Interesting article about travel ball and recruiting

slugger3 said:

Here's a question that would have the broadest spectrum of answers to it...

What is the average cost (everything included) spent on a Top 25 D-1 Fastpitch player on anything related to softball before they started playing for a D-1 program?
$50,000 to $100,000 over the course of 4-6 years of travel ball?

What is the lowest amount you guys think was spent on any Top 25 D-1 Fastpitch players out there today over the course of their Travel Ball career?

Is it almost a pre-requisite for any girl who ends up on a Top 25 D-1 team, to spend top dollar and to travel across the country to play ball, just to make it to that level of play? And to be considered good enough to play on a Top 25 D-1 team?
(All skills being equal)

I suppose you could go to the websites for all of the Top 25 D-1 teams and start reading player bio's, to see who was playing for Top Level Gold team. Aptly named ....Team Airline Miles...

Or who was working in a lumber yard the summer before they started playing college ball.

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ScottyDont said:

How much you spend on travel ball depends pretty much entirely on your goals for your daughter and your location in the country. If you live in New Jersey and your daughter wants to play at UCLA, be prepared to spend some money. Top level showcase team, camps, recruiting visits, all the big showcases, PGF Nationals, etc. If you live in Atlanta and want to play for Georgia Tech, I imagine it would be a lot easier. I count 10 Georgia residents on their team for this past year.

I live in NJ and my DD wanted to play ball within a couple hours of our house, so there was less need for her to travel. Unfortunately, when you want to play high level ball in college, you have to play high level travel ball. In our area, there are really only 3-4 teams that get it done, so we went with one of those. There's a lot of unnecessary travel for showcases in various parts of the country, but that's part of the cost if you want to get seen as being a top level player.

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slugger3 said:

I'd love to hear from a parent or coach on this board of a girl they KNEW was going to be on a D-1 team...the girl had the skills, drive, desire, work ethic and grades to take them to the top.
At what age did you know your DD had the Right Stuff, so to speak?

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slugger3 said:

Thank you for sharing this article!

Read this article...it could save you $50,000 to $70,000.

Is it really worth it, all of this?
When alot of College Coaches would much rather your DD come to their camps to see them play...

After some camps, my oldest DD got invited on a tour by the Head Coach or staff.
And at other college camps she was told to help clean up after the camp.

Both of them were great learning experiences for her...and especially me.

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junkball said:

My oldest has learned confidence. Learned to perform under pressure. Learned what it means to be a teammate. Learned what it means to fail and then have to go back up again. Learned to understand that even though there are rules, it's not always fair how they are applied (bad umps). Learned that umpires are human, just like her. Learned that the pizza by the pool with her team at the hotel after playing 4 games that day taste 1,000 times better than the pizza she has sitting on the couch all weekend. Learned that the she doesn't "throw like a girl" but there are lots of boys who wish they could throw like this girl. Learned how to own up to her mistakes. Learned how to work hard to achieve a goal. Learned that there is so much more to life than watching TV or playing video games. Learned how to make friends from once perceived enemies. Learned how mental toughness is way tougher than physical toughness when the going gets tough.


I'll gladly pay what I've paid in total as of today for her to develop these skills and traits that can't be taught by taking the money I would've spent on softball and investing it for her future college costs.

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Strike2 said:

I know of two players in my area. Both are pitchers AND very good athletes...they can play anywhere. One had her well-known D-1 school locked down as a sophomore, and the other just before starting 9th grade. Both schools are in-state. Had they wanted to play out of state for some reason, their recruiting would likely have taken longer. In terms of joining quality softball programs, they couldn't really do much better.

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slugger3 said:

I'd love to hear from a parent or coach on this board of a girl they KNEW was going to be on a D-1 team...the girl had the skills, drive, desire, work ethic and grades to take them to the top.
At what age did you know your DD had the Right Stuff, so to speak?
Knowing they had the Right Stuff, was that one of the factors that allowed you to push on financially in this endeavor?

I am not a gambler, it was not worth the cost of $20,000 a year to us, HOPING she had a chance of getting on one of her dream teams.

My oldest DD started out so late in skill development, that to think of her getting a verbal offer as a middle schooler is literally laughable.
She did very well in 10th grade, and that's when she started thinking about playing at the college level.
She was laughed at by nearly everyone, except myself and her HS coach....for merely having the dream of playing college softball...anywhere.
From a very early age she wanted to go to one of the two D-1 schools up here in the Upper Midwest, not because of there softball program. Just because of their proximity to home. Playing softball in college literally didn't enter her mind as a possibility until 10th grade.
So those were the schools she contacted first.
It was a great learning experience for her...bottom line she wasn't good enough to play there.

So, if she couldn't get a second look from one of the lower to mid-level D-1 schools around here, why would we spend $20,000 a year traveling around the country, hoping Awesome U. would send her a camp invite.
It made no sense to us.
There were a handful of D-2/D-3 coaches who reached out to her from the beginning with camp invites from her performance in the high school ranks and well as a Individual Showcase put on in Minneapolis. (Great job Sean!)
No they weren't begging her to come to the camps, just an invite.

Even though the glamour of traveling across the US playing ball was appealing, it was not feasible for us.
In the Upper Midwest (MN, Dakotas, Iowa), we've heard they are very few early verbals to middle schoolers, even up to 10th and 11th graders...
The PGF tournaments in the Twin Cities were the best tournaments we could have been in. Because there were many D-2 and D-3 coaches there....something realistic for my DD as well as her team mates.
My DD and her teammates got camp some invites, they played in Friendly's, and had a blast.
In Iowa City, they got to play in front of Trachsel, who was at Iowa State then. (trust me, she wasn't there to see my DD).
It was hotter than hell, they were chuggin gatorade, and showering in bug spray since the mosquitoes and gnats were so bad...I ran back to the car 2 times to get re-fills of OFF for all of the girls.

The girls played their butts off, even when a college coach wasn't there...and I admire the heck out of hard workers....not just great ball players.
The last game they played in Iowa City was over in the Rhubarb 5 complex and off by itself a 1/4 mile or so...
It was the last of 5 games in 2 days, none of the parents gave a schlitz anymore...so we were cheering for each other's team every time a player for either team made a great play or hit.


If I would have dumped $20,000 on ball last year...I don't think I would have a positive outlook on it looking back.
For us, we stuck around the Minneapolis area. And it all worked out in the end.

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slugger3 said:

Learning confidence, performance under pressure, the meaning of a teammate, that life isn't fair, metal toughness, (and I'll add, how to work hard)...aren't our DDs supposed to learn that from us as parents? I didn't have to pay a dime for that.

Mowing lawn, cleaning house, washing dishes and laundry, power washing the house and cars, taking care of the pets, planting 1000-1500 trees every spring for the last 5 years, Fall and Spring yard prep, building huge tree forts, tearing down huge tree forts....

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