Is Travel Ball the best way?

[MadBandit22]

To all the parents that have been through the TB scene and those going through it now a few questions for you:
Is playing TB the best way to get daughter recruited?
Is a better option getting private hitting/pitching lessons and going to camps/clinics of schools that she is interested in attending?
Is High School and private lessons enough? Do we really have to sacrifice most Summer weekends traveling all over the Northeast for game experience?
I must admit I don’t mind traveling to practices and games if there is an end goal that can be reached. My daughter has her ear/air buds in and is on her phone the whole time to & from practices/games so there is no conversation/bonding going on that I read about.
If I saw maximum/honest effort outside of team practice I wouldn’t be questioning the process.
My DD is a very good player but I see her being even better with more dedication and practice time.
Not going to push her anymore. Encourage yes but going to make her come to me if she wants extra practice. Not asking anymore.
Just thinking if it’s worth it to put all the time & money in and see her go through the motions.
She asked me recently if she was going to tryout for a National 14U team this Summer/Fall. It’s only 10K and they travel all over the country. I believe she could make the team at 2nd or OF. Just question her level of dedication.
I’m thinking HS & private lessons may be the way to go.

 

[The Man In Blue]

It’s a good way to spend lots of money ...

 

[Cornbread]

Going to college camps is the easiest way to get attention from colleges. I coach High School and have built good relationships with many of the head coaches and asst coaches in my area which has allowed me to set up workouts for my players that want to keep playing. My travel ball organization plays showcase games at these schools as well. Travel ball helps players get better due to the high level of competition.

Girls will go through wanting to play a bunch when they are younger, to wanting to enjoy other aspects of life as they get older. If SHE truly wants to play college ball you will know. If she waivers at all, she is most likely ready to hang it up after high school.

I would never pay 10K for any type of travel ball fee! It ain’t that important lol

 

[CMMom1740]

"Only" 10K? Yikes. We paid $2500 and have traveled around the SE and to CO. There's probably a happy medium between no TB at all and something that expensive unless you're in a part of the country with a dearth of teams.

 

[MadBandit22]

It’s a good way to spend lots of money ...

Always helpful Blue.

 

[Vertigo]

I honestly think it depends on what college level she wants to play at. If she plays for a very competitive high school team in a strong conference and stands out and wants to go to a local College program, then she probably wouldn’t need to play travel, as long as she reaches out to the coaches and they can see her playing for her school (when recruiting rules allow) and at camps.

However, if she wants to play anywhere else, I would strongly recommend travel. The college coaches want to know that potential recruits can play at the next level and the only way to easily find that out is by seeing them playing against other teams with college-prospect talent.

IME, private lessons and high school ball can only get you so far - consistently playing at a higher level is what helps girls to develop and stand out.

ETA: Local colleges meaning local JUCO/DIII programs. Many moons ago I was recruited out of HS by an in-state DIII. Never played a day of travel in my life. Only township rec ball and a mediocre HS program. Probably not very common now but can happen.

 

[BT3100]

You can spend $1000 on team fees or $10K in the Northeast. A lot depends on what you want and your DD's goals. We do the crazy national schedule and make it work. Costly and a ton of sacrifice for the family. We started that travel when DD was 13. By that point she demonstrated a sincere and incredibly passionate attitude towards the game. She's a pitcher and at 16 years old trains insane. (runs 15 miles a week, weights etc.. along with pitching and hitting). If I had to fight her on any of that we would never spend this kind of money on this sport. Her travel organization has helped her make amazing progress. Some teams just cash checks and unfortunately you may only learn that after the fact. The best indicator of future commits for an organization is past commits. If your DD wants to play D1 or D2 you better have her in a program that has a track record of placing kids in that level of college program.
I think our HS is the best in the state of PA in training our kids. They have open gyms starting in September 2-3 nights per week and our last game of the season was the last day of school. The HS program is good but is nothing compared to the level of training you get from a high quality travel program.

