Opinions needed

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

Nov 4, 2015
320
43
It's tryout season. DD went to a tryout and was offered a spot. This is 12U. As we find out who was offered positions, it is easy to see that there are 5-6 pitchers. All can play other positions. DD is slower than 3 of these girls. Probably throws a few more strikes, but not by much. About the same speed as another and then an AC's daughter is probably the slowest. Can stay with current organization, probably be the #1, but it will be a much younger and weaker team. DD is friends with all. Coaches of tryout team say they want a lot of pitchers and they will swap them out regularly. He is an old friend so I believe that is what they will try to do. Just don't know that there are enough innings to go around. DD is happiest when she is pitching and will have a hard time beating out 6 or so of the girls on the tryout team for playing time at other positions. Will be top 5 with current organization. DD is a good ball player, but i am not wearing daddy goggles. I know she needs reps and needs to get more aggressive. Push her by being on the strong team and hope it challenges her to improve to get playing time, or play her on a team where she will be one of the better players and hope that pushes her to step up and lead (get better) because the other girls will depend on her more? For what it's worth, i believe we should stay with current organization and get more game time reps. Pros and cons? Anyone made this type of decision? Help out a bucket dad that is trying to do right for his DD. thanks
 
Aug 26, 2011
1,285
0
Houston, Texas
It's tryout season. DD went to a tryout and was offered a spot. This is 12U. As we find out who was offered positions, it is easy to see that there are 5-6 pitchers. All can play other positions. DD is slower than 3 of these girls. Probably throws a few more strikes, but not by much. About the same speed as another and then an AC's daughter is probably the slowest. Can stay with current organization, probably be the #1, but it will be a much younger and weaker team. DD is friends with all. Coaches of tryout team say they want a lot of pitchers and they will swap them out regularly. He is an old friend so I believe that is what they will try to do. Just don't know that there are enough innings to go around. DD is happiest when she is pitching and will have a hard time beating out 6 or so of the girls on the tryout team for playing time at other positions. Will be top 5 with current organization. DD is a good ball player, but i am not wearing daddy goggles. I know she needs reps and needs to get more aggressive. Push her by being on the strong team and hope it challenges her to improve to get playing time, or play her on a team where she will be one of the better players and hope that pushes her to step up and lead (get better) because the other girls will depend on her more? For what it's worth, i believe we should stay with current organization and get more game time reps. Pros and cons? Anyone made this type of decision? Help out a bucket dad that is trying to do right for his DD. thanks

I think 5-6 pitchers on 12U is too many. On 18U or college showcase level, sure, but not 12U. If you want her to get more reps and mound time, find another team where she will be one of 3 or at max 4. And being on a weaker team can be mentally taxing to any pitcher...but could help her get the reps she needs. My 2 cents.

Good luck with your decision.
 
May 6, 2015
2,397
113
being on team with lots of competition for circle time might push her to work more on her own to get better. you know your DD best, so you have to decide if this might be the scenario for her or not (some girls it might push them the other way, I know).
 
Nov 4, 2015
320
43
May end up coming down to how much she WANTS to pitch. Also, in saying the organizational team will be weaker, it will be in comparison to the team she tried out for, but will, i believe, be stronger than the team she played for last year. It's crazy how we can get caught up and stress over softball this way. I know that she loves PLAYING softball. When she was 10, she sat a lot and those rides home were tough. Improved past half her team from beginning of 10u until end of 1st year of 12U. She has improved tons. Super proud of her. Still a lot to work on. Only about 3 or 4 of the girls she played with the last 2 years will be with her if we stay with the organization.
 
Feb 22, 2013
206
18
When my dd was younger, we would watch the other teams at the tournaments and observe the talent level of athletes that were playing for the various organizations. We would also observe the pitchers that the current team had and the quality of the pitchers that feeder teams currently had. We would observe the coaches and the coaching styles. By the time tryouts would roll around, my dd would have a general idea of where and who she would like to play for and what pitchers were likely to return the following year.

When my dd attended tryouts, she would put down that pitcher was her primary position and then list her second and third preferences for playing positions, as requested by the forms. She went to a couple of tryouts where all the girls were lumped together and the girls demonstrated their outfield and infield skills, along with their batting skills and then they would end the tryouts. There were a couple of tryouts that I would walk up and thank the coaches for the tryout opportunities and tell the coaches that my dd wasn't interested in playing for their programs after the tryouts. The coaches would just stare at each other and ask, why she wasn't interested in knowing if she would be offered a spot or not. I would say that my dd wanted to be a pitcher for the team and work with the talented girls that showed up for the tryouts, but if they weren't going to let her pitch to the catchers and observe the other girls that were trying out for pitchers that she would go elsewhere.

