A different HS story

Warning this a long post. For those with DD's approaching HS age I wanted to give you a different type of HS story than many we see on DFP. DD is currently a sophomore in HS. As a parent I thought I had a pretty good idea of were my DD stood in regards to the other players on the varsity team but you never know how things will turn out and parents tend to have rose colored glasses. We are the visiting team in the first game freshman year and I am curious to see if DD will get to play. When she came out in the on deck circle to bat 5th ahead of 4 upper classmen I was surprised. When she went to left field to start on defense I was even more surprised. DD had over 200 games of TB experience at 1B and exactly 5 innings of outfield experience. The team needed a LF and had a girl who needed to be in the lineup and needed to play 1B. DD was a better 1B than this girls but the team was better off with DD in LF. It took a lot of work and DD made some errors she was not used to making. By halfway through the year DD was batting 150 higher than the #4 hitter and her slugging percentage was double hers. DD could not understand why the coach would not move her up in the lineup. It gave an excellent opportunity to talk to DD about all the factors that go into lineup creation above and beyond pure numbers.
Fast forward to sophomore year and DD has taken over the starting CF spot and leads her team in every offense category. She started the year batting 3rd but was moved up to lead-off to make it more difficult for opposing teams to pitch around her. She is determined to earn the starting CF spot on her TB team and move away from 1B. All the reps in HS practice and games gave her the opportunity to turn into a good outfielder. Her TB teams never gave her these opportunities because she was viewed as too valuable at 1B.
This week we had senior night for the 7 graduating seniors. At the banquet after the game the seniors usually read some notes to the group. The first girl who read a note had to stop several times because she was crying. Her parents also cried and many other people where noticeably moved by the impact softball had on this young lady. This girl was a part time TB player, a fair HS softball player on an above average HS team. The best senior girl who is a cut-throat softball competitor couldn't even talk she was so emotional. After seeing how much softball meant to these girls I was glad DD had participated on this team if for no other reason than to help these girls have a good senior season.
I just thought I would post this to show that there can be good HS experiences as well. It would have been easy to have been upset at the coach for playing DD out of position or for not moving her up in the line-up as a freshman. It was a great learning experience for DD and one that has paid off huge for her. I realize others have different experiences and it doesn't work for everyone. For those that say no coaches come to HS games DD has had one D1 coach come to see her play and several D3 coaches come. As I mentioned on another thread a D2 coach came to look at the opposing pitcher but after the game came up to our coach to talk to him about DD and another girl on our team.

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Thanks for sharing your experience. My DD is in 8th grade and I don't share with her the many horror stories I read on these boards, but I will share your DD's. She is excited to play for her school next year as there is no MS softball in our area, but I'm nervous for her and hope it's a positive experience. She is one of the alpha dogs on her TB team, hits 3rd and is the starting C. None of those will be the case next year in HS with a Senior who has committed to play D1 clearly the starting C.

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I think we complain because we start out thinking life is fair....
We all look forward to “moving up”
We believe that when you get to HS, it is the end of daddy ball and the beginning of a meritocracy.
Then you wind up on a team that is in no way a “team”....
You are still in daddyball only the coach isnt the father of a player.

That said, i am glad the dream is still alive for You and i hopemany others!
Those of us with less than textbook experiences are not all whiners, just not in a good place. We wish our DDs could play on a team where players have to earn their spot.

obbay said:

We believe that when you get to HS, it is the end of daddy ball and the beginning of a meritocracy.
Then you wind up on a team that is in no way a “team”....
You are still in daddyball only the coach isnt the father of a player.

Click to expand...

DD's HS coach is the father of one of the players But from what I saw last year there definitely wasn't any daddyball going on.