Evaluation in rec league

[AtlantaHitDoc]

I've coached on and off in a rec league in Atlanta for 20+ years. We have 650-700 girls playing softball there. At the 6U and 8U levels, the girls are assigned to teams based on proximity of where they live. Focus is on instruction and not W/L.

At the 10U, 12U, 14-18U, we have tryouts. Girls are rated in five categories - hitting, running, throwing, fielding grounders, catching flyballs - on a scale of 1-10. It takes about two to three minutes per girl as we have it down to a science. All the coaches rate the girls. Lowest/highest scores are tossed out an there's an average score for each girl. We then have a draft. There's always protected players and they are slotted into various rounds. We always try to ensure that each team has a pitcher/catcher. It's worked over there years, but we seem to tweak things every year. The goal of course is to get as balanced a team as possible where each team will go .500. Of course, that never happens but it's always been very competitive.

 

[Ace]

I am on the board of directors for our league. This spring will be our 8th season and selecting teams has been an issue, but I suppose it is an issue with all leagues. The way we choose teams was designed with the intention of creating evenly matched teams and prevent one coach from having a stacked team year after year.

Our board of directors select players for teams. The HC's daughter is only player that is automatically placed on a team. We have had our players divided into 3 age groups. 5&6 y/o, 7,8&9 y/o and 10 to 14 y/o. (we only had a few 13 and 14 y/o players as most went to the local junior high teams). We have had the coaches rate their players on a scale of 1 to 3, with 1 being an impact player and 3 being inexperienced. We then break the list of players into ages. We start placing players by first choosing the oldest #1 players, then oldest #2 players etc, until we go through the list for each age group. The intention is to have teams that have an even mix of players based on age and skill. We spend a lot of time working on this and trying to be honest about the mix each team has. If a team looks stacked we will make some changes to make things look even on paper. But no matter how hard we try, there always seems to 1 team that ends up with several players that quit or won't show up regularly and they struggle to field 9 players. We try to have teams that have 12 to 14 players on each team depending on the number of players in an age division and we usually have 4-5 teams in each age group. Of course there are 1 or 2 coaches that no matter the talent they receive, that always finish at the top.

We have gotten some criticism from a few of the coaches in that they want to pick their own teams, but I am not sure we want to go that direction. I understand their reasoning in that if they end up with that team that quits and does not do well, they are the one that picked it.

We have not done try-outs the past few years. The players that have never played before, are rated as a 2 and spread out across all teams.

From reading all these posts, regardless of the method for selecting teams, there are always unforeseen problems and complaints. You just have to do the best you can.

 

[marriard]

I think we do it about as well as you can.

We do each division separately. Coaches come out and do their own evals - however the league evals are also conducted by the girls from the local high school and they provide the league a nice objective view of the players.

They rate the following across three stations(0-5 for all categories so 45 max for non pitchers, 60 for pitchers):
- Batting: Mechanics, Contact, Strength
- Running: Speed to 1st, Sped from home to home
- Fielding: Grounders, Fly balls, Throwing mechanics, Throwing strength throwing accuracy
- Pitching: Speed, Accuracy, Mechanics

These results are then compiled, sorted and then presented to all the coaches in a pack several days before the draft (we have an excel sheet that basically does this for us). In the pack is also any (very limited) buddy requests which are non-guaranteed but we ask coaches to accommodate where we can. I think we have accommodated all but two over the past few years.

Coaches kids are slotted into the draft originally based on the objective evaluations (which are normally really accurate). Coaches are offered the opportunity for input and we make any adjustments required. We have had coaches with 11th and 12th round daughters and coaches who have two 'first rounders' who didn't pick until the 5th round (where we gave them extra picks) who ended up with teams about equal.

We then discuss non-evaluated kids - we decide whether they should be given an evaluation based on past knowledge (when we all know the player) or whether they will just be not be draft eligible and assigned randomly at the end of the draft (which happens when we have new coaches in the league) or if any one disagrees.

At this point we do a random draw for first pick and snake our way throw the draft until all the teams are picked. We demand that ALL teams have 2 pitchers by the end of the third round and we will restart the draft if someone doesn't.

Draft night generally takes less than two hours to pick 6-8 teams in a division including a meal and couple of beers. Over the past 4 years we have found this 'fair because even is impossible'.

