Has anybody seen the articles on Travel Ball Select about this tourney?? Will all Triple Crown tourneys get this kind of attention or did a writer just happen to be in the stands Sunday??
m72, I'm not sure how a coach can cause that much of an issue where your son no longer wants to play baseball. If he was not enjoying the team/coach and it was causing major issues why didn't you leave the team? I don't believe being committed means you stick around in a detrimental situation.
As far as the gossip, trust me, the parents and coaches earn that all on their own by their actions and what they do. It's not like coaches are out "blackballing kids" because if a kid can play he will find a team who will take a chance on him. When a coach or parent does something bad, it will get around.
I agree that some kids/parents want to play for us because we win and if we didn't we would have less interest. That goes without saying. However, those parents are easy to detect and if I have one on my team they are usually released the next year. I want parents that like the coaching and would stay if we were a top team or just an average team. I don't need any one or two players as there are plenty of kids of similar skill set. There were two dominant kids last weekend and they both were from southwest GA and then about 75+ kids that are very good players. As stated many times, I'm fully aware that I don't have the best 11 kids in the state nor do I worry about trying to get them. The whole package has to work (talent, attitude and parents being on board). If they don't have all 3, they usually don't make it the next year.
There are "showcase" teams out there that parents can try to get their kids on. There are two in FL and one in NC that I know of. They have 20+ kids on their USSSA roster and just rotate them through. One team actually refers to themselves as a showcase team -whatever that means! I'm guessing kids and parents realize that they are on/off the team on a tournament basis so they can showcase their talents to all the 11U scouts in the bleachers....
M72 - I can assure you that nobody in this age group is blacklisted at ECB as I have not heard anything about it. Most of these coaches are desperately trying to compete against one another so I know they aren't working together to blacklist any kid.
I'm going to lay off the board for a while as I need to focus on my team. I figured I would try and help because many coaches and parents read this blog and get confused by the fringe element.
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Posted - 03/01/2011 : 23:52:23
