Should she give up school ball?

[Beeg]

DD is the starting pitcher for her travel team (playing Div B). She is also one of their top 3 batters. Now that softball just started, and their first tournament is coming up, we will resume pitching lessons 1x a week and batting lessons 2x a month. We just moved to this area and found it hard to schedule lessons, as there aren't that many good PC and BC in this area. Her PC is an hour away, but we make it work.

Now middle school ball just started. They practice Mon-Thurs right after school. Her travel team practices 2x a week at night from 6-7:30.

Her school ball team consists of 4 girls who play travel (including DD), 2 rec ball, and 7 who's never played softball before, so you can imagine the practices are very fundamental. Her school ball coach originally mentioned that DD can miss school ball practices to go to lessons, since she gets enough practices from her travel team anyway.

But another MS girl "protests" that players (a.k.a DD) are missing school ball practices, so the coach just implemented no 3 missed practices or you are out. It's already difficult to schedule lessons, esp. pitching lessons, around her travel team schedule. If she can't miss school ball practices also, then she wouldn't be able to take lessons at all.

It is between lessons or playing school ball and forgoing lessons til June. My feel is that TB is #1 priority, so private lessons are #1 priority, and she should not play school ball.

What would you do?

 

[texasheat]

Goodbye middle school ball. It was fun while it lasted.

 

[CMMom1740]

I don't know what state you are in, but here in GA, we play school ball in the fall. All the TB teams respect that schedule and do minimal or no practices or tournaments until school ball season is over. So, basically, there's nothing happening travel ball-wise in GA between mid-August until late October/early November. This prevents the issues you discuss here. And if TB teams decide to practice on a Saturday and a girl has a school ball game, she is excused from practice.

ETA: your school coach sounds like he's shooting himself in the foot by preventing his ace pitcher from having lessons. Dumb. All to shut up a couple of complainers. They will eventually realize that if they want to win games, they need the TB girls on the team and should not chase them off.

 

[_MIA_]

Biggest problem here is that a MS coach is implementing rules based upon the complaints of a 13 YO girl...

 

[KrisHur]

Buh bye - sounds exactly like DD's middle school experience, a complete waste of time. DD had to miss once a week for pitching lessons and he was ok with it until a girl complained and then he took away DD's captainship. However, you do want to make sure it doesn't come back to bite her in the butt when HS ball starts. If there are different coaches at the HS, and being a pitcher (and always in demand) probably not an issue.

 

[Long Baller]

The coach had a deal with your DD regarding practices, then reneged?

I would see what kind of schedule/competition the team is playing before you pull the plug. Private lessons and such are important, but there is no substitute for seeing live pitching, especially if it is good pitching.

 

[KrisHur]

P.S. if she's in 7th grade this year she might be able to try out for the HS next year. Here in NY talented 8th graders can take a pretty rigorous athletic test and if they pass try out for HS teams. Check your HS's athletic department website on Advanced Placement Process.

 

[Bpolly2004]

In Missouri we can't practice TB while a team member is playing for the school team. It's not allowed. School ball and travel ball can't go on at the same time. We play school ball in the fall. After the school season is over we do 3 or so tournaments with our tb team. Then pick up where we left off in the spring.

 

[Dandan111]

We don’t have middle school ball. If we did Dd
would play. I look at it as free reps. I suppose it
depends on the level of ball you want. What’s Dd say?

 

[texasheat]

I don't know what state you are in, but here in GA, we play school ball in the fall. All the TB teams respect that schedule and do minimal or no practices or tournaments until school ball season is over. So, basically, there's nothing happening travel ball-wise in GA between mid-August until late October/early November. This prevents the issues you discuss here. And if TB teams decide to practice on a Saturday and a girl has a school ball game, she is excused from practice.

ETA: your school coach sounds like he's shooting himself in the foot by preventing his ace pitcher from having lessons. Dumb. All to shut up a couple of complainers. They will eventually realize that if they want to win games, they need the TB girls on the team and should not chase them off.

She's in Middle School not High School. No TB teams go dark for Middle School ball.