The softball world outside of SoCal

[SoCalDad]

In a recent thread I posted I started to understand that youth softball world (pre high school) outside of SoCal seems to be very different. For example, I read references to middle school ball. I have been involved in girls softball in SoCal for almost 20 years and have never heard of a competitive middle school program. To be honest I am not sure they exist in my area. If a 7th or 8th grader wants to play softball they either have to join a rec league or a travel program. Also I was getting a sense that in other parts of the country the rec leagues seem to play others during the spring season. I have seen this done at the 14U level but not at the younger divisions. The only time all divisions play other leagues is during tournament season and perhaps fall/winter ball. Is this the case?

I am feeling that some of the disagreements that happen on this board are caused more by a lack of understanding of how other parts of the country play softball. I am interested in how your leagues are organized and I am also interested in what you find odd or different about SoCal ball.

 

[Simo]

Good observation about the differences. For one, you are in one of the premier areas of the country for fastpitch. Your weather allows for year round ball should you have the inclination. For those of us who have been around the sport for a long time, the SE USA is catching up rapidly as it has much of the same advantages. The only thing lacking was the organization. I warned the SoCal crowd 15 years ago that their dominance in FP would be challenged by the SE over time. Population demographics and weather advantages would result in parity over time. If you llive in the upper midwest or northeast the weather sucks 50% of the time. Winter ball is impossible outside and often the seasons and state rules (HS) chart the course of ball and limit opportunties. If you play college ball in the Midwest, you can expect to play some games in the snow.

 

[EP Dad]

I'm not sure I understand enough about SoCal ball to comment on yours but I think I almost understand enough about how we are set up to give you an idea.

Here in my suburb of Minneapolis we have a non-profit association which runs what we call an in-house league and also runs trave teams for 10U, 12U, 14U, 16U and 18U. The in-house is our rec league. Our rec league (my daughter is in 10U travel) only plays against itself. We don't as far as I know play against other communities. It's completely in-house as the term suggests. To be honest I am not sure if the older rec teams play other cities or not, they might due to lack of numbers. My older daughter did play one season of rec last year (the only year she has played) and she was in 8th grade. They only played against other teams within our in-house league. They actually won the championship at the end of the year. I just read our In-House information and the rec league does play against three other cities when the girls get to grades 10-12. K-9 is entirely insular.

Travel:

Travel starts at 10U here. I know some cities around here are starting 8U teams but for now we start at 10's. As of right now the 10's and 12's ages you are restricted to playing for your respective community associations (you have to live within the city you play for) unless your city doesn't have anything of course. The whole sanctioning thing is almost too complicated to explain cause we have ASA, USSSA tournaments here but since the two big leagues that play in Minnesota are in the MMFL most teams are sanctioning only NAFA right now. Lot of alphabet soup. Basically what that boils down to is that at the end of the season we end up playing a League Tournament (we are in one league, there are two suburban leagues that comprise the cities around Mpls., St.Paul. After that we get seeded to a State MMFL tournament usually (although some choose to do an ASA (ASA's Minnesota league is MFL or USSSA state tournament. Almost separate from that is the various in-season tournaments and the league and state tournaments allow you to earn a berth in a national of some sort. Our 10U teams have attended both ASA and NAFA nationals (we usually have two 10U teams) the last few years. This year we are being told that our association is only sanctioning MMFL/NAFA for 10's and 12's so the NAFA national (which only had Minnesota teams last year anyway) will be our only choice. It seems we're in a bit of a governing body war right now and it's hard to say what will happen.

Starting at 14's things get a little goofy. At 14's we have a club level. Club teams recruit girls from wherever to field a team. Our association actually runs some club teams because that's the only way in some cases you can field an "A" team at the 14-18 age groups. The association still has some "B" level teams at 14-18 as well and those tend to be only kids from our community. The MMFL governing body runs an ELITE league with 14's-18's that is comprised mostly with club teams and supposedly runs above what is considered "A" level around here. It's really quite a mess but people hope we don't get the club stuff pushing down into 12's. I remember I asked once what the difference was between elite and "A" and the person said "the elite teams just want to call themselves that." I'm sure if I had asked someone from the elite level they would have had a different answer. I have no opinions either way on Elite vs. A and Club vs. Community and I don't want to sound that way. And of course we have High School softball. 14-18 seasons are run so they do not overlap or interfere with the High School season. Our High School team has 9th, 10th, JV, and Varsity teams.

There is a fall season that starts the very end of August and runs through September for Travel. 10U-18U. So, at the higher levels you can end up playing up to 4 seasons (High School, Spring Travel, Fall Travel, Dome Ball).

Oh, and since we have snow here we have these "domes" (bubbles) with artificial turf around the suburbs and we play Dome Ball seasons for 14U-18U in the winter.

So if you break it down we have:

High School
Elite Level
A Level
B Level
C Level
Rec

EDIT: for those in Minnesota I have no negative feelings towards either "Club" ball or the elite level and from what I have now heard I see they serve a very useful purpose.

 

[Simo]

Dear EP dad, have you seen my post on "Pitcher Wanted" on the College Forum? If you know the 18U TB coach and there is a candidate, the opportunity is baiscally in your backyard.

 

[EP Dad]

Dear EP dad, have you seen my post on "Pitcher Wanted" on the College Forum? If you know the 18U TB coach and there is a candidate, the opportunity is baiscally in your backyard.

I did see that and forwarded it onto someone who might know somebody. That age group is out of my zone since my travel kid is just starting really.