 

[2ddsplayingball]

I agree with evaluations at times. However, we have run into a problem, where both my girls had made the All-Stars the previous year and played up a level in fallball. So, we get to evals, older dd (10u) at time, of course is going to play 10u due to age. But, younger who was a first year 8u, but, played 10u for fall is told that she cannot play up due to safety reasons, but, I was told that if I were to coach a 10u team, there would be no safety issues and she could play 10u. Please explain this team me. Now that same daughter is playing TB for a 12u team and she would be a first year 10u this year, but, has played 10u the past 2 years, all at catcher and catching a 12u the whole season.

 

[coach james]

One major problem with ranking the kids on a scale system is the coaches... Ive seen this at our local league with both girls and boys. A coach will purposefully rank a kid a 2 when shes really a 4 or 5. IMO it needs to be a blind draw at a rec level. Put all the names in a box and draw them one at a time, alternating between coaches.
It will truly be luck of the draw...

 

[David Carter]

One major problem with ranking the kids on a scale system is the coaches... Ive seen this at our local league with both girls and boys. A coach will purposefully rank a kid a 2 when shes really a 4 or 5. IMO it needs to be a blind draw at a rec level. Put all the names in a box and draw them one at a time, alternating between coaches.
It will truly be luck of the draw...

Can't really do that because of pitchers.... you have to make sure every team has a couple. We do evaluations but there is no openness because coaches kids are slotted regardless of ability, this is something I am trying to change right now as we re-write the bylaws. A draft works fine as long as there are not too many slotted picks. Last year was just crazy we had what basically amounted to a reserved list of 7 or 8 players that were going to be on one team for various reason and amazingly they were the best team with the best players that all made the All Star team. I told the president, who was also the instigator of this incident, that while it might have been fun last year you will run the league into the ground if you keep it up (and yes I was the newly formed third team in that division who got all the girls that had never played before and we had a blast)....then got myself on the board and volunteered to head up the committee that is re writing the by laws, I might start a thread on what ideas people like our biggest is going to be this issue of no preformed teams going into the draft.

 

[coach james]

I know... I forgot about pitching. but there were several cases of what I described here. one team would dominate while the other three or four teams struggled. it was usually because a dad/coach wanted all his kids friends on the same team that he was coaching.

 

[Rmc1981]

I've been coaching in rec league now for 2.5 years but am switching to travel. One of the reasons (among many) is that I'm tired of starting over every season. Our league does much of what has been talked about here in an effort to make all things equal. It's fine when we are playing our league but when we play tournaments around the area (which we are basically required to do), we get our tails beat. Other teams have been playing together for years while I'm once again teaching 12 girls how to catch and throw. It's not just the girls who've never played...out of 4 coaches in 8U last year, 2 were terrible which meant all the girls that moved from their team to mine were under coached and didn't know what they were doing.

I know it's terrible for me to feel this way, but I'm weary with it. Truthfully, our draft is set up to help new coaches more than returning coaches. We do our own evaluations, which I like. I feel like I'm taking responsibility for my own team. If I draft bad, it's on me to be a better coach.

Anyway, just tired of getting to the end of season where we are finally competing and then losing my team.

 

[DD11]

I've been coaching in rec league now for 2.5 years but am switching to travel. One of the reasons (among many) is that I'm tired of starting over every season. Our league does much of what has been talked about here in an effort to make all things equal. It's fine when we are playing our league but when we play tournaments around the area (which we are basically required to do), we get our tails beat. Other teams have been playing together for years while I'm once again teaching 12 girls how to catch and throw. It's not just the girls who've never played...out of 4 coaches in 8U last year, 2 were terrible which meant all the girls that moved from their team to mine were under coached and didn't know what they were doing.

I know it's terrible for me to feel this way, but I'm weary with it. Truthfully, our draft is set up to help new coaches more than returning coaches. We do our own evaluations, which I like. I feel like I'm taking responsibility for my own team. If I draft bad, it's on me to be a better coach.

Anyway, just tired of getting to the end of season where we are finally competing and then losing my team.

I feel you.
In my DDs league - we draft at 8U and assuming the girls would like to continue to be on your team, you are on the same team unless that kid chooses to be redrafted. I've had the same girls for 3 years, been nice to not have to start all over every season.

 

[JAD]

There is no such thing as a perfect system for evaluating talent, but I would recommend you go to a 1-5 scoring system to try to refine the breakdown in skill sets. 1 is a beginner, 2 is below average, 3 is average, 4 is above average and 5 is a superstar. You also need to make sure that everyone is evaluated equally. Some evaluators are Paula Abdul, some are Randy Jackson and some are Simon Crowell.....we had a tryout one year and one of the returning dads who was helping out gave every girl a 4 or 5, so his evaluations were useless in selecting the team. Needless to say his nickname is now 'Paula Abdul'! LOL