The multi-sport thread made me think more about how the local HS scene looks.
I took our local county - which is considered strong state-wide and have had the most success in terms of getting to and winning state championships the past few years:
Team Quality:
Contenders: 8 (varsity teams with all travel players, most or all from high level 'A' orgs)
Middling: 7 (at least 1/2 travel players, have a mid-level pitcher with experience)
Bad: 28 (No travel players or at most one or two)
Contenders break down:
5 openly recruit as either private schools or charter schools. All have JV teams full of travel players, all of which would beat most of the 'middling' level HS varsity squads.
3 public schools have strong rec leagues and travel leagues based in their home cities and are also large to very large High Schools(between 1800 and 6000 students)
All the quality pitching in the area attend these schools. Most have 2 quality starters - some have as many as 4
Middling Schools:
Most travel players are in more local travel teams or 'b' level teams. Most not good enough to get recruited into the top 5 contenders. They have the second or third level of pitchers which allows them to crush the bad teams but have zero chance against the contenders. No depth.
Bad:
Ugh. Nothing. Or next to nothing. Will get beaten 15-0 by the contenders in 3 innings and it wont be much better against the middling schools. Games against each other are generally 23-20 walk-fests that end when the sun goes down (because no way their fields have lights)
Several of the middling and bad teams have been totally decimated by the recruiting teams. They should be able to field good teams but all the players who should be attending are at the Charter or Private School or have taken advantage of school choice/magnet programs to get to a different school (this includes the lone travel player on a bad team transferring schools to be on a middling team).
The games between contending teams are more intense than any travel game and are really high quality. Games between differing levels are generally awful. Middling teams versus middling teams can be fun. Bad versus bad is painful for the most part.
Looked quickly at the county above and below us geographically and the team level mix is similar but with even less middling teams and a fewer (but stronger) top teams. Statewide we are clearly the county that is most top heavy with teams and have the highest concentration of the best travel players in the fewest number of schools which is why the county does so well at State.
How does your area look?
I took our local county - which is considered strong state-wide and have had the most success in terms of getting to and winning state championships the past few years:
Team Quality:
Contenders: 8 (varsity teams with all travel players, most or all from high level 'A' orgs)
Middling: 7 (at least 1/2 travel players, have a mid-level pitcher with experience)
Bad: 28 (No travel players or at most one or two)
Contenders break down:
5 openly recruit as either private schools or charter schools. All have JV teams full of travel players, all of which would beat most of the 'middling' level HS varsity squads.
3 public schools have strong rec leagues and travel leagues based in their home cities and are also large to very large High Schools(between 1800 and 6000 students)
All the quality pitching in the area attend these schools. Most have 2 quality starters - some have as many as 4
Middling Schools:
Most travel players are in more local travel teams or 'b' level teams. Most not good enough to get recruited into the top 5 contenders. They have the second or third level of pitchers which allows them to crush the bad teams but have zero chance against the contenders. No depth.
Bad:
Ugh. Nothing. Or next to nothing. Will get beaten 15-0 by the contenders in 3 innings and it wont be much better against the middling schools. Games against each other are generally 23-20 walk-fests that end when the sun goes down (because no way their fields have lights)
Several of the middling and bad teams have been totally decimated by the recruiting teams. They should be able to field good teams but all the players who should be attending are at the Charter or Private School or have taken advantage of school choice/magnet programs to get to a different school (this includes the lone travel player on a bad team transferring schools to be on a middling team).
The games between contending teams are more intense than any travel game and are really high quality. Games between differing levels are generally awful. Middling teams versus middling teams can be fun. Bad versus bad is painful for the most part.
Looked quickly at the county above and below us geographically and the team level mix is similar but with even less middling teams and a fewer (but stronger) top teams. Statewide we are clearly the county that is most top heavy with teams and have the highest concentration of the best travel players in the fewest number of schools which is why the county does so well at State.
How does your area look?
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