re: Travel Ball Mecca

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Yes, he does. Plays basketball and flag football for “rec league” type leagues. Enjoys it very much.

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See this is what it’s all about…..not 9yr olds practicing hitting 3x week all year round.

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In my opinion your kid will be a way better baseball player by playing these other sports vs someone that mainly just plays baseball.

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most travel ball kids play other sports. said that 100 times in these threads

and you talked about rec being feb-june.....thats the same as the travel ball season. difference is playing on weekends vs during the week. and also level of play.

not many travel ball kids just playing baseball under the age of 13. sure they practice in the fall but many teams only play 1 or 2 tournaments.

example, our team and many others in south louisiana sept-first week in decemeber is practice and you play the toys for tots or the 2d or Pg tournament that is the first week in decemeber. then you shut down. its usually only 2x practice a week in the fall with focus mainly being long toss, bat speed and strength.

come back in january(some start 1st week some start feb 1st) and you go 3x practice a week. usually first tournament is last week in feb or 1st weekend in march.

most do about 10-12 tournaments through early june and then go to a world series.

every travel kid i know though plays atleast 1 other sport. every kid on our team plays football of some kind. about half do basketball and couple do wrestling, golf, tennis. couple that only do football and baseball also dont play any others because they do 4H stuff like rodeo and livestock.

i personally dont know any travel ball kids that only play baseball.

as mentioned in swla...rec ball is not good. and i can promise most good travel teams would destroy rec all stars. i can promise the 3 top 10u travel teams in the LC area would beat the SLC 12 year old all star team.

also my contention is by 10u, AA ball is not a ton different than rec. little better but not much.

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Do you get tired of typing the same type of responses every time these threads pop up? You’ve got extreme patience my man.

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of course but wtf else is there to do on my friday i work? literally 4 people out of 50 in my division here today and its our slow time right now.

I mean i guess i could actually work...but frick all that

I’m seeing a lot of “open tryouts” for “highly selective competitive” travel teams looking for “highly motivated and skilled players.” This is all over my Facebook feed. Sometime with the tag line “BALLERS ONLY.”

Once again, no matter what anyone tells you, travel ball is just what rec ball used to be with an added travel component and higher cost and the perceived air of superiority which appeals to so many WASPY suburbanites. It’s not selective or elite in any way unless you are referencing the ability to pay to play and the time to travel 200 or more miles every week for this weeks “World Series of Podunkville.”

My kid plays on a 9U AAA "travel" baseball team. He loves baseball and wants to play it. I have success to afford it so why not. He plays on the 2nd team (not sure of their rankings) soccer team. We are very new to the soccer world, he's has only succeeded at this age on athleticism. We don't have to play rec this year because we made this soccer team. Plays rec flag football. Likes golf so he has done 2 camps this summer. Loves to fish so I have a kayak set up and he goes most weekends.

My daughter plays rec soccer, dance, ballet, and is asking to start the swim team at her school.

Both do very well in school. We take other vacations and enjoy life. We don't expect any extra curriculars to become "careers" but it makes them better people and teaches them a different set of values that are conducive to individualized settings.

My best friend has a 5 year old kid and is actively trying to make him only interested in fishing because that's what my friend wants to do. I don't agree with that stance but its your kid so whatever.

These topics tend to show that the very "anti" are just as extreme as the very "pro" in being irrational.

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travel ball is just what rec ball used to be with an added travel component

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high levels of travel ball is like if you only had the all star team from each league and only played with those.

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It’s not selective or elite in any way

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again depends on what level you play at. i can tell you, if you want to play on a high level team in south louisiana......only about 8 from nola to LC...if that. even less in north & central LA

now AA teams...there are tons of those everywhere. thats what some of yall dont seem to understand...yall see these AA teams and think that is how they all are...thats not the case.

High level Majors select ball in Houston is like if you took the 2 best players from every all star team in a 200 mile radius and made a squad.

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yet im the extreme one

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You are teaching launch angle to 8 year olds, doing bat speed and velo chasing at 8 in the off-season. Yes you are extreme.

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You are teaching launch angle to 8 year olds, doing bat speed and velo chasing at 8 in the off-season. Yes you are extreme.

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so we shouldnt use objective data to see if we are improving or not?

so we should teach an 8 year old to hit the ball on the ground because other 8 years cant field at a high % rate? so what happens when they get to 10 and suddenly the other team isnt making those errors? if teaching the kid how to hit the ball correctly is teaching launch angle, guess i am.

bottomline is you have to have some kind of objective data to see if you are improving or not and like it or not.....the big field is coming and you either get prepared for it or you end up out of baseball before HS like so many other kids.

and yea shouldnt chase velo right...just let it come with age...thats how you end up with 14u kids that throw 65 and cant get the ball across the infield.