Recruiting Players for teams (some would say stealing)??

At our league meeting last night one of the coaches wanted the league to discuss fines/penalties levied at coaches that were caught 'recruiting' players.

His issue was he had set up a team and at a practice recently 4 didn't show up. He then found out all 4 have decided to go play for another team he claims they were 'talked into it'. So now he is short players.

1. Does this happen in other areas? What do you/your leagues do about it?
2. Isn't up to the coach to keep the players they have. If a kid was truly happy would they leave?
3. He wants a letter of intent from the player to be signed and enforced by the league. Does anyone else do that? If so how do you handle those?

My concern with the letter of intent idea is some teams hold tryouts 3-4 weeks before others and they want the kid to make the commitment at that tryout or a day or two later so the player can't go to another tryout. Would it be out of line if we go to this form to have a set date that no team can require a player to sign before?

Thoughts suggestions welcome as we are going to discuss it more at the next meeting.

How effective any roster rules can be is going to be dictated by how few options you have to play and or how badly teams want to play in certain events. Your league can choose to ban teams from participation that take teams from other frozen rosters (Roster freezing dates are a whole nother topic) but that doesn't mean much if the offending team can just choose to play in another league somewhere else. California has pretty strict roster guidelines that are enforceable because even though everyone has options, 99% of the teams really really want to play in ASA events and if you violate the local Socal ASA rules you won't be allowed to play in ASA Events.

I like the idea of have a commitment start date. (i.e. no commitments are valid until ....) that prevents players being pressured onto teams early and/or an escalating arms race of early tryouts that eventually leads to tryouts being held the day after the summer season ends.

Our area is terrible for rules but getting pretty good about mutually respecting each others organizations. We have so many equally desirable options of where to play (ASA, USSSA, NAFA) that enforcing rules would take some sort of joint resolution between all National bodies and that's not on the horizon. BTW I don't think ASA USSSA and NAFA are equal, but for the majority of the teams that aren't ready to compete at the very top ASA level going to a USSSA National/ NAFA National/ASA Regional are all relatively equal opportunities.

Many leagues in all sports have rules that prevent a player from playing for a different team in that league after X date. If they start practicing with one team, after a certain date they cannot change and play for someone else.

Travel ball is different. You are spending big $$$ to field the best team possible. Recruiting takes place all year long for next year, talk girls into coming to your team next yr if they are good enough and on a weak team. Grown men will fight over 12 yo girls.

jazz10NE said:

At our league meeting last night one of the coaches wanted the league to discuss fines/penalties levied at coaches that were caught 'recruiting' players.

His issue was he had set up a team and at a practice recently 4 didn't show up. He then found out all 4 have decided to go play for another team he claims they were 'talked into it'. So now he is short players.

1. Does this happen in other areas? What do you/your leagues do about it?
2. Isn't up to the coach to keep the players they have. If a kid was truly happy would they leave?
3. He wants a letter of intent from the player to be signed and enforced by the league. Does anyone else do that? If so how do you handle those?

My concern with the letter of intent idea is some teams hold tryouts 3-4 weeks before others and they want the kid to make the commitment at that tryout or a day or two later so the player can't go to another tryout. Would it be out of line if we go to this form to have a set date that no team can require a player to sign before?

Thoughts suggestions welcome as we are going to discuss it more at the next meeting.

Click to expand...

Set a date for rosters to be set and stick to it. I would hope most coaches would have enough pride to quit talking impressionable children into making them look like better coaches.

Yes, teams need to be set. Recruiting needs to stop when a player has committed to a coach.

I can't imagine stealing from another team.

No one would like that.

mudbug said:

Many leagues in all sports have rules that prevent a player from playing for a different team in that league after X date. If they start practicing with one team, after a certain date they cannot change and play for someone else.

Travel ball is different. You are spending big $$$ to field the best team possible. Recruiting takes place all year long for next year, talk girls into coming to your team next yr if they are good enough and on a weak team. Grown men will fight over 12 yo girls.

Click to expand...

Agreed. If it is league or rec ball, rosters should be set after a certain date. When mine was very young 6-8 years, all the girls went into a draft. Coaches had 1 pick each until draft was done. Teams were locked in until season over.

Now travel is much more serious. Most players/parents know who has the best traveling team. I would never make a player or want someone else to make a player sign a document that locks a player on a team. Too many 'what if's' to worry about.

recruiting

Not sure if this is rec or at what age, but the best way to protect yourself as a coach is to always, always, always get a ca$h commitment upfront with your signed team parent / player agreement. As they say in the contracting world, if it isn't in writing, it was never said (no matter how many times you said it!)

Agree with some of the comments already stated. Our rec league does have a final roster date where recruiting and drafting players is set. Travel ball is very different. Last year I lost 3 girls to volleyball (they have since realized it wasn't the sport for them) and ended up picking up 4 from another team. At the time I didn't know they were not happy with their team. The coach was not happy with the fact that the girls left his team and thought I had done something to lure them away when in actuality, I had never spoken to them.