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re: Who actually likes “travel ball”
Posted on 5/15/23 at 9:56 pm to lsu777
Posted on 5/15/23 at 9:56 pm to lsu777
quote:
And anyone playing 100 games a year is retarded. Games are just to learn to compete and learn the game. You get better in training. And of course if you aren’t busting your arse in the weight room, running bat speed and velo programs in the off season, aren’t eating to gain weight and aren’t chasing the metrics for skills that scale of course you will get passed But between driveline, bill Miller, dr heenan, thread, creasey, explosive mechanics etc etc it’s all laid out for you. Just have to put in the work. Not to mention the batting instructions is amazing online now, all for free. Just takes work
We are certainly on the same page about that
1
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:00 pm to SlowFlowPro
quote:
25+ years ago, you knew if you had a chance to play for Barbe by middle school. The very small % who had a shot were SLC all stars, and BHS almost exclusively picked from that pool (one of my friends came in from TX and made the team, but he was 6-5 and really good and ended up being a top pitcher by our senior year). Once again, these threads are targeted at the parents of kids who aren't on that level, who delude themselves to thinking "this is how you get to play for Barbe" or "this is how you get a college scholarship" when it's not in the cards. It's all lies. Extremely expensive self delusion.
This I actually agree with you on.
It’s the same today. If by 13, you aren’t playing very high level aaa or majors ball…very slim chance you are making any of the really good teams in swla.
The parents having their kids playing aa ball…not worth it and waste of money. It’s why my oldest doesn’t play, it’s not his sport.
If at 12 you are throwing 55, time to find a new sport or atleast realize, hey I want to play this just for fun and understand that’s what it is.
But to be fair. Almost all of those types of kids, in in LC, almost never play anywhere further than Lafayette or Beaumont with many just in LC. So they are really only spending 1500 or so just to play, which ain’t that much.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:11 pm to BatonrougeCajun
quote:
We are certainly on the same page about that
I know pg is big up there and I know things are different but in south Louisiana you don’t have orgs telling kids you have to play for this team to make such and such high school. You of course have feeder programs but you don’t have to play for those teams nor do they care.
But a school like barbe is gonna take 10-12 max kids freshman year, same with Sam Houston and Sulphur. Some years 6-8, but by soph year usually down to 6 or so. Schools like St. Louis, Westlake Iowa…about the same, sometimes more then cut after freshman year to see who makes it as that can be a big development year.
So do you really think you are making the top 10 or so in the area if not playing travel? If your desire is to play for a school that goes to Sulphur year in and year out…you better be on a really good travel team facing real good competition, better be working your arse off in the off season and you better be lifting as early as possible and eating like your life depends on it.
If no coincidence that players at barbe are up there in the off season at 9pm nightly and then suddenly turn into all Americans and college prospects. They aren’t getting that type of work ethic by playing rec 3-4 months per year, then not picking up a baseball for 9 months while growing up. Those kids learned it by working year around starting at 7/8. Same with west Monroe.
Go watch west Monroe bulldog teams and see how they are in the youth tournaments. Go watch cenla knights(holy savior menard feeder), go watch storm(stm feeder now), pelicans feed Zachary and central, etc and etc
These kids learn to work at a young age and you don’t get that from rec ball bullshite. And I know, I have kids in both and have coached little league 8 years in a row now.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:21 pm to lsu777
quote:
dude never played sports,
Wut
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:28 pm to lsu777
quote:
But a school like barbe is gonna take 10-12 max kids freshman year, same with Sam Houston and Sulphur. Some years 6-8, but by soph year usually down to 6 or so. Schools like St. Louis, Westlake Iowa…about the same, sometimes more then cut after freshman year to see who makes it as that can be a big development year. So do you really think you are making the top 10 or so in the area if not playing travel? If your desire is to play for a school that goes to Sulphur year in and year out…you better be on a really good travel team facing real good competition, better be working your arse off in the off season and you better be lifting as early as possible and eating like your life depends on it. If no coincidence that players at barbe are up there in the off season at 9pm nightly and then suddenly turn into all Americans and college prospects. They aren’t getting that type of work ethic by playing rec 3-4 months per year, then not picking up a baseball for 9 months while growing up. Those kids learned it by working year around starting at 7/8. Same with west Monroe. Go watch west Monroe bulldog teams and see how they are in the youth tournaments. Go watch cenla knights(holy savior menard feeder), go watch storm(stm feeder now), pelicans feed Zachary and central, etc and etc These kids learn to work at a young age and you don’t get that from rec ball bullshite. And I know, I have kids in both and have coached little league 8 years in a row now.
There is a lot to unpack here that I never realized. Do those schools not have freshman and JV teams? If they are only keeping 6-12 or less each grade than that would certainly cause a reason to press early. We are definitely different here. And it’s not nearly as hard to simply make a team. We have 78 kids in our program. 25 freshman, 25 on JV and 28 on varsity. We keep a bunch and then let them battle it out each day. All three teams are trying to win as many games as possible because here if you don’t win your arse is grass. Nobody cares how good of a classroom teacher you might be. Because of that it’s brutal to get on the field but we keep kids around to develop because you never know who the late bloomers are. We had 16 seniors this year. 5 started. Our best player who was the runner up for district mvp had 1 hit on JV as a soph and 1 hit on JV as a junior. He blew up this year. Had we only been keeping 10 or so per class than he would likely have never played at all.
