First place I would start is stop travel ball tournaments before 14U. So, if you're going to have these national exposure teams and "national tournaments" why not rank the kids. Seems it would save alot of time, money and letting kids be kids while weeding out. Too much money involved by all parties from organizations, specialty coaches (hitting/pitching) to stop.
Twitter blowing up about 7th grade rankings
- Thread starter PapaBear
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First place I would start is stop travel ball tournaments before 14U. So, if you're going to have these national exposure teams and "national tournaments" why not rank the kids. Seems it would save alot of time, money and letting kids be kids while weeding out. Too much money involved by all parties from organizations, specialty coaches (hitting/pitching) to stop.
- Jan 1, 2023
- 137
- 28
My 2028 DD was ranked by Legacy & Legends. It was free to submit and is free to view. Had to send in video.
Obviously you take it with a grain of salt, but she was happy to make the list. Not sure what the issue is.
Obviously you take it with a grain of salt, but she was happy to make the list. Not sure what the issue is.
- Jun 8, 2016
- 16,118
- 113
If everybody viewed it this way it wouldn’t be a big deal. Unfortunately not everybody does..
Something to consider for sure. Is the pressure put on the kid or it is put on the parents who believe their kid might get exposed? Everyone keeps saying mental health, but those same coaches have no issue cutting a player if they can't help them win. Which is more direct, being told you're not good enough for this team or a national ranking of thousands?
Seems like a non-issue to me. My DD was ranked and we're proud of her and it's fun to see her name in print. But we know it's pretty hard to rank her vs. a player from the other side of the country, and that the rankings are very suspect.
I walked into a conversation of moms saying how absurd the rankings were and how it's total garbage. Well of course their DDs didn't make the list (correctly so). I simply said, "well we've played against a lot of the players on the top 100 and they are very, very good players. So I think there's more merit to the list than you think."
It kind of ended the conversation. Well, at least until I left. Not only are their players not on the list, they don't even play the teams on the list or enter the same tournaments.
I walked into a conversation of moms saying how absurd the rankings were and how it's total garbage. Well of course their DDs didn't make the list (correctly so). I simply said, "well we've played against a lot of the players on the top 100 and they are very, very good players. So I think there's more merit to the list than you think."
It kind of ended the conversation. Well, at least until I left. Not only are their players not on the list, they don't even play the teams on the list or enter the same tournaments.
- Jun 8, 2016
- 16,118
- 113
A little story which I have told before but which is relevant here I think.
When I was in LL I was really good...and I had a lot of people tell me I was really good. My father never made a big deal of it but I wasn't deaf, I heard it. As I got older, kids caught up for various reasons and it messed with my head to the point where every failure felt like the end of the world and (as everybody knows by this point) I ended up quitting in college because of how miserable I was. My parents never put any pressure on me, academics was always first in their mind, but I had created this view of myself (with the help of outside influences) that I could never live up to as I got older...
N=1 I know, and I was a baseball obsessed kid to begin with, but
I could guess at several morals to that story. Is there a main one for you? Or just a story.
My DD is pretty humble, and we play with players better than her. I don't think we're headed down that path, but anything to avoid it sounds wise...
Agree. The rankings have their flaws but they also have their pros too.
The chinamigarden ranking service had my dd ranked #1 in her HS grad class of 2015 as early as 1998. And she never fell out of that top spot. That ranking service was in consensus with topgrandpa and momsproud ranking services. Those services were considered just as accurate as any other ranking service of middle schoolers.
