Minority in 10U, 12U and early 14U
Majority in 14U and older when reality becomes really real.
The "Hissy-Quit"
- Thread starter Eric F
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Minority in 10U, 12U and early 14U
Majority in 14U and older when reality becomes really real.
Parents are not always a fault and somtimes the coach deserves the blame and sometimes there is enough blame for all parties to share in it. But unless there is actual abuse going on, physical or verbal, there is no excuse to make a scene like the one described by OP.
Based on what I read on this forum, and the people around me in the TB world, the majority. Based on what I read on a few FB pages, who knows. There's a lot of dumb beliefs out there - LOL.
Yes, there are crappy coaches out there. Unless your DD is in immediate danger because of the coach's actions, pulling your DD off the bench in the middle of a game is a bad move.
If our primary goal of playing travel was for the scholly...we failed!
Most parents are very uniformed about the realities of what school's can and are willing to pay for. Many private schools have high costs of tuition but that is really their window sticker price. They have lots of room to negotiate that price down through the random schollies, FAFSA forms, and discounts. Juco's give full rides and lots of them.
A mom told me that her DD got a full ride at large local college. Myself and another dad looked at each other and smirked. I really wanted to ask her to give me the break down. This player is not a highly sought after pitcher...sooooo...full athletic ride...doubtful. My DD's former catching/hitting coach who owns the career HR record at this school told me her sholly % breakdown by year. Fr-50%, So-50%, Jr-%75, Sr-%100. She is a stud and played a few years in the NPF.
No, I completely agree with that. 100%. But, as an example, our HC last year added a girl to the roster in March. The parents (including Dad who came in to help as an AC) were told that she would get plenty of time in the field (3B/OF), as well as hit. HC had been pursuing this girl/family for several seasons, but the time wasn't right until then.
After things started going south with the team following HC's decision to bring 17 to CO (including several pick-ups that were unannounced to anyone), I was talking with the OTHER AC. He told me in confidence that he and his DD would be leaving next season. He also told me that the girl mentioned above was brought onto the team with FULL intentions of using her as DH only and little to no fielding. HC completely blew smoke up their skirts to get her to join and then benched her from the field all season, other than a few scattered innings here and there. Guess what? She and her Dad, the second AC, are leaving next season too. When both AC's and their daughters bail, that should be a sign.
ETA: And I should add that the family paid full fare, even though it was already March.
That's the kind of shady stuff I'm talking about that HC's sometimes do. Sneaky and dishonorable.
Thankfully, we have not had that experience.
A long time ago at 12U we had a dad storm the dugout, tell off our head-coach (I was an assistant) and pull his kid from the game and later the team. It was ugly for everyone. Our coach was one of the best and most communicative coaches I've ever seen -- he was legendary for being easy-to-get-along with and willing to talk to every parent about everything.
Over the years, we came to talk to the girl (who was extremely embarrassed), the mom (who was also embarrassed) and the dad (who eventually apologized) and we all wished the best for all of them and became friendly with them.
To me, it just goes to show the high-pressure and high-stakes of travel sports sometimes make people do things they shouldn't and wouldn't do otherwise. We can all sit there and watch our kids excel, or be in the dugout and think we are doing right by all the girls and the team. Yet there's probably someone also on the sidelines (or multiple people) just dying inside because things aren't working out as they hoped and it feels like life and death to them in the moment. It's never a bad thing to be empathetic, even if someone's behaving badly (maybe it's even more important to be empathetic in those situations).
Doing the wrong thing is never right. And some people are just monsters. It's true. But not always.
Over the years, we came to talk to the girl (who was extremely embarrassed), the mom (who was also embarrassed) and the dad (who eventually apologized) and we all wished the best for all of them and became friendly with them.
To me, it just goes to show the high-pressure and high-stakes of travel sports sometimes make people do things they shouldn't and wouldn't do otherwise. We can all sit there and watch our kids excel, or be in the dugout and think we are doing right by all the girls and the team. Yet there's probably someone also on the sidelines (or multiple people) just dying inside because things aren't working out as they hoped and it feels like life and death to them in the moment. It's never a bad thing to be empathetic, even if someone's behaving badly (maybe it's even more important to be empathetic in those situations).
Doing the wrong thing is never right. And some people are just monsters. It's true. But not always.
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I am happy I found this thread though, because I am still on the fence of letting my DD join a newly formed TB club this fall...
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My DD just finished her 5th year of travel ball. She is entering first year 14U now. Playing travel ball is the best decision we every made. The friendships, car rides, and every softball game (win or lose) are all priceless memories IMO. The parents are by far the drama ones in my 5 years experience. Some parents vs. parents, some parents vs. coaches, some parents vs. their own child.
We have always been supportive parents. Our coach this past season is retiring from coaching and went out of his way to thank us for always being positive parents and for not complaining (our DD didn't get to play in many bracket play games all season). He said that word gets around about positive parents too. I sure hope that is true! Good luck to all of the girls out there playing the game they love so much!
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My DD just finished her 5th year of travel ball. She is entering first year 14U now. Playing travel ball is the best decision we every made. The friendships, car rides, and every softball game (win or lose) are all priceless memories IMO. The parents are by far the drama ones in my 5 years experience. Some parents vs. parents, some parents vs. coaches, some parents vs. their own child.
We have always been supportive parents. Our coach this past season is retiring from coaching and went out of his way to thank us for always being positive parents and for not complaining (our DD didn't get to play in many bracket play games all season). He said that word gets around about positive parents too. I sure hope that is true! Good luck to all of the girls out there playing the game they love so much!
- Jun 8, 2016
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I am a bit leery to put this on here but I put myself in a situation recently which embarrassed everybody around me. I won't go into details (if anybody likes car wrecks they can PM me) but it involved my DD, an umpire, a LF fence, a water bottle and eventually (totally unecessarily but I digress) the police. Everybody was in the right in the situation except me. Everybody was apologized to eventually, including the umpire, but I have now put myself on hiatus from DD's games until I can figure out how to control myself.
