12 YO DD (and Mom) thinking we may need to reevaluate.
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- May 7, 2012
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DD was bored and needed more of a challenge and the league would not let her play up.
- Jan 24, 2011
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DD played two years of Little League softball. The competition was poor and the instruction was even worse. Just seemed like a huge waste of time. Switched to TB at 10 years old and never looked back
Yep...we moved on when DD wasn't being challenged AND the instruction was poor...she wasn't getting better. Once we moved on, it was a whole new world.
- Jul 9, 2012
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It was a combination. For two years at 9 and 10 I asked her both springs if she wanted to look into tb. Both times her response was no, I just want to play with my friends. At 10 she was dominating her rec league, hitting (true) .600+, ops over 1.400, and throwing out kids to the point that no one would run on her. Her team was basically beating other teams 15-2 on average in a rec league. But most of the parents didn't know anything about tb, save two that had older daughters. With those two parents guidance, we put the rec team into two C level local tourneys and they got second and a first. The parents and kids thought that was fun so we tried a b level tourney and got smoked. Our pitching just wasn't good enough to compete at that level. I think this also turned off some parents because they figured out real quick to compete above c our kids would need to practice at least 2x a week (we only practiced about every other week during the season, and once a week for 6 weeks prior to the start of league) take pitching lessons, take hitting lessons, practice through part of the winter, etc.
Then an A coach asked my daughter and the SS to come practice with their team. She did, and figured out she could play at that level, but more importantly she figured out that she didn't have to be scared of failure. That is when she said she wanted to try it. That A coach picked her up that fall, and she has grown leaps and bounds competing at a high level. Sometimes it just astounds me as to where she was to what she has become in two years of playing. She has a good coach, has access to good facilities, and is supported.
The rec team still plays as a few of the girls and their parents decided they didn't want to do tb, and are happy. 4 are playing tb at different levels and on different teams with different levels of commitment. And unfortunately, 3 of the players are not playing softball at all.
Then an A coach asked my daughter and the SS to come practice with their team. She did, and figured out she could play at that level, but more importantly she figured out that she didn't have to be scared of failure. That is when she said she wanted to try it. That A coach picked her up that fall, and she has grown leaps and bounds competing at a high level. Sometimes it just astounds me as to where she was to what she has become in two years of playing. She has a good coach, has access to good facilities, and is supported.
The rec team still plays as a few of the girls and their parents decided they didn't want to do tb, and are happy. 4 are playing tb at different levels and on different teams with different levels of commitment. And unfortunately, 3 of the players are not playing softball at all.
After her first season in LL we had some league wide practice nights in the gym. My dd was being told to not throw so hard. She was told this by a coach who she had just thrown the ball.
- Apr 1, 2010
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It was a combination of things. DD enjoyed playing on a rec team with the girls from her school, but the rest of the team was very casual about practicing and playing. The rec association's fields were one of the venues for a C VIP tournament and the rec teams were allowed to enter for $50 rather than $300+. I think it was a 5GG double elimination format, so $10 per team per game...what a great deal! Their team entered (they were basically cannon fodder for the true C teams, but won a few against other rec teams) and her eyes were opened to this whole other world of softball that we hadn't known existed.
She stayed with her friends in rec, but grew less satisfied: she wanted to play hard and win, they were more interested in having fun. I think her final straw was when she threw down to second on a steal and the ball went bouncing over the base and into the outfield because neither the SS or 2B had gone to cover the bag. :-D She decided she'd like to try to get on a competitive team; I found some tryout postings, wrote them into my calendar and planned for a busy August... She got accepted after the first tryout, just fell in love with softball and never went back to rec.
Does your DD want to play in high school?
This last week my DD went to the spring softball camp for grades 3-8 put on by her future high school team. Her motive for going was to get acquainted with the coach and his assistants and let them get a good look at her. I watched the final scrimmage with grades 5-8 for a little while and you could absolutely tell which girls played tb and which girls played rec. Some of the rec girls were very athletic, but honestly, the tb girls, even the young ones, looked like studs in comparison. They knew how to field, throw, catch, hit and run the bases; they were having a blast and it seemed effortless for them. I was surprised that there was such a difference.
She stayed with her friends in rec, but grew less satisfied: she wanted to play hard and win, they were more interested in having fun. I think her final straw was when she threw down to second on a steal and the ball went bouncing over the base and into the outfield because neither the SS or 2B had gone to cover the bag. :-D She decided she'd like to try to get on a competitive team; I found some tryout postings, wrote them into my calendar and planned for a busy August... She got accepted after the first tryout, just fell in love with softball and never went back to rec.
Does your DD want to play in high school?
This last week my DD went to the spring softball camp for grades 3-8 put on by her future high school team. Her motive for going was to get acquainted with the coach and his assistants and let them get a good look at her. I watched the final scrimmage with grades 5-8 for a little while and you could absolutely tell which girls played tb and which girls played rec. Some of the rec girls were very athletic, but honestly, the tb girls, even the young ones, looked like studs in comparison. They knew how to field, throw, catch, hit and run the bases; they were having a blast and it seemed effortless for them. I was surprised that there was such a difference.
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- Apr 11, 2012
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I suppose it's different for everyone....if you all are treating rec softball as just an "activity" ....then you are in the right place because its the best place to start....but as MsDinosaur asked "Does your DD want to play in high school?".....continueing to play rec ball at a 12U level might make that pretty tough....
WARRIORMIKE
Pro-Staff Everything
Managing,coaching and be a league president for 5 seasons and seeing our LL program grow in strength is awesome. However with me putting in all this time, it may be time for me to "just be a parent" and watch my kid play. I will give her another season and let her decide on what direction she wants to go. Good luck with your decision.
DD got tired of practicing for 3 months to play 16 games and then sit all Summer, so we found a way she could keep playing.
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