New to HS ball

[ang2bmd]

Can't really argue with the results at my dds high school with a history of multiple state titles but even still there is sometimes a kid that plays that nobody quite understands why.

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[ChrisSB]

I thought I would post a follow up as DD's first high school season is about to end. It has not been a great experience. There are multiple issues that have caused her to lose motivation and her drive to excel.

Practices are exactly the same every day. They never do anything different and she is bored. It's not fun for her. She doesn't feel pushed or challenged, and playing time is determined more by seniority than skill. She was very teary eyed today as told me she doesn't even bother diving for the ball anymore in practice because it doesn't matter. She feels there's no reason to give 110% because it won't result in increased play time. It breaks my heart to hear this because she has always been the kid that goes full out for the ball, runs into fences, whatever it takes. She's also had a very hard time feeling connected to any of the girls. It's a new school system for her, the kids have all been going to school together for a long time and have established friend circles that have been very hard to break into. She doesn't feel part of the team, and instead of being disappointed that the season is almost done she is counting down the days till it's over. I just hope her love for the game comes back once travel starts.

 

[KrisHur]

I feel your pain. My DD's first year of HS ball too. Varsity so a lot of the girls have been on the team together for a long time, but the roster is small and DD has good skills so was taken in by the older girls immediately. However.... same coaching issues. Other parents had nothing but praise for the coach...until you get to know them. Same practice every day. It's boring her to death. This same guy said 2 half-hour pitching practices at school was enough to maintain and develop skills. To steal when the pitcher is in the apex of her windmill.... He never warms up hitting before games - no bownets, tees or even wiffle balls. The 2-3 mails to coach I sent about the schedule never get answered - I had to go to neighboring school's athletics pages to get the answers. After being quiet and trying to get the lay of the land for a few weeks, I came on like a freight train. Started recording/streaming games. Then reached out to all the parents from modified through varsity to start a boosters club to get supplies - asked the coach for his wishlist and got the brush off - the school supports us, we have everything we need. Going to get a subscription to the NFCA for him as a post-season gift Once I started being a PITA the enthusiasm was contagious. One parent started coming with a speaker and doing walk up music and music between innings. Parents can't wait to start the booster club, everyone was too afraid of him to do anything. He has no roster and needs DD (one of 4 travel kids and one of the most skilled - only has rec playing freshman to replace her who rode the bench all season) so it will be pretty obvious if he starts benching her b/c I'm trying to do better for our girls.

 

[Rambler34]

I feel for the ones that have HS programs that are below par. It's one thing to be pushed to win and not have the talent but another for the coach or admin to simply not care or let politics run things. HS softball should be a fun experience with friends at minimum and chasing championships if you are lucky. When we wrapped up Saturday DD was still crying on and off until Sunday because she knew it was over with that group of girls.

 

[Orange Socks]

I feel your pain. My DD's first year of HS ball too. Varsity so a lot of the girls have been on the team together for a long time, but the roster is small and DD has good skills so was taken in by the older girls immediately. However.... same coaching issues. Other parents had nothing but praise for the coach...until you get to know them. Same practice every day. It's boring her to death. This same guy said 2 half-hour pitching practices at school was enough to maintain and develop skills. To steal when the pitcher is in the apex of her windmill.... He never warms up hitting before games - no bownets, tees or even wiffle balls. The 2-3 mails to coach I sent about the schedule never get answered - I had to go to neighboring school's athletics pages to get the answers. After being quiet and trying to get the lay of the land for a few weeks, I came on like a freight train. Started recording/streaming games. Then reached out to all the parents from modified through varsity to start a boosters club to get supplies - asked the coach for his wishlist and got the brush off - the school supports us, we have everything we need. Going to get a subscription to the NFCA for him as a post-season gift Once I started being a PITA the enthusiasm was contagious. One parent started coming with a speaker and doing walk up music and music between innings. Parents can't wait to start the booster club, everyone was too afraid of him to do anything. He has no roster and needs DD (one of 4 travel kids and one of the most skilled - only has rec playing freshman to replace her who rode the bench all season) so it will be pretty obvious if he starts benching her b/c I'm trying to do better for our girls.

I am the President of my DD's Schools Booster club which includes ALL sports programs. We have $$$$ and we have given out over $50K in scholarships in the past 5 years. The school is one of the poorer demographics in the district right across the freeway from one of the wealthiest schools in the Houston area where many local sports figures send their kids. (just showing you the disparity in the same district).

You need to understand the coaches (for the most part) don't want to deal with the outside stuff. If you can do the things like you are talking about on your own, to make the experience cool the coach will be on board. YMMV. The one thing that we lack is people power. I have made some big changes to make information more accessible to the parents... as long as they know where to go. Unfortunately, the coaches don't share the information because they have other things to deal with . I have created a sportsengine website that houses all the booster club information (social media links, game calendar, coach info, booster links, etc) and a squad locker store to supplement our spirit wear program.

Join the booster for $25/yr, volunteer your time, fill out the paperwork for your Senior athlete and we will give you $1000 scholarship!!! Only 3 parents did the work this year. Pretty sad. We also give a Scholar Athlete awards for each sport and an overall $2500 big award for the athlete that best embodies a Tiger Athlete on and off the field which is comes from coach recommendations. Soooooo....you gotta be a good person and the coach has to like you.

 

[KrisHur]

I am the President of my DD's Schools Booster club which includes ALL sports programs. We have $$$$ and we have given out over $50K in scholarships in the past 5 years. snip for brevity Soooooo....you gotta be a good person and the coach has to like you.

Our overall sports booster club has done a lot (new scoreboard, etc) but sports need individual parent groups for the small stuff. Baseball raises a ton and it shows-matching batting helmets, personalized jerseys they get to keep, socks/belts. Our girls get reused jerseys and that's it. I don't care if he likes me or not - not looking for anything from him except that he actually know something about softball and give a crap. He keeps saying the scoreboard is broken (it's not) so he won't have to ask a parent to do it. He has a Sports U to communicate with the girls but doesn't want parents on it. The weeks leading up to tryouts every other spring sport coach was in touch with information about getting ready for tryouts except... you guessed it, softball. I'm not standing by without trying to inject some life into the program. He loved the music and suddenly the next week the scoreboard worked. Enthusiasm is contagious.