Can travel ball kill a rec. league?

[GatorGirl]

So we had our winter workouts for the rec. league we play in start this past Sunday. The new 10U travel team they put together in the Fall must have had some issues, because the first 3 work outs are for evaluations to build a new team with a new coach at the helm. In listening to the time obligation, DD said to me "NO WAY". But I went on to listen and what I heard concerns me.

So one parent asked if kids normally play both rec. and travel. The "new" coach says at 10U yes, but 12U and 14U not likely. These travel teams are affiliated with our rec. leagues and they use the same fields, the leagues name and such, but I don't really how deep the relationship goes.

I guess I am just bummed that the travel teams seem to be killing this rec. league. 14U is totally gone and 12U has whittled down to only 2 teams--barely. Now that they are "serious" about this 10U travel team, who knows.

I guess I just wonder what happens when all the parents who are happy to run things now because their DD are on the travel team progress higher and where does that leave the rec. teams. I just thought travel teams where supposed to be their own entity and I feel like the ones in our area are cannibalizing our rec. league. Maybe this is just how it goes and such, but we don't have a middle school team and so I am lost as to where my DD will play through the middle school years if she wants to play in high school.

Any thoughts? Is this normal for travel teams to take the kids, fields, names and such of rec. leagues??

-GG

 

[Axe]

Some Rec leagues will associate with travel teams, some leagues will specifically avoid being related to travel teams to try and keep their players longer. Either way, it is the nature of Rec leagues to "produce" players for travel teams. That is why coaching and player development in Rec leagues is so important. You have to develop deeper than the top few players so that your league can survive the cream being scooped off the top every season.

 

[starsnuffer]

Yes, it does, however there are steps that can be taken to avoid it.

I worked with a rec league that had just 450 kids at one point, which is pretty small for around here. The organization wanted to grow its travel program to include all age groups.

What we did was move the games to weeknights only, 2 games a week on either mon/wed or tue/thurs, leaving the weekends and fridays free for travel. We also pushed the season back deeper into the summer so to allow high school kids (mostly JV players) to play rec ball as well. Now, the league has grown a bit but has 190 kids playing travel ball, with multiple teams at 12u, 14u, 16u, and 18u. It also has a successful 18u rec program. All of the travel players MUST play rec ball. There are rules and considerations for exceptions and of course fall ball has its own set of rules as there is no rec ball at that time.

If your travel and rec overlap and you try to have rec games when tournaments are going on, you're going to have issues. What you want is for the travel players to bring back what they learned to the rec teams to make the org better as a whole. You also have to adopt the mentality that kids leaving to play A ball is not a bad thing, infact it is a good thing. When a kid gets good enough in your org to move up then you have accomplished the goal of instilling a love of softball in a kid and teaching the game. Rec/B leagues are all about teaching the game and giving a taste of higher level play. They are not an all-encompassing 4th Reich of softball.

-W

 

[Rocketech1]

I guess I am just bummed that the travel teams seem to be killing this rec. league. 14U is totally gone and 12U has whittled down to only 2 teams--barely. Now that they are "serious" about this 10U travel team, who knows.

Even in large rec leagues in SoCal, after 12U most kids either play travel ball, middle school ball or completely drop out of the sport for a variety of reasons and result in the rec league in the upper divisions have a lot less players. Most of the travel ball teams that I am aware of in SoCal are not directly affiliated with travel ball teams but are independent organizations that run travel ball programs in several divisions (10U, 12U, 14U, 16U, 18U). You also have the one-off travel teams that sprout up every year and are mostly short lived because they can't attract the top players or sponsorships to off-set some of the travel ball costs.

I understand your concern but this seems to be the case with most sports around here too including soccer, baseball, and basketball.

 

[marriard]

Agree - yes it can - but there are steps that can be done to avoid it.

It helped when I got out rec league to think about it this way.

#1 - Recognize that travel is not the enemy. They are not stealing players. You don't 'own' any individual player except that ones that live at your house. Parents will do what they see as best for their kids.
#2 - If a talented player in your rec program progresses to the point where they ONLY play travel then you have succeeded as a rec league in helping develop that talent. You didn't 'lose' that player to travel.

