LL Regionals vs. Nationals with travel team

[joemcq51]

Finally a topic where I feel like I have some insight. My DD was a pitcher for he LL All Star team last year. You are allowed to pitch complete games. If you throw more than one inning, you need a complete days rest. I live in Florida. Rain is pretty constant in July. So you put all your eggs in one or two pitchers and you get a rain out. Next day double header. Both kids done for the the following days games. If your team has never advanced out of the state level before, it takes a lot of talent and luck. Lets actually do a comparison of LL All Stars and travel ball. LL- you play the same 3 or 4 teams for 2 weeks in districts. Then a week later, you play a best of three series, then a week later you go to state. Lets say you are really good, your team plays a total of 8 games against mediocre talent from mid June to end of July. Then you have to hope you are good enough and no rainouts to get past the 4 teams in your state tournament. Travel- Same time frame of mid June through July. You could play 4 out of 6 weekends and have a little time off. Play 20-25 games, with most being against decent competition. Then go to a national tournament at the end of summer against 50-150 teams. (depending on which ABC assoc)

I have done the LL thing as a coach and a parent. I have also done the TB thing as a coach. If the best LL programs are playing TB tournaments to prepare for LL, doesn't that answer the question?

My only exception would be if your LL program allowed your DD to practice and play when SHE was avaiable. At least that way, she could make the decision to play both and cross the regionals/nationals bridge after seeing if they even got that far. My experience is that LL All Star coaches insist that players make them the priority. 4 hour a day practices, 10 straight days to prepare for a 11 day 4 team tournament.

I think you and your DD made the right choice.

 

[3'sDad]

DD finished her LL All-Star career last year; playing 4 years. As a 10 y/o she was part of a team that made it to sectional finals; 1 st time for our program....what a great run and something she won't forget. As a 12 y/o last year she played LL All-stars and travel. We only had one tough weekend - PONY Regionals and District Finals 4th of July weekend. DD was pretty tired after playing that weekend in the heat.

One of DD's softball friends last year took a pass on LL All-Stars (this girls team plays in States or Regionals every year) to attend PONY Nationals with her travel team....her choice.

 

[BB875]

I am partial to TB. We have no softball LL in our area and I saw a few of the LL All-star games on ESPN last year and I was very unimpressed with the level of play. Please don't take this wrong, but nothing compares to the talent at the ASA Nationals...Sorry. I'm sure the experience is a once in a lifetime thing, but the kids you will see on ESPN at NCAA WCWS are at the ASA Nationals as kids...JMHO.

 

[softballphreak]

It's too bad that LL is so over-protective and that TB is so disorganized. Imagine the high level a nationally televised world series COULD be.

 

[goinglefty]

Wow. This thread is like a time machine for me. I can't believe I wrote this 3 years ago.

Just to give an update on what happened. My DD was able to do both LL All stars and TB that summer. Her LL All Star team won state; her TB team went to 12U Pony Nationals (more like a super regional than a national) in Cary, NC, after that she caught up with her LL All Star team in the middle of Eastern Regionals in CT. By some crazy luck they won the regionals and ended up at the LL Softball World Series in Portland, OR. I felt like I didn't go to work the entire summer. lol.

It was probably one of the most memorable summers she ever had and while the competition was much better at the TB national, the LLWS was an experience she will never forget.

 

[dadonachair]

Did the same thing last year. DD played USSSA nationals in MD. She missed the first game at states for LL all stars. We came back and won states.Eastern regionals in CT then went to Seatle/Kirkland WA for the Junior softball World series. It was the best time she ever had on a field.

Playing with teams from Italy, Mexico, and the Phillippines and Canada not to mention the rest of the US. It is something that Nationals just can't seem to match. It was a very long year. I would do it all over.

DD loves TB but LL is where it all started and always has a small place in her heart.

 

[goinglefty]

Did the same thing last year. DD played USSSA nationals in MD. She missed the first game at states for LL all stars. We came back and won states.Eastern regionals in CT then went to Seatle/Kirkland WA for the Junior softball World series. It was the best time she ever had on a field.

Playing with teams from Italy, Mexico, and the Phillippines and Canada not to mention the rest of the US. It is something that Nationals just can't seem to match. It was a very long year. I would do it all over.