 

[fastpitch5]

i agree with your assessment socaldad. we're in the midwest. typically the bigger school districts have middle school teams - some years they have a team for each grade level (7th or 8th), and some years they just have a single "middle-school team". they typically play in the fall. my understanding is that typically these teams aren't very good. in fact i've been told that my 10u team could probably hold their own against last year's 8th grade team. sounds to me that the middle school ball is school-sponsored rec ball. not saying there's anything wrong with it - in fact i like the idea of exposing more girls to fastpitch - but it sounds like the programs are usually just an afterthought.

rec ball plays in the spring time. our association plays against teams from our association, plus two others. we have free substitution and we bat the roster (standard "you pay you play"). we typically refer to pure rec teams as "C" teams. NHSA rules are the dominant rules we follow. we get a lot of families who just want to "do the softball thing" during spring then be done with it in time for summer vacation and put in as little effort as possible. the better players usually move on to travel/select teams.

some of the other associations around us draw more players/teams, so they play a bracket system comprised of a and b teams. they typically follow ASA rules. this is where most of the travel/select teams do their pool play, and are typically regarded as a-level teams. i understand the theory behind the a-level designation, but don't necessarily agree with it. there a quite a few "a" teams that can't play their way out of a wet paper bag.

i take a hybrid approach. i coach/manage our 10u select team. we are a tournament team, but we do play a rec schedule as well at our local association. this helps the girls who want more diamond time get it, and in a less competitive environment, so the emphasis is on having fun and doing the basics (basically its 14 practice games). the rec association didn't want me to bring in a travel team and whoop up on everybody, so i agreed to either take players from the draft each year or play up a division. last year we played up b/c i had my whole travel team participating, but this year we are playing at the 10u level with 6 players from the draft. unfortunately the rec crowd can be rough, and i usually get a tongue lashing when my travel pitchers take the circle b/c most of the parents see me as an overzealous coach who just wants to win. unfortunately they just dont know my program, and quite frankly their dd would prob benefit from it if they chose to participate. but i digress... this approach is becoming more popular it seems like.

what do i think about california ball? let me say this - i work for the largest telecommunication company in the world, and we have a huge presence in CA. i have been involved with the CA public utilities commission more than i care to admit, and i have learned over the years that CA does everything by their own rules. so am i surprised that ca has their own fastpitch thing going on? nope. i don't necessarily think its a bad thing, either. i think its long been recognized that CA is the hotbed for youth fastpitch and a lot of really good players seem to come from socal. to be honest, i dont know enough about your rules to form a really educated opinion. but on the surface, all seems ok to me.

the BEST part about socal...the weather! spent a few weeks in san diego a couple years ago...beach to the west...desert to the east...mid-80s and none of the midwest humidity.

 

[Amy in AZ.]

In IL., MS ball is in the Fall (August, Sept, Oct.) and begins in 6th grade. It is sometimes very competitive and ends with the state tournament. It is the same set up for softball and baseball. Most schools have 2 teams, like A and B, but I think that 8th graders can only play A.

The coaches are generally paid and teams travel on the school bus.

The school teams are generally well supported by the community.

I often read that it doesn't matter if you play school ball or not. I suppose that is true in some states, but not in IL. I know that you could still be recruited from your TB team, but in the community, they only care about what you can do for the school. (Of course, my opinion only.)

Tucson, AZ. also has middle school ball. So, I was unaware that other states don't have this program.

 

[RichK]

Amy I'm in the Chicago burbs and some towns have middle school ball and some towns don't. I was surprised when I heard a few years ago that my older DD's travel teammates from other towns played school ball, it was totally new to me!

The funny thing here this year (to me anyway) with younger teams is this idea of 11U and 13U teams (rather than 10U, 12U, 14U which are the actual tournament age groupings). These "11U" teams are everywhere (and didn't exist when my older DD was that age). What it signals to me is coaches trying to keep teams together (a good thing) and also telling everyone that hey we're a "young team" and that's why you beat us (ego thing) : >

Do other areas typically have the traditional 10U, 12U, 14U, 16U teams or are these odd-year teams becoming more popular? I think USSSA might have some influence, I think they make this distinction. Just curious.

 

[sluggers]

Amy--In Illinois, the middle schools call the championships a "state" championship, but it isn't. Each MS belongs to a regional athletic organization. (E.g., sijsaa.com) So, that regional athletic organization has an end of year tournament among its member schools. Those organization sometimes call the winner a "state champion", but, in fact, it is simply the best team within the organization. Many MSs don't even belong to a formal regional organization.

 

[fosterspoint]

In Georgia we play HS ball in the fall. Some of the private schools have formed a Middle School league, but the public schools around Atlanta don't offer softball. Our league offers a fall rec league up to 12U for the middle school kids. The fall league plays games with another park, and with a couple of 12U middle school teams.

We play our main rec season in the spring, our park is medium-small. The Tee Ball, 8U and 10U leagues only play in park games. The 12U girls play some Saturday games against another small park that is a few miles away. We combined our 14U and 16U leagues because of the numbers. The 16U league plays a full schedule of games in a league with two other small parks.

We recently organized our travel efforts. Our travel program includes one other park, we are working to get an agreement with another park or two to combine our numbers. It is tough to form a travel team out of one medium sized park, there are not 12 girls with the same interest and ability, some want more competitive, others want less competitive, so the teams tend to break up after a year or two. With several parks working together, we are trying to form a team at each age, like '95, '96, '97, etc... If we get enough players, we could offer 'A' leval and 'B' level teams.