14 "A" or 16 "B", which one is more competitive?

My DD was born on New Year's Eve, which means every other year she is the absolute youngest player in her age bracket (no one plays up in our league during the summer). She also happens to be one of only two pitchers on her team. Over the years, we have become gradually 'wedded' to this team, both emotionally and by necessity (if she left, there would be only one team instead of two in her age bracket, and many of the girls would not be able to play).

In my honest opinion, our talent pool puts us somewhere between an excellent "C" team and an average "B" team. The girls certainly seem to enjoy playing together, but I think few if any of them will be staying with the sport beyond high school.

After a surprisingly successful 14 "C" season, we are now faced with a problem that many second year 14 U "B" and "C" teams have had to struggle with: What to do with the "5 high-school players" limit imposed by ASA? As all but three of our players entered high school this fall, we simply can't reconstitute the same team as a "B" team for the coming season. Meanwhile, nearly all of these girls continue to want to play together, and players from the younger team below us are not particularly keen to fill any vacant spots on our team should we decide to put together an ASA-legal 14 "B" team.

Our coaches are now playing with the idea of converting ours into a 14 "A" team, so that all of our high-school girls will have a chance to rejoin the team. However, others in the league are adamant that we'd be better off going the 16 "B" route, as this would allow us to both keep our high-schoolers and maintain the community nature of the team (which is after all one of the main purposes of the league), and, according to some at least, the competition at 16 "B" would be more at our level. The latter point is in direct contradiction with our coaches' prediction that our chances of doing well in 16 "B" will be vastly more remote compared to how we would fare against 14 "A" teams.

I had no prior exposure to fastpitch until my DD got involved in the sport, so I have absolutely no clue which of the above predictions is more realistic. Since my daughter plays an important role on the team, the coaches want me on board when the decision is made. I'd like to understand what really lies ahead before deciding one way or the other.

Any comment or suggestion from those who have gone through this before?


Thanks!
GT

P.S., Sorry if this topic had been covered before. I did a quick search here and didn't find what I was looking for.

Where do you play? That isn't a national ASA rule must be something your local JO commissioner dreamed up when his daughters team got beat at 14B state.

Really depends on the area. Around here 14A is a lot tougher than 16B. 16B essentially means here that your still playing because you love it, but know that your not headed to college to play ball. 14A on the other hand still includes college bound kids (at least in their own minds). IMO The difference is that the pitching at 14A might be much better, hitters at 16B might be a little better.

Thanks, Snocatzdad. What you wrote makes a lot of sense. If other teams in our situation also choose to go the 16 "B" route (which seems to be the easiest route), then we should end up playing more or less the same teams there as we had in years past, plus some that are two years older.

We are in the SF Bay area.

I do think this is a silly rule. Now that I know it's locally concocted, it is looking even sillier. How does the act of going to high school give a player an undue advantage anyway? The rule basically forces all girls who were born before December (the date cut off for school enrollment here in California) to play only one year of 14 "B" or "C". The teams that manage to stay in 14 for a second season probably have a coach or manager whose daughter is December-born and who doesn't want to play up.

It just creates a partial short circuit in the bi-annual age progression chain for no noticeable gain to the players. If the 16 U "B" pool is so depleted that they need to pull in girls from 14 to have decent tournaments, then they might as well make a rule that says everyone can only play one year of 14 U and be done with it.


Thanks again,
GT

What's funny about this situation is that the ASA National rule to bar college players from playing on 18UB rosters is stirring a lot of local debate here in MN. We have many small colleges where the softball team is whatever 12 girls show up to play and some never even played in HS. Forcing those girls to play 18A is just as silly as assuming that playing at a HS makes you a 14A level player.

I know that for CA colleges, even the community colleges probably field elite softball teams and since most of the rules in ASA Code seem to be centered on what works well for CA they probably laugh at the idea of a college player playing "B" ball. That's how we would feel about hockey here in MN. We have small colleges with a DI hockey team but might not field a decent softball team. Again playing "B" ball after playing college ball in CA may seem laughable, but what's the quality of the typical small college hockey team in CA? Is it just a pick up team of players? Should they have to compete at an elite level in the summer just because they volunteered to play college during the school year.

