Parent complaints after Game #1

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BobInMadison said:

A lot of folks don't really understand the upper midwest.

Around these parts, the winters are long and cold. Not much pitching gets done. There is snow on the ground right now, today, as I write.

So, you have a girl who was maybe practicing pitching once a week, maybe not even, during the off-season. Suddenly in practice she is expected to pitch every day, and when the games start, she is pitching every inning of every game. OTOH, if a team uses two or more pitchers, the pitchers can really ease into the season.

With DD 3 not playing HS ball this year, I am worried her arm won't be ready for TB. Last year she pitched a LOT in the early tournaments because the other starter didn't pitch HS ball, which compounded things a bit.

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Not a whole lot different in PA> The original schedule looked fine. Most games were scheduled for Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. No more than three games in any week. And no back to back days. I'm not concerned about DD pitching through that. But now the season has started, so far we played 1 game and have had 3 games postponed. We have another scheduled for tomorrow that will probably also get postponed. Where they place these games on the schedule will determine the challenge. Last year a pitcher from our travel team was asked to pitch 6 complete games in one week, and one of them went extra innings. Her totals were 45 innings with over 800 pitches in one week. In my opinion that is just too much.

Funny how just a couple weeks ago we were talking with another poster about them going to the coach about playing time instead of the DD. A lot of us said "don't do it!"

Anyway, DD's HS coach laid out the rules, in writing to the players, and at the parents meeting.

Her #1, she will not discuss playing time, with any one, ever. She is happy to discuss with the player, at an appropriate time, what they need to work on to give them the best chance at competing. But playing time is only discussed among the coaching staff.

She will not discuss this with parents.

Any discussions requiring a parent, will also involve the AD.

All discussions will also require the player to be present, nothing will be said behind their backs.

It clear as day. You don't need to sign anything. These are just the rules.

It'll be interesting because HC is keeping 15 for varsity. We only graduated 2 starters last year, so there are a lot coming back, but a lot of newcomers that will be fighting for playing time. Most of them won't get it, but hopefully the team will be competing hard at every practice.

There is little a coach can do in a single game (unless you're Gabe Kapler, maybe) to warrant this kind of action from a group of parents, which makes me think there's some kind of coordinated effort to intimidate going on here.

The bad part is there's not really a way to punish the parents. You can't bench a player because her mom is a jerk. But I guess you can tell parents that you won't keep any players around if their parents are a problem. It would suck to drop a girl for that reason, but if it becomes that much of an issue, you may have no choice.

I'm curious: How did you respond?

How did you respond?

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CoachJD said:

There is little a coach can do in a single game (unless you're Gabe Kapler, maybe) to warrant this kind of action from a group of parents, which makes me think there's some kind of coordinated effort to intimidate going on here.

The bad part is there's not really a way to punish the parents. You can't bench a player because her mom is a jerk. But I guess you can tell parents that you won't keep any players around if their parents are a problem. It would suck to drop a girl for that reason, but if it becomes that much of an issue, you may have no choice.

I'm curious: How did you respond?

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We as a staff listened and asked they trust us. And definitely mentioned it was one game.
We (staff) agree that we will listen once then the next time we have to speak about same topic means it is probably best we (team-parent/player) go our separate ways. (Meaning they take their daughter off the team and accept the result.)

old school coach here -
"we, as a staff..." nope, it's fine to have a staff discussion but with the parent, it's "me as head coach." and, two, I understand your concern, parent. if your DD is to get more playing time, your DD needs to get better doing ... here are some drills you can help her with.

CoachJD said:

There is little a coach can do in a single game (unless you're Gabe Kapler, maybe) to warrant this kind of action from a group of parents, which makes me think there's some kind of coordinated effort to intimidate going on here.

The bad part is there's not really a way to punish the parents. You can't bench a player because her mom is a jerk. But I guess you can tell parents that you won't keep any players around if their parents are a problem. It would suck to drop a girl for that reason, but if it becomes that much of an issue, you may have no choice.

I'm curious: How did you respond?

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I have. Especially one who was coaching his son while he was hitting. He told his son to not listen to me and bunt the ball like I wanted. The son must have told the dad all of our signs. So, he hit the bench. That was my first game here as a baseball coach many years ago. The point was made.

cvsoftball said:

old school coach here -
"we, as a staff..." nope, it's fine to have a staff discussion but with the parent, it's "me as head coach." and, two, I understand your concern, parent. if your DD is to get more playing time, your DD needs to get better doing ... here are some drills you can help her with.

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I wouldn't even engage that much. It gives their gripe credibility to even address the concern. It opens you up to more and more of this kind of thing.

I think the only response, especially in this case where it's crazy parents reacting to one game, is to say "If your daughter has an issue she knows to make an appointment to meet with me" (or whatever your policy is for how/when you meet with players). And that's it.