Idk which way is better. I imagine Barbe would beat us if we played but our way doesn’t create that kind of pressure on a 10 year old and his family.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:45 pm to BatonrougeCajun
quote:
There is a lot to unpack here that I never realized. Do those schools not have freshman and JV teams? If they are only keeping 6-12 or less each grade than that would certainly cause a reason to press early. We are definitely different here. And it’s not nearly as hard to simply make a team. We have 78 kids in our program. 25 freshman, 25 on JV and 28 on varsity. We keep a bunch and then let them battle it out each day. All three teams are trying to win as many games as possible because here if you don’t win your arse is grass. Nobody cares how good of a classroom teacher you might be. Because of that it’s brutal to get on the field but we keep kids around to develop because you never know who the late bloomers are. We had 16 seniors this year. 5 started. Our best player who was the runner up for district mvp had 1 hit on JV as a soph and 1 hit on JV as a junior. He blew up this year. Had we only been keeping 10 or so per class than he would likely have never played at all. Idk which way is better. I imagine Barbe would beat us if we played but our way doesn’t create that kind of pressure on a 10 year old and his family.
So they have usually 1 big JV team. Last barbe had 6 seniors maybe 7, but only 4 or 5 played at all.
St. Louis has 3 that play this year
Sulphur had huge senior class comparatively, like 12 or 15 which is kind of unheard of
Also realize barbe only has 1800 students, St. Louis -600, Sam Houston-1200…so they are much smaller than the Texas schools. Sulphur is biggest and only 1900. These aren’t huge schools and 78 kids is insane number.
I would rather your way, but we don’t have the resources as far as facilities, coaching staffs etc to do that, but y’all’s way is better because it allows long term growth of some kids to really blossom into something great.
But the thing is the kids on these programs get crazy amount of coaching, could t do that with your way.
ETA- just went and looked, barbe kept 12 last year for freshman and last year was pretty stacked class. Other times it’s less plus many quit or transfer out. Not many transferring in.
This post was edited on 5/15/23 at 10:55 pm
Posted on 5/15/23 at 10:46 pm to SlowFlowPro
quote:
Wut
If wrong, I apologize, it’s been 20 years and I didn’t go to barbe, sorry. Didn’t remember you playing
Still ignorant on the subject though. But do agree by 12 you usually know.
This post was edited on 5/15/23 at 10:47 pm
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:03 pm to lsu777
quote:
Also realize barbe only has 1800 students, St. Louis -600, Sam Houston-1200…so they are much smaller than the Texas schools. Sulphur is biggest and only 1900. These aren’t huge schools and 78 kids is insane number.
It gets pretty crazy and hearing how it’s done other places is great for context. One of the teams in our district is one of the top programs in the country and they had 28 seniors this year. It’s not unusual for schools to have d1 signed seniors not be able to get on the field at all. A few years back Coppell was #1 team in America and requested they be able to take in/out before tournament games (which teams don’t usually do here) because they had pro scouts coming to watch guys who weren’t going to be playing and they needed to see them do something. I don’t know if I buy that that was the reason or not but it’s a damn good story
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:06 pm to BatonrougeCajun
quote:
One of the teams in our district is one of the top programs in the country and they had 28 seniors this year.
How many dudes did they have overall?
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:17 pm to chalmetteowl
quote:
ow many dudes did they have overall?
40ish
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:17 pm to BatonrougeCajun
Yea barbe a lot of times has 1 senior that get scholarship but don’t play much.
I would imagine y’all’s school is much bigger too. I know my cousins graduated from highland park and it was a good bit bigger than barbe, like 25-30% bigger. I know Allen is huge and I think south lake has as many as barbe just in grades 11-12.
But yea they usually keep 10-12 freshman so got to come in ready to play, period.
I would imagine y’all’s school is much bigger too. I know my cousins graduated from highland park and it was a good bit bigger than barbe, like 25-30% bigger. I know Allen is huge and I think south lake has as many as barbe just in grades 11-12.
But yea they usually keep 10-12 freshman so got to come in ready to play, period.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:18 pm to BatonrougeCajun
Wait they had 28 seniors but only 40 overall? Wtf they gonna do after those guys graduate?
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:22 pm to lsu777
quote:
would imagine y’all’s school is much bigger too. I know my cousins graduated from highland park and it was a good bit bigger than barbe, like 25-30% bigger. I know Allen is huge and I think south lake has as many as barbe just in grades 11-12.
We are around 3200 which makes us average for the schools around us. Affluent suburb so lots of athletic kids in the building
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:24 pm to lsu777
quote:
Wait they had 28 seniors but only 40 overall? Wtf they gonna do after those guys graduate?
Reload like a mofo like they do every year. That 40 was the varsity. Probably about 60 or so on the sub varsities. This particular school has two freshman and two JV teams. They are hard to beat.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:26 pm to lsu777
quote:
Wait they had 28 seniors but only 40 overall? Wtf they gonna do after those guys graduate?
