to run in full gear including the helmet.
This isn't just once, it goes on for a couple of weeks. Blasting legs in the morning, bullpens all afternoon, running suicides in full gear. Groundhog day. Over and over.
Now, the kid's legs are shredded. Jello has more strength than his legs. And, finally, he says to the coach: With everything we're doing, my legs are shot. I'm not building anything. I'm just tearing apart what I got.
The coach's answer was "You'll be a better man for it when it's all over."
So, the kid keeps grinding and dragging himself through it. And, then he comes up with a shoulder injury.
To this day, I'm convinced the shoulder was the result of all that throwing on legs that were shot. I have no proof but I know he went to school with a shoulder that was 100% sound and 100% rested.
It's stuff like this that you might want to anticipate when your son is a freshman.
It’s stuff like this that you should already know about before your kid commits to a school. I bet that there is not one player that was on the roster the year before that wouldn’t have talked about it had they been asked about what fall practice sessions/training regimen was like. A lot of college HCs run their programs like this. But it’s not that hard to find out which ones do and don’t. 5 am lifts is a red flag and where there is one red flag there are often many others.
@Francis7 posted:This one story is something to share regarding freshman year experiences. This was my son's former school....It's stuff like this that you might want to anticipate when your son is a freshman.
I know it's too late to do anything about this but I imagine your son will be going thru the process again.
When it came down to decision time our travel coaches set up calls with their former players that were currently in the programs it had been narrowed down to. It was an honest no holds barred discussion that covered the ugly side of it.
For the programs we didn't really have any player connections to he typically just DM'd a current player and asked some questions.
There were two schools that weren't #1s but were definitely in consideration that were crossed off because of some of the petty nonsense that went on at in the program.
Some may not like this subject. But, it can be a problem for softball players. When my daughter was a freshman she dealt with serious sexual harassment … from her teammates. They were trying to determine which “team” she was on. 40% of D1 female athletes are lesbians.
She went to the coach. The coach told her to deal with it. It turned out the coach was a lesbian. I advised my daughter if she pursued it any further she would have to quit the team. She chose the school because it was D1, major conference, competitive and one of the top schools in the country for her major. She was going to stay at the school.
She got a guy friend to be an occasional faux boyfriend, watch parts of practice and wait for her outside the locker room.
@Francis7 posted:Stupid question but I have to ask...what make and model bat was he using when he broke his hamate?
Rawlings Velo 33/30 2019 and also the 2021 Version.
@adbono posted:It’s stuff like this that you should already know about before your kid commits to a school. I bet that there is not one player that was on the roster the year before that wouldn’t have talked about it had they been asked about what fall practice sessions/training regimen was like. A lot of college HCs run their programs like this. But it’s not that hard to find out which ones do and don’t. 5 am lifts is a red flag and where there is one red flag there are often many others.
The weird part is that, no matter who you ask, current player, former player, parents of players, travel coaches, former colleagues, opposing coaches, they all never have a negative comment about the coach. My guess is because he wins, he wins a lot, and it's consistent every season. More than a dozen years on the job, lifetime winning percentage better than .667, almost always wins the conference.
@Francis7 posted:The weird part is that, no matter who you ask, current player, former player, parents of players, travel coaches, former colleagues, opposing coaches, they all never have a negative comment about the coach. My guess is because he wins, he wins a lot, and it's consistent every season. More than a dozen years on the job, lifetime winning percentage better than .667, almost always wins the conference.
I have not found this to be true. You have to ask the right people and you have to ask the right questions. It's easier said than done. There were two P5 schools that had offered that were immediately crossed off the final list because of concerns other people had talked about when asked.
In our program over recruiting is a problem. Opportunities for those towards the end of the depth chart are an issue. Coaching/Dev is lacking. Our coach's ego is concerning. When people ask about our coaching staff and I don't know them well enough to get into details I tell them this:
Since I've been part of this program - 4 players have been cut, transferred out and have been drafted since. Make of that what you will
Adbono,
It is similar to Ft Campbell basic training. If you desire info on a team ask the umpires and Sports Writers
Bob
When my son was fourteen I started attending college games and chatting up parents. I was told a lot of negative stuff without asking.
@Francis7 posted:The weird part is that, no matter who you ask, current player, former player, parents of players, travel coaches, former colleagues, opposing coaches, they all never have a negative comment about the coach. My guess is because he wins, he wins a lot, and it's consistent every season. More than a dozen years on the job, lifetime winning percentage better than .667, almost always wins the conference.
I have not found this to be true either.
@adbono posted:It’s stuff like this that you should already know about before your kid commits to a school. I bet that there is not one player that was on the roster the year before that wouldn’t have talked about it had they been asked about what fall practice sessions/training regimen was like. A lot of college HCs run their programs like this. But it’s not that hard to find out which ones do and don’t. 5 am lifts is a red flag and where there is one red flag there are often many others.
100% true in my experience as well
College Baseball is really hard. With the roster logjams post pandemic it’s even tougher to get on the field. Lots of 5th year Seniors starting, and lots of Seniors this year planning on coming back for a 5th year next year
Thats just the reality of things. Gotta work while you wait and be mentally tough
My Soph son hasn’t started a game yet but has appeared in 11 of the team’s first 16 games so far. And he’s fortunate for that. He has Soph teammates who just got their first career at bat this weekend
Our sons travel coaches were heavily involved in sons decision. Narrowed down to two programs, coaches gave son names of players that were at both programs. He got the scoop on them both, but didn't commit until he got to know staff from both programs.
I don't know, is it just me but it seems that your son has had multiple injuries over the years so is it fair to say it was last years activities that caused an arm injury?
@TPM - when he hurt his shoulder, the pain happened while throwing. I just figured that it was hurt throwing. Then, describing the whole situation to someone else, they said to me "Don't you think that having his legs ripped up caused him to throw less with his legs and put more stress on his shoulder?" Until then, I never thought about it.
Again, it's possible that maybe it's not related? But, I do know when he went to college that his arm was 100% sound. Something happened there that caused the pain. (And, it went away on it's own after he was shut down for the rest of the fall.)
@Francis7 posted:@TPM - when he hurt his shoulder, the pain happened while throwing. I just figured that it was hurt throwing. Then, describing the whole situation to someone else, they said to me "Don't you think that having his legs ripped up caused him to throw less with his legs and put more stress on his shoulder?" Until then, I never thought about it.
Again, it's possible that maybe it's not related? But, I do know when he went to college that his arm was 100% sound. Something happened there that caused the pain. (And, it went away on it's own after he was shut down for the rest of the fall.)
Wasn’t he also injured in high school?
@Francis7 posted:Can the argument be made that kids have changed because parents have changed and parents have changed because the world has changed and the world has changed because the kids who changed grew up and became adults who changed the world....never mind...my head hurts.
“Children; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. They no longer rise when elders enter the room, they contradict their parents and tyrannize their teachers. Children are now tyrants.” Socrates, circa 470BC.
Same as it ever was, or at least same as it was 500 years before Christ...
I wonder if any of the players that you spoke to about the program were catchers. I could image that pitchers and position players might have a different impression.
Also it would be tough to catch so many bull pens on top of everything else. Lots of throwing even if it is a lower intensity. My catcher son is much younger but some coaches seem to forget how hard catching can be on the body.
Coach was a catcher. So, he knows.
In many programs you might find that there are students that will do bullpens.
Good question to ask during recruitment.