How much would you pay for a berth?

[SoCal_Dad]

It occurred to me that some teams might justify the high entry fee ($6k) for ASA's new JO Cup by what they'd save on qualifying for ASA or PGF Nats. It would be interesting to see what those berths would fetch on an open auction. The sanction could donate the money to charity.

How much is your team willing to spend on a berth - qualifying and/or buying? For which event?

 

[Jquick823]

Nothing. At least if I was the manager that's what I would pay. I like the qualification portion of the sport, it shows the girls that not everyone is good enough. Makes them work harder and appreciate it more.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

Jquick823 - how much is your team willing to spend qualifying and for which event?

 

[Jquick823]

I understand where you're going with that. Lets say my team spends $6K and doesn't qualify then it's easy to say we would spend $6K on a berth and just play that tournament. But it's the success and failure, the highs and lows during those other tournaments that make the push towards a berth.

 

[YOCOACH]

I second Jquick283's post....nothing. IMO the tournament fees in general, and the Nationals in particular, for many of the ABC organizations are getting out of hand. There are far too many teams with some very talented players that will never get seen because they lack the financial backing to play these tournaments already. The Regional "Nationals" have helped with some of that but it's still very costly if your team is on the fringes of that particular region once you factor in all of the associated costs such as gas, hotels, food, etc. etc. Pretty soon, these same ABC organizations will see the same limited number of teams over and over again. You can already see this happening as we speak. In the meantime, other ABC organizations that are lesser known or smaller such as the SEAA offer their version of a "National" tournament at half the cost with all of the pageantry and, for the most part, at equal quality venues. These types of tournaments seem to be growing rapidly since the associated costs will remain roughly the same as a regional "National" but at half (or less) the entry fee.

Edit to Add: These smaller ABC organizations Nationals are also attracting quite a few college coaches. After talking to a D1 coach who attended one of these last year, she attributed her attendance to several reasons. 1) Her travel expense account is limited and it's less costly to stay closer to home. Thus, by saving some money she gets to attend another large showcase that she wouldn't have been able to otherwise. 2) Since these tournaments are seeing a rapid growth, there are many teams traveling from various states and it gives her the opportunity to see a wide range of quality players. 3) She feels that a vast majority of players attending the PGF and ASA National tournaments in California have verballed or signed their NLI already so why spend the money? 4)She feels she has a better opportunity to see/find diamonds in the rough or quality players that haven't committed yet.

 

[crystlemc]

If you are spending 6K chasing a berth, then the likelihood of you getting an invite to an event like this is slim to none. The implication is that only the truly elite teams will be invited. Truly elite teams will likely get their nationals berth in one tournament, not play one after another trying to qualify.

 

[JAD]

If I was to put together some numbers I would estimate the following for each qualifier we play. Our team plans to play up to 5 qualifiers - 2 state, 2 regional, 1 national and even our state qualifiers will require a hotel stay this year. Obviously these are estimates and the numbers can vary depending on the hotel costs and where you eat. Kind of scary when you add it all up.

Qualifier
$350 entry fee
$300 gate fee (30 parents/sibilings/grandparents per day x 2 days x $5 each)
$1400 food - 14 families x 2 days x $50/day
$2800 hotel - 2 nights @ $100/night x 14 players

$4,850 estimated cost per qualifier

$24,250 possible expense trying to qualify for Nationals (5 qualifiers that require overnight stays)

Nationals
$650 entry fee to ASA Nationals
$10500 hotel - 14 families x 6 nights x $125/night (with ASA getting a $25 kickback per night)
$7000 travel expense to nationals (since most of them are in BFE) 14 families x $500 round trip (more if flying)
$4200 meals 14 families x 6 days x $50/day

Total: $22,350 to attend Nationals

$46,600 grand total......just dayum!

$46,600 per team x @ 120 teams at ASA Nationals = $5,592,000.....

 

[JAD]

If you are spending 6K chasing a berth, then the likelihood of you getting an invite to an event like this is slim to none. The implication is that only the truly elite teams will be invited. Truly elite teams will likely get their nationals berth in one tournament, not play one after another trying to qualify.

If I remember correctly, there were 64 teams invited and the first 32 to sign up and pay the registration fee are in.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

If you are spending 6K chasing a berth, then the likelihood of you getting an invite to an event like this is slim to none. The implication is that only the truly elite teams will be invited. Truly elite teams will likely get their nationals berth in one tournament, not play one after another trying to qualify.

The question isn't specific to the JO Cup - that's just what got me thinking about it. The question is open for any amount and event.

I'm not so sure about your conclusions regarding the JO Cup...

- The break even point vs qualifying isn't $6k - it's more like $4k after subtracting the entry fee of the other event.

- As JAD showed, it's not hard for a team of 15+ to rack up $4k for a single qualifier - entry fee, gas, rooms, etc.

- I'm not sure what you consider to be "truly elite" teams, however I expect they'll be inviting more than them. First off, I don't consider all the teams in the top 60+ to be truly elite. The rankings are more like a pyramid with tiers of teams. The top tier is the 10-or-so teams that are real contenders to win an elite event. There isn't much difference between the ~20 teams in the next tier that are just trying to place in the top 10. The next tier of ~40 teams aren't what I'd consider "truly elite" - they're similar to each other and trying to place in the top 25 with the "truly elite" teams.

Secondly, many/most of the "truly elite" teams already have berths to PGF, either returning or invites, and they're pretty much guaranteed them every year. I seriously doubt many will jeopardize that for an unknown event with an uncertain future.

Lastly, I doubt they'll get 24+ teams from the initial 63 invites. If they don't get a sizable number, they may cancel it. I expect they'll be issuing more invites in March and reportedly may look at teams in the 16U rankings at that time. FCS has heard from some 16U teams that they'd do it.

FWIW, I looked at how 18U teams fared at PGF Nats last year based on how they got their berth.
- Returning berths: 1st, 3rd (2), 5th, 7th, 9th, 17th, 33rd and 0-2 (Texas Glory and Gold Coast Hurricanes w/ Ocasio)
- Invites: 2nd, 5th, 7th, 9th (3), 13th, 17th (3), 25th (3), 33rd (4) and 0-2 (4)
- Qualified: 13th (3), 17th (3), 25th (5), 33rd (11), 49th (6) and 0-2 (10)
- At Large: 17th (CA Cruisers Phil came up short in 3 qualifiers), 0-2 (Louisville Lady Sluggers)

I was surprised there wasn't a correlation between when a team qualified and their finish. All the teams that qualified in the NorCal qualifier failed to qualify in SoCal the week before and they did better as a group than the ones that qualified ahead of them in SoCal. The reason is there's not much difference between the teams in the next tier once you get past the top 10-25.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

If I remember correctly, there were 64 teams invited and the first 32 to sign up and pay the registration fee are in.

It's not first come, first served. They'll go by rankings IF they get more than 32 teams.