28 more seniors
Coach needs to be willing to tell some of them “it might not happen here for you, but I know you can start at XXXXXXX”
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:32 pm to BatonrougeCajun
quote:
Reload like a mofo like they do every year. That 40 was the varsity. Probably about 60 or so on the sub varsities. This particular school has two freshman and two JV teams. They are hard to beat.
Oh I thought you meant 40 total. Insane the number of kids y’all have on the team. That’s as many as some football programs in 5a lol.
100% see why sometimes people say you don’t have to pay travel now. Not like that here though, or Louisiana in general.
Being honest, if by 10, you aren’t on travel, you are too far behind. And if being completely honest, if you wanna play at barbe, you better be high level aaa or majors by 10. Got to think by 14, you have to be top 8-10 in the city to make it, top 25 in the area or you better find a way to go to another school if you want to play.
Y’all’s way is better imo taking long term athletic development into consideration, but with resources her, would be way less actual coaching.
But we also don’t have any programs saying to play at such and such hs…must play for us either.
Posted on 5/15/23 at 11:44 pm to lsu777
quote:
Y’all’s way is better imo taking long term athletic development into consideration, but with resources her, would be way less actual coaching.
I was born and raised in Louisiana and it makes me curious to see if I could take the texas model to Louisiana and see if it works. (I’m not going to but it makes me curious). All of our coaches here have to be teachers but in Louisiana they can be part time, so in theory, you could have a 8-10 man staff. Our staff is 6 but our freshman practice for two hours in the middle of the day (baseball class) and we have two fields so the varsity practices on one field after school, JV on the other. Coaches float depending on what we are doing that day. Practice schedules can be a real dick punch when you are organizing things for that many kids.
Posted on 5/16/23 at 12:46 am to lsudocts
This post was edited on 5/16/23 at 1:06 am
Posted on 5/16/23 at 2:17 am to ZIGG
I've been reading this thread, and I never lived in the Deep South; travel ball wasn't as common in Kentucky, or out West where I grew up. That said, if you weren't playing All-Stars by age eight in baseball, you were screwed. My brother's best friend could have played college, or even low pro ball, but he never wanted to do travel ball. He was also gifted at basketball, and only played Freshman (did not play baseball for HS). Our HS was top ten in the state (not sure now). For baseball, it's definitely true; you have to play high-level/travel/tournament if you're going to make it. A lot of our elite athletes ended up going to private schools anyway.
I did not play sports until I was 10 due to health issues, and I did ok at Football and Basketball (played high school for both - mostly JV for basketball, and was a "rotation player" in football- started some). I was completely lost in baseball, and gave up after less than one year. It's a shame, because I love baseball, and it would have been my best sport. But at age 13, I was so far behind, I had no chance. At the time, my family could not afford it anyway.
As far as travel ball is concerned, I see its merits, and I see its drawbacks. Nowadays, to be elite, travel ball is almost necessary. But there is also a balance that's needed. My brother's best friend would have benefitted from it, but he was burned out anyway, even without the travel ball.
I did not play sports until I was 10 due to health issues, and I did ok at Football and Basketball (played high school for both - mostly JV for basketball, and was a "rotation player" in football- started some). I was completely lost in baseball, and gave up after less than one year. It's a shame, because I love baseball, and it would have been my best sport. But at age 13, I was so far behind, I had no chance. At the time, my family could not afford it anyway.
As far as travel ball is concerned, I see its merits, and I see its drawbacks. Nowadays, to be elite, travel ball is almost necessary. But there is also a balance that's needed. My brother's best friend would have benefitted from it, but he was burned out anyway, even without the travel ball.
Posted on 5/16/23 at 5:57 am to lsu777
quote:
The parents having their kids playing aa ball…not worth it and waste of money. It’s why my oldest doesn’t play, it’s not his sport.
We have some friends whose kid is on a low level A or AA team that won like 2 games out of 45 last year and traveled to tournaments out of state. They’re doing it again this year. That’s absolutely insane to me. Why pay $1000+ plus travel costs and general time commitment just to get run ruled every game and get zero development? Facebook pics? The problem for them (and most other people) is that travel ball has killed city rec leagues to such a degree that it has rendered them almost unplayable.
We play AAA/Major and are pretty miserable with the sheer number of tournaments we play, but we’ve got a fun group of coaches who weave a lot of positive/life messaging into practices, and our son still likes it. First question we always ask after a game or practice is “are you having fun?” and it’s the main thing we tell him on the way to games — “it’s all about having fun and enjoying the sport.”
We got sucked into the travel ball vortex a few years ago and got to a point where we were spending $50 a week on hitting or pitching lessons and then found ourselves putting pressure on our kid because of the monetary investment until we had the stark realization of “what the frick are we doing?” That realization sort of changed everything and put us on a better trajectory.
However, this will probably be our last season unless he just begs to play next year. Too much time, money and effort, and it splits our family because we have a younger child who doesn’t want to sit at the ball fields (I don’t blame him).
This post was edited on 5/16/23 at 6:01 am
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