One of the tryouts, the coaches flat out told my dd that they had two returning pitchers and that they would be their #1 and #2 pitchers the following year. My dd looked at the coaches and said, that is why I chose to drive 3 hours and tryout for your team, because I've watched your team play and I think that I am a better pitcher than both of your pitchers. The next summer, my dd pitched against their team and knocked them out of their tournament on their field. The opposing coaches and players would not walk out of their dugout to shake hands.

My point to the story is that if your dd wants to be a pitcher, find a team where she can pitch and get a lot of pitching time. You are investing your time and your money and your dd's time into a team where she should be working towards a goal. If her goal is to pitch, find a team where she has the opportunity to pitch. Teams looking for pitchers will usually hold a time for the pitchers and catchers to get together and work together and observe the competition around them. Then if she does find a team where she will be allowed to pitch, make certain that there is also a quality catcher available.
 

ez_softball

Life at the diamond...
Apr 14, 2017
158
28
We've been there and done that! I'll reply with what we have done:
  • 10U (old) played for lesser team pitched 75% of the time.
  • 12U (young) played for better old 12U team (low level tournament) with 3-4 pitchers better than her. DD pitched 1 inning all season. Wasted a season with essentially no pitching game experience. Could have played for lesser team and pitched majority of time.
  • 12U (old) played for better mid level tournament team with 4 pitchers. Worked into #2 pitcher on team. Coach only pitched #1 and #2 all season so, she got roughly half the games.
  • 14U (young) stayed with same mid level tourney team with 6 pitchers. She was legit #1 and pitched roughly 1/3 of the time.
  • 14u (old) played on high level tournament team w/ 8 pitchers. Daughter worked herself into rotation as #2 or #3 and pitched roughly 25% of the time.
  • 16U (young) will continue on same team.

The biggest jump in daughters pitching was at 12U (old) when there were better pitchers around her and competition was good. Same happened at 14U (old) when again she was around better pitchers. Seeing girls that threw as good or better than her motivated her to work harder. At 14U she played with girls who had better velocity and spun the ball ... daughter decided she needed to get up to speed.
 
Apr 16, 2010
924
43
Alabama
You are in a tough spot. Getting innings is important but having players ahead of her may her push her both in the circle and in other positions. If you believe the coach will give her innings it may be best to go with the team that will force her to compete more for playing time. In 12U we had 6 pitchers and all pitched through pool play and most during bracket. Everyone was getting innings every weekend and it was a win win for the team as a whole. Pitchers got experience and the top two stayed fresh for deep bracket runs. I would say all 6 could have found a home and been a number 1 for some team but the rotation worked.
 
Jun 12, 2015
3,848
83
We want our pitcher to be top 2. That way she gets circle time. At this point (going into first year 12U) I would actually consider a team where she was the #3. She's also 3B/SS and loves those positions almost as much as pitching. So if she had to work harder for circle time but still got her back-up positions I think she'd be more than happy. If she were a super motivated pitcher who wasn't great at fielding I'd be more inclined to want to stay top 2. I guess it just depends on your DD. It does seem like way too many pitchers to me. But I'm coming off a season where DD was our only real bracket level pitcher and she did not like that at all. She wants to know if she's having an off day someone has her back. No easy answer really.
 
Nov 4, 2015
320
43
Don't mind her having to work hard. She is ok with that. Will be hard to make it to top two on the new team if we join. Being honest, she would probably start out tied for #4 with her strongest point being a little better control. Probably be in the bottom 1/3 as far as position playing right now. She LOVES playing softball. Wants to win, but admitted that she really wants opportunities to pitch. Without travelling a lot, there are very few 6 gg near us. Cant keep 6 pitcher's and their parents happy in 3gg formats unless you are playing every weekend. both of these teams will probably play 10-12 tournaments during the year. If my DD was more aggressive it would be easier to go to the new team. She works hard, but that "go wide open" all the time switch hasn't flipped yet. Probably going to go with the option of getting more innings. Will still have to work hard and get better to get wins and even though young, will probably be a better team than she was on last year, just not as good as the other option. This type of thing is going to give me gray hairs. Odds are against her playing college ball and here i am stressing over messing her up going forward. This should be fun. Not a job, and not a lot of pressure. Fun! Right??
 

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
42,830
Messages
679,481
Members
21,445
Latest member
Bmac81802
Top