Someone explain to me why a kid who is in high school (or 8th grade for that matter) and intends to play high school ball would play anything but 18A. Why not show up for high school tryouts already having seen the pitchers you have to hit against for your school.

I coach the off season high school team - and my travel team. I am getting some kids on the off season h/s team who played 14 friggin b last season, and now coming to play - good athletes, but 3-4 years behind in experience and serious game time against the kids they will now face.

This may not be possible in God's own Socal where the men are men and the average 12 y/o is 6 foot tall but in the rest of the world, it is not only possible, but makes total sense.

DonnieS said:

Someone explain to me why a kid who is in high school (or 8th grade for that matter) and intends to play high school ball would play anything but 18A. Why not show up for high school tryouts already having seen the pitchers you have to hit against for your school.

I coach the off season high school team - and my travel team. I am getting some kids on the off season h/s team who played 14 friggin b last season, and now coming to play - good athletes, but 3-4 years behind in experience and serious game time against the kids they will now face.

This may not be possible in God's own Socal where the men are men and the average 12 y/o is 6 foot tall but in the rest of the world, it is not only possible, but makes total sense.

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We have several hundred HS in the state and only 60 18U teams in the state and only 15 of those play at an 18UA level. In contrast there are 200 16U teams in the state and about 70 of those are at the A level. So really if you want to face those best HS pitchers there are a few of them playing 18U the rest are playing 16U.

I don't know why 18U is so low but my speculation is that unlike some of the bigger states where everyone seem to go from 12U to Gold our teams aren't at the caliber yet that the best 14U teams are ready to compete at Gold and even the better 16U teams would rather compete for multiple berths to 16U ASA A than fight it out for a single Gold berth which is all our state/region is allowed.

I understand wanting to compete against the best available competition, but if you aren't near that competitive level on a hitting, pitching, fielding basis then it's tough to learn much when your team gets 9 at bats a game and gets run ruled all the time. There are HS's here that a decent 14B travel team could give a run for their money. So playing HS doesn't mean your ready for 18A. There are HS coach's here that take their school team into summer and play at 16B and 18UB because that is where they match up competitively and can get challenged, but also have enough success to make progress.

DonnieS said:

Someone explain to me why a kid who is in 18A (or 8th grade for that matter) would want to play high school ball.

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Fixed that for you Donnie.

DonnieS said:

Someone explain to me why a kid who is in high school (or 8th grade for that matter) and intends to play high school ball would play anything but 18A. Why not show up for high school tryouts already having seen the pitchers you have to hit against for your school.

I coach the off season high school team - and my travel team. I am getting some kids on the off season h/s team who played 14 friggin b last season, and now coming to play - good athletes, but 3-4 years behind in experience and serious game time against the kids they will now face.

This may not be possible in God's own Socal where the men are men and the average 12 y/o is 6 foot tall but in the rest of the world, it is not only possible, but makes total sense.

Click to expand...

HS ball is weak and often pathetic. The good athletes who have had years of training arent concentrated enough, practice time is limited, season rules , etc. Politics and other constraints work against you, and often...the coach just isnt very good or really cares.

To suggest that a HS player is an "A" player is folly. 75% of HS players could not make an avg "A" team.

To answer the question, most "A" teams arent real "A" teams. Depends on the area, but probably safe to say 1-2 out of 10 are real "A" level teams.

A strong 14U "A" team will beat most 16U "A" teams, many 18UA teams, and would be far superior to any "B" team out there. It just depends on the team, they are good teams (10%) , and mediocre teams (70%), and poor teams (20%) . Not scientific percentages, just observations.

mudbug said:

To suggest that a HS player is an "A" player is folly. 75% of HS players could not make an avg "A" team.

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I think what he was saying, or the main thing I took him to be saying was, the better pitchers you face in high school (the ones you need to step up your game to beat) are going to be A or gold pitchers. Everyone is going to hit the lesser pitchers. To hit the A and gold pitchers, you need to be facing them as much as possible in the summer.