Once you think this way, you can develop a path to work with the local travel teams (directly associated or not) to come up with win-win scenarios for everyone.

Starsnuffer outlines some of the things that worked for them. We have done similar things. We have full 12U travel teams that play in our 14U division for experience - same with some of our other divisions - which has been a good fit for us recently. We don't 'force' our travel ball players to play rec - but most do - they just play up a lot. For the most part the younger more experienced travel players mix well with the older, less expereinced players to make reasonable teams in age group divisions.

 

[Sparky Guy]

Travel does not kill rec leagues. The kids who leave to play travel will do so on their own no matter what if they really want elevated competition. The majority of the kids who move to travel will never look back at rec again. That's why many rec leagues are trying add travel into their offerings to keep more kids in their programs.

Your DD said "No" to the commitment to travel. And that's perfectly fine if she does not want to make the time commitment. If all she wants to play is 1 or 2 games week with minimal practice, rec is the place for her. She may change her mind when she gets older.

As for the tapering off of kids playing rec at the older levels. It's the same thing in travel ball as well. The number of girls who play shrinks, but the competition level increases. The girls find they like different things and will gravitate towards them. At 14U and up the girls are playing the game for themselves. The parental influence lessens.

 

[GatorGirl]

Good to know. I guess I am just wondering where it leaves the rec. league once the kids that the travel leagues were started around move up. It is apparent that a coach who has a daughter in 10U travel is going to want to move up to the 12U travel when she does. So unless you have another 10U parent willing to step up, where does that leave the travel team and the "void" if you will that it has caused in the rec. league.

Nature of the beast I guess. We do have a few other options if 12U completely burns out once she gets there after 10U, but right now, she won't even discuss doing travel. She does cheer, volleyball and girl scouts on top of rec. softball with separate pitching lessons and practice so she refuses to think about traveling all weekend(me either). But maybe once the rec. is burned out, she'll be ready to consider travel.

I was just curious as to how it worked instead of just posting a flaming review like I did in the Fall with the formation of the first 10U travel team. Thanks for the input.

GG

 

[marriard]

I was just curious as to how it worked instead of just posting a flaming review like I did in the Fall with the formation of the first 10U travel team. Thanks for the input.

GG

Rec is where the entry level players start - so any girls 'moving up and out' need to be replaced by 'net new' players or you need to make it attractive for the travel player to be involved (opportunity to play in the older age divisions perhaps). So you adapt, recruit and advertize hard. And yes, it means someone new has to step up both in parents, coaches and players.

The whole 'they betrayed us by leaving' is BS. They didn't owe the league anything - in fact they normally gave more to the league when they were more involved than the average family. I know several people here who have been like that - I know I was one.

 

[canyonjoe]

We have a league about an hour from us that does a great job of having a good league and travel team. A couple of the travel teams regularly play extremely well against A level teams. Our old league is trying to develop a travel system. I believe they will just take players from rec teams and have around 18-20 girls that can decide weather or not to play in a tournament.

In our area the local little league works extremely well with one of the local travel teams. They get the tourney schedule and take dates off when the team is traveling to allow the players to play both. Almost all the kids on my son't TB team play Little League too.

 

[mogsoftball]

Its like MLB

before you get to the show you got levels of the minors.

Rec is A ball
Local select teams, all stars, low level tavel AA ball
Mid level travel AAA ball
Top level travel the majors.

Rec is where you find out if girls
1. Love softball ebough to commit the time in takes for travel
2. have enough natural ability and coachibility to move to travel.

The way it seems to work mostly around here
10u plays rec at least 1 year and the girls who fall in love with it and stand out as the best players move to travel at 12u.

At 10u it was such a mix in rec, we had a few girls who could hit, field, and throw well, and some others that couldn't make a throw from 2nd to 1st, could catch a ball thrown right at them, or even an easy pop fly.

The higher level more dedicated girls wanted more so moved to travel.

We told our girls when we prefer they not play rec ball. With practice during the week and games on weekends as well as privates there is just no time.