Hitting Slump or just bad luck?

[AmyLynn05]

Dd just finished her season of softball. She's playing at the C level (tournaments) and her team did 2 tournaments at 12u and 2 at 14u this fall. She's always been a solid hitter and usually sits between 4-7 in the batting order on a team that has seen a lot of success (went 18-5 this season).

One of the other parents posted a screenshot of the team batting Avg/OB% stats (with names blacked out)...looking at it I realized my DD was sitting dead last on the team for batting avg and ob% this season (.3 & .4). I'm not sure what to make of this. I knew she was having a serious case of thr "At Ems" this season but darn. She is literally one of the (if not the) best on the team at hitting the ball- only had 4 KS all season and very few walks...she'll almost always find at least one hitable pitch in the series.

Looking thru my book it looks like about half of her at bats were caught by outfielders and the other half were caught infield or out at 1.

What do I even say or how do u improve when you hit the ball (hard) most at bats but still get out? I know she's got to improve her physical speed to first to reduce those outs, but that's only a fraction of it. As a coach/parent what do you say or do about a player like that? Just an unfortunate season? Would u rather have a kid who hits like this or one with a higher ob% but that takes a walk or K because they struggle to hit? Unfortunately I don't have access to the whole stat set, but I'd assume she's in the top half of RBIs for the season.

 

[Greatdaytobeawildcat]

1. GC stats are generally unreliably entered by some mom or dad who doesn't know what they're doing.
2. 23 games, means probably 70 ABs, so 21 hits is a .300 avg, so basically almost a hit per game. Not a slump.
3. .300 BA is not a slump.
4. Teams where the worst hitter has a BA of .300 are called Oklahoma
5. There is no need to say anything to her
6. Keep playing, keep working hard
7. GC stats are stupid. Fretting about them is stupider.

 

[_MIA_]

One of the other parents posted a screenshot of the team batting Avg/OB% stats (with names blacked out)...

Find out how this person takes their coffee, offer to buy them one, and then lace it with arsenic (I kid of course....that would be too easy to trace)

 

[AmyLynn05]

Oh I'm not mad about them posting it...just confused on how dd ended up at the bottom when (at least I thought) she's solid at bat. The rest of the team was .55-.69 ob% and .34 to .676 batting avg.

 

[AmyLynn05]

Oh I'm not mad about them posting it...just confused on how dd ended up at the bottom when (at least I thought) she's solid at bat. The rest of the team was .55-.69 ob% and .34 to .676 batting avg.

They are very borderline B level....but coach has tried a few times to move them up and it doesn't go well at all and destroys their confidence.

 

[_MIA_]

Oh I'm not mad about them posting it...just confused on how dd ended up at the bottom when (at least I thought) she's solid at bat. The rest of the team was .55-.69 ob% and .34 to .676 batting avg.

How much you want to bet the parent who posted it has the kid with the highest BA??? (and yes I know they blacked out the names..) They could have just posted the team BA if they wanted everybody to know how well the team hit...

If she is hitting the ball hard I wouldn't worry about it. That said 96.287% of amateur hitters need to improve their swing anyway so...

 

[CoachJD]

1. GC stats are generally unreliably entered by some mom or dad who doesn't know what they're doing.
2. 23 games, means probably 70 ABs, so 21 hits is a .300 avg, so basically almost a hit per game. Not a slump.
3. .300 BA is not a slump.
4. Teams where the worst hitter has a BA of .300 are called Oklahoma
5. There is no need to say anything to her
6. Keep playing, keep working hard
7. GC stats are stupid. Fretting about them is stupider.

#1 and #7 are keys here.

I've been regularly following the GC for a local travel team because a couple of my HS girls play for them. I've also gone to about half their games this fall just to watch.

I sometimes wonder if the person doing GC has ever watched the sport before.

I've seen clean singles ruled errors. I've seen singles that roll through an OFs legs ruled home runs. I saw a play where a 1B just totally whiffed on a ball ruled a throwing error on the shortstop. I've seen an at bat where swinging strikes were called looking and vice versa. There were so many "stolen bases," especially of home, that were not actually stolen bases. Ever watch a game live while tracking on GC (for the score) and wonder if you were even watching the same game?

I don't know these coaches, and I certainly don't think there's any kind of ill intent from the coach doing GC, but other than the final score, there are very few takeaways you can trust from looking at the team's GC.

 

[Chilixa]

They are very borderline B level....but coach has tried a few times to move them up and it doesn't go well at all and destroys their confidence.

Is your teams goal success or development? If the whole team is hitting above .300 it might be time to move up a level in competition so they can learn to hit better pitching. They probably will struggle some as they face better pitching but at that age I would want them being challenged more.


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[AmyLynn05]

How much you want to bet the parent who posted it has the kid with the highest BA??? (and yes I know they blacked out the names..) They could have just posted the team BA if they wanted everybody to know how well the team hit...

If she is hitting the ball hard I wouldn't worry about it. That said 96.287% of amateur hitters need to improve their swing anyway so...

Yes, but its really not like that with this team. We are seriously one of the lowest drama teams out there.

 

[AmyLynn05]

Is your teams goal success or development? If the whole team is hitting above .300 it might be time to move up a level in competition so they can learn to hit better pitching. They probably will struggle some as they face better pitching but at that age I would want them being challenged more.


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That's why we moved up to 14s for the last 2 tournaments. We were bound to USA tournaments this fall (due to our 2009 birthdays) but wanted to give the 2010 and 2011 kids a little more time to adjust to faster pitchers in 12u. USA by us doesn't have a ton of B tournaments. One of the teams we played this last tournament was all 8th & 9th graders where we are 6th, 7th, and 1 8th grader (who is the youngest kid in her grade).