Interesting Dilemma on Roster Size and Playing Time

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

radness

Possibilities & Opportunities!
Dec 13, 2019
7,270
113
I always find the "daddy ball" discussions interesting. Not sure how it is in other areas, but if parents didn't volunteer to coach in my area, youth sports would no longer exist...
Excellent point!
Add~

Not all parent coached scenario's are the same.
Meaning not all parent coached kids get the golden treatment. Some kids get the brunt of the situation.
And
Favoritism happens regardless of DNA.
 
May 31, 2018
227
43
Allen TX
We could easily improve our team through tryouts each year, but we keep a close knit group and have very little turnover."

I take the blame on that one. This year, I made some offers to returning players before tryouts. Most were no brainers, but a few a may have reached on. Won't happen again. Everyone will have to earn a spot.

With regard to A/B play. We absolutely destroy B teams. As a first year 14u A team (with several 7th graders, and NO HS players), we are .500. Not killing it, but holding our own. We haven't beaten the strongest teams yet, but we have played close.

The makeup and talent of the team has natural progressed since we practice a lot. A few girls are not keeping up. I'm quickly realizing that girls are going to leave for many different reasons, and I can't Coach to please every parent/player.

We have a real solid group (9-10 of the remaining 12) that doing a good job, and a few that are trailing a little. We will continue to work with them in practice and get them developed, but we are no longer going avoid bringing in talented players to appease the weaker ones.
 
Sep 17, 2009
1,637
83
I take the blame on that one. This year, I made some offers to returning players before tryouts. Most were no brainers, but a few a may have reached on. Won't happen again. Everyone will have to earn a spot.

With regard to A/B play. We absolutely destroy B teams. As a first year 14u A team (with several 7th graders, and NO HS players), we are .500. Not killing it, but holding our own. We haven't beaten the strongest teams yet, but we have played close.

The makeup and talent of the team has natural progressed since we practice a lot. A few girls are not keeping up. I'm quickly realizing that girls are going to leave for many different reasons, and I can't Coach to please every parent/player.

We have a real solid group (9-10 of the remaining 12) that doing a good job, and a few that are trailing a little. We will continue to work with them in practice and get them developed, but we are no longer going avoid bringing in talented players to appease the weaker ones.
This is what we did (we as coaches took our own DDs to 18u and then stayed on a few years after they left with much the same model). I'd call this approach A- or B+ ball, depending on the level of talent you can acquire. I can 100% guarantee you have a goal of 'getting the team better' -- that improvement just comes within certain parameters. There's nothing wrong with that at all. It also can be hard to do.

Because you are on a similar journey, I'll give you my story (a bit). With my younger daughter, we went from an in-house clearly B-Team to competitive B+ team entering a few lower level exposures at 14/16U to being an A- team playing PGF Nationals and almost but not quite top exposures and being extremely successful our final year at 18U. We gained a reputation as we proved it on the field. Our final year we brought on a couple of players due to that reputation that brought us to another level. At that time we also mutually separated with some kids, including TWO coaches kids. It was obvious we needed to do so and it worked out for both sides. All through we as coaches worked hard to keep everyone engaged with what we were doing. About half played in college (D3) and half wrapped it up after successful high school careers. We had a great experience. It can be done. It's not easy. Good luck.

(BTW, my older daughter went the A-team route -- there were good and bad years. So I've lived both approaches. They both have their merits. If you want to go D1, you can't beat playing on the very best team you can find).
 
Aug 19, 2015
1,118
113
Atlanta, GA
All I know is that very few true A-level teams have a core of girls who've been together since 8U or 10U. Maybe 2 or 3 (coaches' daughters, usually). True A-level is much less about friendship and much more about the individual player. I'm just saying that those coaches can and do cut long-time team members who get complacent and can't compete with new players or girls who try out for the team and really show out. If you want to move toward that model, you'll have to figure out whether that type of model is for you or not. If the core of close-knit girls staying together and having fun is the goal, totally fine, but you can't want that and want to increase competitiveness at the same time. Those goals seem incompatible to me.
 

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
42,830
Messages
679,481
Members
21,445
Latest member
Bmac81802
Top