DD loves TB but LL is where it all started and always has a small place in her heart.

Wow sounds amazing! Staying and playing with teams from all over the world was definitely a cool experience for my DD. LL & TB are no comparison as far as level of play. But I'd say if you are lucky enough to have the chance to go, especially at the younger ages, forget about the level of play and just have the kids enjoy the experience. It's a lot of fun for them and really a once in a lifetime experience. They are all still competing and just having fun playing softball which I guess is just what its all about.

 

[Little Angels Softball]

I've been getting pressure from a lot of parents for her to skip Nationals and have her go to regionals and try to get to the LLWS. They say it would be a once in a lifetime experience and that PONY/ASA Nationals etc will be there for her next year and the year after.

There is a MASSIVE difference between ASA Nationals and PONY nationals. If I had a team that was going to ASA Nationals I wouldn't even consider LL .... even playing on TV. For PONY, it's a different story, though. Might have to think about it a bit.....

 

[soupy62]

Wow. This thread is like a time machine for me. I can't believe I wrote this 3 years ago.

Just to give an update on what happened. My DD was able to do both LL All stars and TB that summer. Her LL All Star team won state; her TB team went to 12U Pony Nationals (more like a super regional than a national) in Cary, NC, after that she caught up with her LL All Star team in the middle of Eastern Regionals in CT. By some crazy luck they won the regionals and ended up at the LL Softball World Series in Portland, OR. I felt like I didn't go to work the entire summer. lol.

It was probably one of the most memorable summers she ever had and while the competition was much better at the TB national, the LLWS was an experience she will never forget.

I was lucky enough to help coach a team that made it to the LLWS in 2008 we got third and easily that groups most memorable softball experience! They were rock stars in our commuinty and all the neighboring towns! Heck it still gets talked about and most of them are freshman in college. Most have played in at least 1 ASA/USA Nationals and Most have played in several USSSA WS including one at Disney. Nothing comes close to that event for the girls.

Goinglefty: In 2011 i was lucky enough to ride the shirt tails of the team from the Central Region (as the manager) all the way to the Championship in Portland. To both regionals and the WS we brought a Newpaper guy and a radio guy. Every day the newspaper put in a complete section on the girls most days consisting of 3-5 pages about the girls and team. And every game was on the radio for our complete area to listen to. I heard stories about factories stopping work and allowing employees the watch our games from the internet using projectors to put them on a wall once we were at the WS for the games that wernt televised. Once we got home it was a circus for a week! 2 parades, a full blown assembly at our high school which im guessing there was way over 1,000 people at. A local car dealer rented a limo for the girls for the first day of school and the girls were taken to the 4 elementary schools and marched around each school like celerities. the young kids were going crazy about the team coming. Both the cubs and the white sox had us to their parks to regognize us for what we did. Absolutely the most incredible experience of my life watching my girls go through all of it!! And i know it will be tough for them to ever top it. For all the people that talk about the competition level they are 110% right! But taking 1 year off for something like this didnt hurt us a bit!!! That same team minus 1 kid won the ASA A 10U Northern Nationals 2 years prior to that and got about a 2"X2" write up in our paper. Not that i was ungrateful for it at all but the girls just dont get the regognition for ASA ball that they do LL. That same team again minus 1 girl we to ASA/USA Nationals last year as 14's. We finished a respectable 33rd the paper never had a blur in it about it. Since that all went down..... travel teams in this town have probably doubled! Every little girl now wants to play softball and try to do what this group did! So because of this 40 to 50 girls that may have not played ball are now excited about the game. Pretty cool stuff!!!
I do remember the 2011 East team very well! You had a good team. But what i remember the most is how much fun you guys had. There was a mom and a grandma that our team got close to and i think some still talk to! A great group of people!!! From what i remember didnt you guys get invited to a Yankee's game and treated like royalty?
Our District administrator really pushed hard for me to take the girls and attempt it again their 13 year old year for the JR league but every one of them felt like they needed to focus more on travel and getting the most competition.

 

[canyonjoe]

We had a girl who was about to join our TB team last year but had to finish her LL season. Because our state has very few LL programs they made regionals in SoCal by default. Her dad said the experience was amazing for the LL Kids. They all stayed together, only played 1 game a day so they had a lot of time to meet other kids. The even went to Disneyland on an off day.