looking for advice for Middle School Tryouts

hello all ,
My daughter is a seventh grader. she wants to play for her Middle School team. Its only one team 7&8 grade. She understands if she makes it she may not get to play where she normally plays on travel. All she wants too do is make the team and once she is on she will try to impress her coaches and hopefully skill will rise to the top rather than town influence by high exposure parents.

Can someone give us some advice on what to do to stand out above the rest even if you are an average playerl?
Any tricks to the trade here?

thanks in advance for any help.........
Bigblue

My past experience is that Middle School Ball is watered down talent wise. (like rec ball)
In general, Travel teams are much more talented. Let her go out and be herself, no pressure to
perform. Many school personnel moves are based on familiar older girls get first look, everyone else
comes after. Coaches like to stay in the comfort zone. Some MS coaching is pretty good, some
is pretty bad. The coach at that level is usually a teacher, you never know what to expect

I would guess that any kid that wanted to stand out in that type of crowd would help themselves by

#1 hustling everywhere. Coach says "Come here, girls" be the first one there, Coach says "grab your bats and helmets" have your helmet and gloves on while other girls are still rummaging through their bags.

#2 Pay attention. Make eye contact when listening, that's tough for young girls but if you really want it bad enough you will do it. Don't be talking when the coach is talking, listen, ask questions as well that shows your actually thinking about what the coach is saying.

#3 Make practice about practice. 90% of the girls will not be able to refrain from turning around and chatting with their buddies while waiting to execute a drill. Be in the 10% that doesn't get hit by a ball while not paying attention.

None of this will help if your the slowest, most uncoordinated, can't throw a lick player, BUT if you are of equitable or better talent this is how you stand out. Coaches will always choose the hustling, attentive, hard working kids when making choices between relatively equal talents.

Thanks for the feedback

I will make sure to tell my DD no talking and hustle .................

It doesn't hurt if she's a pitcher that can throw strikes with some velocity. That will get the coaches attention pretty quickly.

Tryouts are learning experiences. So, tell her this is like a job interview, and tell her how to prepare for a job interview:

(1) There is no second chance to make a good first impression.
(2) Be neat.
(3) Arrive early. (If the coach says "tryouts are at 5:00", then she should be there, with her glove, ready to go, at 4:45.)
(4) Be polite.
(5) Know something about the company/team (what the record last year? Is this a new coach? What is the coach's name?)



Specifically, I would make sure she knows how to throw and catch a ball (TWO HANDS, move the body). That is the first thing the coach will see her do, and she wants to look like she is a "pro".

Coach JV said:

My past experience is that Middle School Ball is watered down talent wise. (like rec ball)
In general, Travel teams are much more talented. Let her go out and be herself, no pressure to
perform. Many school personnel moves are based on familiar older girls get first look, everyone else
comes after. Coaches like to stay in the comfort zone. Some MS coaching is pretty good, some
is pretty bad. The coach at that level is usually a teacher, you never know what to expect

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You can't put a blanket opinion out like that on school ball. Depends greatly on who plays, and what kind of competition you face. We were lucky enough to have 13 out of 21 that also play "A" travel ball. And 7 out of the 11 schools in the district also have majority travel ball players. So some games were worth the entry fee, some were not.

If she wants to play and represent her school, town, and county that's great. That is what's wrong with most kids now, they have no 'pride' in much at all. Sure it's easy to play on a travel team that has 12-13 studs, but in school you might have the chance to be the hero, and there is NO BETTER FEELING. ( then maybe winning nationals lol )

Just remember all the greats have played school ball. Jenny, Cat and so on. Mine broke 3 school records last year in a school that has had a program for over 20 years. She has made history, and that sticks with you all your life to have a plaque in the hallway with your individual accomplishments.

Good luck. ( but still travel after the season

You definitely can't blanket all school teams. Some are good, some are bad, some have talented coaches, some have coaches that don't know what they are doing. In my high school career (I'm a junior and have played softball for school since 8th grade) I've seen 7 different coaches for JV and Varsity combined. That's a lot of changes, some coaches were good and some coaches were bad. You'll get that anywhere.

Good attitude. I've watched one of my coaches cut girls just for attitude alone. Being ready, hustling, as others have said. If you're in the outfield and they are hitting infield-outfield, back up every single ball. Someone on some forum once said that an outfielder should run 3-5 miles backing people up without ever touching a ball. Not sure how much truth is in that, but you want to back them up. Demonstrate proper throwing mechanics--if you can't hit a bull in the rear with a handful of cotton seeds then you are doomed, hit the ball. After a long time without softball for many less serious girls, they are going to look rough. Those that can knock the snot out of the ball in February look a lot more promising than the stud from last year that is out of shape and couldn't hit a grapefruit with a ten foot pole.

A big one that many forget is cleaning up or setting up things. I'm pretty much the resident equipment carrier, which definitely gets coaches attention. If balls need to be picked up, I'm doing it. If the bucket needs to go in the shed, Amanda has got it! Also, for the future, attend optional practices or field work days. We do all of our own field work, whoever wants to show comes on. I've always helped, even when it hasn't been required in the past. Gotten some great stories out of it as well. We built benches in our dugouts, which we painted along with the dugouts themselves. They were putting dots of color to indicate what color something should be painted. The legs of the bench were white, but they had a dot of blue on them. I thought they should be painted blue, so I painted them blue. Whoops. No one was really mad about it but the visitor's side legs are blue when the home's side is white because of me! We always laugh about that if a newbie points it out!

If shes a travel player, she probably wont have a lot of trouble making a school team, unless the rest of the school team are also travel players. It could happen, but unlikely that more than 1/2-2/3 or so would be. Its very probable too that her skills will be noticed relative to rec ball players, etc. When surrounded by rec ball players, a travel player normally stands out by the disciplined practiced way they do everything. I can look at a HS team practicing and normally pick the travel players out in just a couple seconds.

Now fighting politics on school ball, thats a different story. Good luck there.

Saw a school tourney last weekend, in the 2rd inning of the 2nd game a team played, a girl hadnt played and her dad told her loud enough for the coach to hear "why dont you just come out here and sit in the stands with me". The girl was not very good, and the coach was trying to win. But the attitude of the parent was typical. Shes on the team, she goes to practice, she must play or hes going to make a fuss, berate the coach, talk to the school, the AD, etc. I heard he did all that too.

mudbug said:

"why dont you just come out here and sit in the stands with me"

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You won't get a participation ribbon that way!