Thread: Bad situation....

Originally Posted by Ken Krause

In my experience it's mostly "him." But the "hers" do seem to be coming out more and more.

More single moms out there now. I have 3 girls with single moms right now.

I feel for the OP & really appreciated all the interesting input everyone's had into this thread. As a 10u HC for both a house team and a select team, i've had some similar challenges - including a regular season completely filled with very lop sided wins (in our district, there's no mercy but we play with a 4 run per inning max)

I think though, do as much as you can to make it fun for the kids & set up a process for them to stay engaged & learn - all you can do.

My approach - which drew ire from some parents was, for the house team - we rotated bench time exactly evenly across the 12 kids. I also rotated them through the positions equally (with the exception of P & C) - and had a failry uniform % of innings played in IF and OF across the team. This was not acceptable to many parents (despite me having made my intent clear pre-season) - who felt their kids didnt get adequate opportunities and, wanted to know why the strong kids were in the IF when we were crushing other teams. I rotated my A and B pitchers equally as well (dont even get me started about parents of pitchers - including my lovely wife! ack).

Batting order, we set it at the beginning of the season as a balanced order, and picked up where we left off in regular season. Again, not good enough for some - whi let me know how unhappy they were about who was batting fourth that game - or why their daughter who was obviously Jennifer Yee in a 9 year old body, was batting in the bottom third of the order yet again. Better still, despite havinga system designed to get everyone equal at bats, i had two parents argue that their child wasnt getting equal opportunities at the plate.

So, good luck, keep your chin up & keep at it.

In NorCal, it's the moms by far.

REC short for recreation, translation for FUN. REC is for the betterment of ALL the girls. All the girls should be allowed to play all positions and experience each regularly. The two main objectives should be fun and learning. And not getting reps and game experience doesn't do much for learning the GAME. When you get to the tournament that's when you pull out the big guns. Placing a girl in a different position likely wouldn't hurt much given the firepower you have

Safety of course needs to be considered. You can't but a girl with shaky catching at first and a cannon arm at third

I think the parents in this case are doing a huge disservice to their DD, and the team and coach. Playing a "team" sport means that sometimes things don't go the way you would prefer with regards to playing time, batting order, etc, but each girl contributes to the whole. My husband and I would NEVER do what these parents did. We signed up for a season and we would complete a season and be greatful for the coaches who put so much of their time and energy into running a team. No parent will always agree with every decision a coach makes, but we think it teaches our kids great lessons that life isn't always fair. Work hard and have a good attitude and don't expect everything to go the way you want, or Mommy and Daddy will throw a fit and fix things for you. Sometimes I don't know how or why coaches stay coaching with all the crazy parents out there! We are a very selfish society where everyone wants instant gratification. Southwestsoftball, thank you for coaching through health issues. It seems to me you are doing a great job!