Playing time and competitiveness vs age. Thoughts?

[John 800]

The program my kids are in is through the community ed dept at their schoole to n a small town, we do not have big numbers in softball once school ball starts which is in 7th grade. The team I coached this year was mostly 2nd year 12u player going into 7th grade with 2 8th graders and 1 new to softball 6th grader. We had 16 player on roster, how do you manage the team?
Completely eaqual playing time? Pretty competitive? Somewhere in between?
Do you manage tournament bracket games differently than weekly league games?
How does it change at 10,12,14?

 

[coachdennis]

The program my kids are in is through the community ed dept at their schoole to n a small town, we do not have big numbers in softball once school ball starts which is in 7th grade. The team I coached this year was mostly 2nd year 12u player going into 7th grade with 2 8th graders and 1 new to softball 6th grader. We had 16 player on roster, how do you manage the team?
Completely eaqual playing time? Pretty competitive? Somewhere in between?
Do you manage tournament bracket games differently than weekly league games?
How does it change at 10,12,14?

A couple things to consider:

• How is the team organized to the number of 16? EX: Tryouts, sign ups/pay to play?
• Level of play, I am guessing since the team is part of a school program the level of play is more recreational/instructional.
• Since you are playing both in a league and, tournaments that opens up additional opportunities. Especially when you add in practices that is a full weeks worth of ball that many families at a recreational level struggle to commit too.
• What was communicated to the parents as far as play? Some leagues/organizations require roster batting and allow free substitutions that would limit ones ability to play competitive.

As a small community team you need to find a way to try to keep the interest of the ladies playing. If they are riding the pine or not active that opens up opportunities for the players to try a different sport or disengage from sport in general.

 

[The Man In Blue]

Having 16 on your roster at any age or level is a "good problem" but it will be a problem! Your biggest challenges will be keeping them all engaged when they are not in the game and keeping them engaged enough they come back next year. Or, as you are noticing, to get them to play school ball since those numbers drop off.

This is going to sound weird, but I would HIGHLY recommend drafting yourself a bench coach. This doesn't need to be somebody who even knows a lot about the game, but somebody to manage and control the seven girls who are not in the game. Create "jobs" that will keep the players involved, attentive, and provide opportunities to learn about the game while watching from the bench. Managing that is your bench coach's job.

Maybe you even "divide" the roster into a split squad ... let the second ("JV") squad play against the lesser opponents and the first ("varsity") squad play against the stronger opponents. Allow the girls opportunities to move up and down among those squads based on their performance though, do not lock them in.

Whatever your strategy, I agree that you need to let the players and parents know up front what their expectations should be for playing time. Then you need to stick to it ... don't get bit by the "Hey, we are pretty good so let's play to win everything" bug.

 

[angispeds]

Completely depends on your level of play and goals. 16 on a high level team is likely to have PO players that don’t play the field and some that don’t hit either on a Rec team those kids probably do all of those things. If it’s a Rec/instructional team then I’d keep track of innings and I’d work pretty hard to make them equal even if it means sacrifice. You shouldn’t have 16 kids if you’ve got some you cringe to put in the game.


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