re: T-ball topic.. Other than fun, what is the goal teaching kids or winning games?

Competition is great for kids. No matter what, we are in competition with one another in some fashion in the real world. Teaching kids to compete makes them want to have the drive to succeed. But, with that comes great responsibilities: teaching kids to lose with grace, never cheat, to always respect their opponent, and to always remember that there are more important things in life than a competition.

With competition, there are winners and losers. It is tough to see a kid lose, but how we deal with defeat defines us (not just our success). If you take this away from kids, they may never know what they are made of.

If you keep competition, the onus is on the parents to support their kids in the agonies of defeat. Taking competition away from kids makes it easier on the parents, and only hurts the children.

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Our league does not have a 1 base over throw rule.

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In tee ball there should be a zero bases over throw rule. However, up to the next level, it should be one base. The next level should have no limit.

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We prefer to teach them to throw to first or other attempted out and if over thrown get it back to the pitcher and stop the play.

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I always want them to make the throw to first. That is a basic fundamental to be taught to that age group. They can't physically catch for the most part, so taking bases on over throws is silly, IMO.

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T-ball topic.. Other than fun, what is the goal teaching kids or winning games?

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Ironically, last night my family and I were sitting down and watching some old camcorder VHS tapes from when our kids were little. One of them was one of my son's early t-ball games. Fun stuff.

To answer your question, at T-Ball, it is teaching kids the game and making it enjoyable for them so they continue on in older years. Nothing wrong with winning of course.

I didn't coach t-ball but did a good bit of it at 9-10 and 11-12 levels later and always had good success. My handout put our goals as something like this:

"To play as good baseball as we can. To have as much fun as we can. And to win as many games as we can."

Reading through this thread, I think WDE24 has the best feel for it. If you have a decent organization and are willing to put a little time in to do preparation, you can make it good for the kids and instill a love for the game in them. Success will follow.

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It definately motivates some coaches and parents to moave away from the learning and having fun focus.

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Yeah. T-ball is all about basic fundamentals and having fun. While winning is fun and learning how to lose is necessary, keeping score gets in the way of the primary goals of t-ball. There is plenty of time for learning the lessons of competition from coach pitch on up, IMO.