My rec league player is on our opponents tournament team...

Sure, to the catcher, it’s just another stupid rec game, and her book shelf is already full of $4 trophies. To her rec league teammates, it’s the FREAKING playoffs. She is in a difficult situation that she created herself. Either choice results in letting down a team she made a commitment to. If there is another game, I think she definitely gets an inning on the bench, and maybe moved down in the batting order. Not really as a punishment, but as a reward to her teammates who showed up, and earned that extra game. They deserve more playing time, and more at bats in whatever games remain.
IMOHO

In addition, if the TB coach will not allow a player to miss a practice for a playoff game in another league, or sport, they should not allow their players to join those leagues.

wheresmycar said:

Sure, to the catcher, it’s just another stupid rec game, and her book shelf is already full of $4 trophies. To her rec league teammates, it’s the FREAKING playoffs. She is in a difficult situation that she created herself. Either choice results in letting down a team she made a commitment to. If there is another game, I think she definitely gets an inning on the bench, and maybe moved down in the batting order. Not really as a punishment, but as a reward to her teammates who showed up, and earned that extra game. They deserve more playing time, and more at bats in whatever games remain.
IMOHO

In addition, if the TB coach will not allow a player to miss a practice for a playoff game in another league, or sport, they should not allow their players to join those leagues.

Click to expand...

In this case, the TB coach knows she's playing rec and his daughter is as well. In most situations, though, the TB coach would probably tell her she's not going to have time for rec, so please don't sign up. Or that she can play rec when the TB is not playing or practicing, but she'll have to miss a lot. I've known a couple of high-level TB kids who play other sports too, and I don't know how they manage it. For example, here in GA, some girls do track and field in the spring while also doing TB. I have to assume that TB takes precedence when softball tournaments and track and field meets overlap, but I don't know for sure.

Thanks to all who offered their opinion, advice, experiences and suggestions. It was very helpful to see this from several perspectives.
To follow up – we won the elimination game and will be facing Team A tonight. I won’t be sitting C or moving her to the outfield. As I said earlier, I tend to see her missing last night’s game as her dad’s decision and there really is no point in sitting a 13 year old who didn’t have any control over whether or not she was playing in our game. My AC will not be happy but it’s my call.

I did shake up our batting order a bit last night and it worked really well so C will be batting a bit lower in our order. This is definitely not a disciplinary action (and I’ll let her know that so she doesn’t misunderstand). This is based solely on a great combination of speed, smart base running and hitting from our 1-2-3 hitters last night.
Wish us luck, we are big underdogs tonight, as we were last night!

Fastpitch_Dad said:

The issue of TB players on REC Team aside......

I’m not sure why you would feel like you needed to discipline the player for attendance especially at REC level? Would it matter if she had a sleepover at G-Ma’s house instead?

There are conflicts all of the time and as long as they are making good faith efforts to attend and not mocking the situation then you play them as usual.

Click to expand...

I coach rec and the way I look at it is that I reward the players who come to practice, not that I'm punishing the players who don't. I'm try very hard to ensure equal playing time regardless of attendance, but the players who come to practice will hit higher in the order and get more time at their preferred positions.