Finding a good HS coach is just like finding a good travel team coach.

1. Find out his philosphies. All about wins or getting better.

2. Make sure your kid doesn't play the same spot as the coaches son. Unfair advantage.

3. If it is HS, make sure the coach doesn't have a son in 5th grade and above who plays your position. Once again, unfair advantage.

4. Expect the HS coach to leave, especially after his kids graduate.

This may be a bit cynical, but you can't really control who your coach is at any level. All you can do is play like it is your last game because someday it will be.

Your going to switch your job so your son can be on a better hs team??? or consider moving so your son can play more baseball yr round????? Why is baseball so important??? what do you think you will get out of it?
If a player is really talented there will be opportunities... get good instruction, play games, go to show case or pro try outs.

quote:

Originally posted by njbb:
TG,
What position did you play in college?

Outfield. I also became a reliever when I responded to "Is there a GD lefty who can come out of the pen and throw strikes?" As a freshman I figured it was more playing time.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill L.:
Unfortunately up here n MD our options are really limited.

Check out how many games MD allows in their HS. Pretty pathetic and they do not play BB in middle school either.

Based on our experiance we feel we have no real choice but tournament ball in MD if he wants to play beyond HS.

I am starting to think this situation differs region to region.

Bill

Why are your options limited? There's ECTB in PA, SATB in DE, Ripken in MD and VSC in VA.

High school ball is becoming less and less relevant for developing to play college ball. There's Legion and travel for development.

My son played for 14U team where most of the kids didn't have middle school ball. The team started playing tournaments in April.

quote:

Originally posted by Doughnutman:
Finding a good HS coach is just like finding a good travel team coach.

1. Find out his philosphies. All about wins or getting better.

2. Make sure your kid doesn't play the same spot as the coaches son. Unfair advantage.

3. If it is HS, make sure the coach doesn't have a son in 5th grade and above who plays your position. Once again, unfair advantage.

4. Expect the HS coach to leave, especially after his kids graduate.

This may be a bit cynical, but you can't really control who your coach is at any level. All you can do is play like it is your last game because someday it will be.

Unless a kid goes to private school he doesn't get to choose his high school coach. Before someone mentions moving into a school district with the right coach, what if the coach leaves or gets fired just before your kid arrives? While it didn't involve a move, the varsity softball coach told my daughter she would be starting in rightfield her freshman year. That was before be ****ed off a bunch of mothers of a bunch of losers and got fired when my daughter was in 8th grade. The coach was good. He knew he needed to build from the ground up. He went down to the rec ranks when my daughter was ten and got the good players into the right travel programs the following year.

The coach suffered through three more years of wretched varsity play by players lacking heart. Just before a class he helped prepare got to the high school to win four straight conference championships, he was fired.

Our high school baseball situation was not good until a new coach was brought in last year. We did look at some private schools. But baseball was not going to take precedence over academics.

In North Carolina, Legion seems to be slowing down. Several halls have either shut down or have cut funding to baseball. (More pressing matters, if you know what I mean)

The High Schools have picked up the slack by forming Summer Scholastic Leagues. There are still some Legion Teams and they are strong. Seems like the idea with the HS teams is to keep players together. The HS coach is able to coach too Teams in our area will play at least one "showcase" on a D1 campus. The allstar team is also considered a showcase team. I don't know how it will all work out, but the potential is huge. We played 7 or 8 teams over 6 weeks.

AAM - imo travel teams will encourage good players to play harder and get better. We started at 12u and benefited greatly. Our area does not have a strong REC program. Anyone can play type deal. Great for kids that aren't competetive, but a better player can lose interest.

At nine, baseball is still fun, very much a game. If he and you are enjoying LL, stay with it for now. I do think you should consider travel for the larger field size as he approaches 12/13. At a minimum play one full season on a regulation size field for a season. only my opinion though!

No two situations are the same, and it is impossible to compare programs across the country.

quote:

Originally posted by 2Bmom:
The school we would have transferred to, with a very well-established quality baseball program, fired their coach of 25 years just a few weeks ago. He made the wrong folks mad and poof he was gone.

There's more to the story than making the wrong folks mad. Never depend on HS baseball to get you a baseball scholarship. IMO, in most areas it's not even a part of the picture, look at it as a chance to improve your game, then go out and play good competition and showcase your talents in front of a much larger audience when the time is right.

I have a friend who moved south for better bsaeball, he claimed his player was a STUD and might get better college opportunities (he was still a pre HSer). He did dominate, however once he moved south, he was an average player compared to the rest. He had to work really hard to keep up, and when he did, he was not the standout he was up north. Would he have had a better chance of going to a better school if he stayed where he was? Not sure, but in the end your player's talent dictates his future and who sees him to determine that talent. Parents often see their players as better than others and IMO, should not change their lives for baseball.

Change schools based on academics, not baseball because in the end chances are that is what will get your player into the right school faster than baseball. And in many good college programs, you don't even have to be the team STUD. JMO.

I also agree that more harm than good comes from young players playing 2,3 games a weekend, unless a tournament situation that happens every so often.

quote:

There's more to the story than making the wrong folks mad. Never depend on HS baseball to get you a baseball scholarship.

I know. It was a difficult situation all around, and folks here seem to be moving on, and looking forward to seeing what the new UF coach can do. Smith is still teaching, and they hired a new coach already and he's got a fall program going. I'm glad to read the second sentence, too. I was really upset when our coach was forced to resign, but we're staying at our small school because of academics, and because my son loves it there. A recent graduate of this school is doing pretty well because he got exposure elsewhere. And the 6.19 60 didn't hurt! Boy, was he fun to watch:
Derrick Robinson

And a first class young man, too. I'll never forget my son playing JV in the 7th grade, telling me after practice, "I got a high five from D-Rob!"

quote:

Posted October 04, 2007 05:18 PM Hide Post
Finding a good HS coach is just like finding a good travel team coach.

1. Find out his philosphies. All about wins or getting better.

2. Make sure your kid doesn't play the same spot as the coaches son. Unfair advantage.

3. If it is HS,

Etc. etc.


I guess I should add that in Arizona we have open enrollment. You do have a choice of where you play your HS ball.

We have "school choice" which is probably similar. The school we were thinking about transferring to is the one that we're actually zoned for, and is closer to our house. But the academic opportunities at his current school are better than what we could get anywhere else, so we're going to take our chances with the new coach and see how it goes.

Sounds like a good choice 2BMom.
Coaches come and go but good academics last forever.

Hi TG,

We are playing Ripken this weekend. We hope to face the SJ young Guns in teh finals and we are playing at Ripken next week as well. Luckily there is some really fine competition both weekends.

We played at VSC 3 weeks ago and it was outstanding. It was are first time out for the fall and our boys went 2 and 2 against some really nice teams. Lost a stellar 3/2 ballgame to the home team.

I appreciate your suggestions and we have played most venues or with most of those organizations with the tournament team on which my son is currently playing.

My only point is that there are few if any really good leagues, travel or other wise, in the state of MD.


Bill

quote:

Originally posted by Bill L.:
My only point is that there are few if any really good leagues, travel or other wise, in the state of MD. Bill

In our area the better travel teams play tournaments. The weaker teams play in the Sunday DH league. There's too much of a struggle to get fields all week due to the rec programs having years of seniority on the fields. It was enough of a hassle to get two practices a week.