 

[softball dad 6]

Mad bandit here is my dd's journey
I think it will be hard to replicate the experience you get playing travel ball with just camps and private instruction combined with hs ball. Freshman year dd was lucky to get to face 3 pitchers either in d1 power 5 schools currently or heading to such a school. Sophomore year it went up to 4 but junior year it went down to one. Half the pitchers she faces are just trying to through strikes. She faces good to very good pitchers in over half her tb games.
Before hs she would play around 100 games of tb per year. All of the reps and game experience really helped her growth.
After they start playing in hs tb games go down by at least half during the spring/summer season if you play hs ball in the spring.
DD got attention from college coaches for her power hitting and athleticism. A few local juco, d2, and d3 schools attended her hs games and contacted her but that was it as far as coaches at hs games.
Unless you go to the prospect camps and the coaches already know you i think it will be difficult to catch a coaches eye. As others have stated the girls the coaches are interested in are put into groups together and the head/main assistant coach spends almost all their time with those girls. DD has been on both sides of this fence.

Her interest from college coaches has differed from many on here. Most of her emails start with a comment about seeing her hit a homerun. She bunts well, hits for average, and steals a lot of bases but that is never mentioned. Her interest has come from mid to low level d1, lots of d2 and numerous d3 schools.

Unless your dd wants to play for d1 power 5 schools she should be able get recruited without playing on a top national team. Based on unsolicited offers i think dd could have played for any d2 or d3 school in a 4 hour radius. She has only played tb for a very good local team. We have been told we limited her options to play d1 softball by not having her play on one of those top teams. Funny thing is during her softball journey she went from thinking she wanted to play d1 with a significant scholarship to falling in love with a top d3 school. Our team dues are $800 per year with fundraising.
We have always told her that if she played a travel sport part of her contract with us was she had to put in extra time outside of team activities. Instead of pushing her to practice i would just ask her if her goal was to play in college and remind her that her competition was out working to get better. Hope this helps with your decision making

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

 

[Momo'sDad]

She asked me recently if she was going to tryout for a National 14U team this Summer/Fall. It’s only 10K and they travel all over the country. I believe she could make the team at 2nd or OF. Just question her level of dedication.
I’m thinking HS & private lessons may be the way to go.

Only your DD can decide what her goals are and then it's up to you to figure out whether they're a good fit for your family's situation.

If she's asking this "national team" question and you're questioning her overall dedication, it does not sound like you and she have reached a meeting of the minds on a possible path for her next few years of softball.

If her goal is to be recruited, she has to play softball. Private lessons and prospect camps (forget about the 200-player skills camps - those are just fundraisers) are excellent supplements, but you cannot get the growth that comes from playing by being a workout warrior only. But until you know her goals, it's really hard to chart a path.

 

[justanotherguy]

I can't fully answer the question as we're only starting the recruiting process. From my opinion though, no, you can't do it without playing TB. That being said, my DD's only interests so far are D1 schools. We've gone to most of her #1 choice's home games. We see the level of play it'll take. Without any of the skills she's refined in TB, she'd have the raw strength with her bat to play at that level. However, raw strength doesn't cut it. You can swing a telephone pole at 70mph, but if you can't connect with a 60mph fastball, it doesn't matter.

Here's my current DD's status (as seen by other posts here). She's a rising junior, right on the cusp of that magical Sept 1st date. We both recognized that, as a catcher and batter, she's not catching D1 talent and batting against D1 talent. She can hit the piss out of the ball. I'd put her up against anyone in this state for raw power. However, again, doesn't mean squat if she can't hit a pitcher that's put in as much time pitching as she has swinging. She HAS to sharpen those skills so as to react to D1 level pitching both as a pitcher and catcher. Now she's on a team catching for a D1 commit, and will be facing the best competition within a few hundred miles radius. No big national tournaments, she doesn't want to play in CA, so that's not needed. However, if she only played HS (rec doesn't even play at the HS level around here), she would never be capable of playing at the D1 level no matter how much raw talent she had.

That being said, that's in OUR area. If you play in southern CA that could be a totally different experience.