AAU is trying to get a foot hold here in AZ. They are starting tournaments in the Tucson area but nothing in Phoenix. We didn't have AAU where I grew up and would like to know if anybody has likes/dislikes about the organization. Our team may go down to play a tournament.

As far as I could tell AAU tournaments were pretty much the same as USSSA and CABA tournaments. Some tournaments the competition was very good, others not so good. I didn't notice any difference in how the tournaments were run.

AAU is just too darned expensive and the paperwork requirements are obnoxious. Once you realize what USSSA, CABA and a few others can do for you, you have to ask yourself why you want to mess with AAU. You sure don't get much for your dollar.

And around here, there are no AAU personnel to speak of, whereas with USSSA, there's a state rep who will bust his hind parts to help you.

I agree with Midlo Dad and golfball (golf?)

my opinion - With the entrance of USSSA in North Carolina, tourneys can go either way with strength. It allows for further dillution - more slots avaliable for teams, the more teams will form. (Which is great for younger players.) Ccoaches can be more selective about where they want to play. Some will always play up, others just wanting to win, will enter tourneys where they think teams are weaker.

I've noticed an influx of 14 and 15u teams, apparently an effort to prepare players for High Shcool.

A program will be as strong as the people behind it running the tournament. A name is just a name.

Find someone that runs a good tournament and you will find the teams. The tournament directors that put on good tournaments attract the teams and they sell out. We have several different ones from our area but as a parent (and used to be team mom) certain ones we looked forward to more because we knew how it would be run and that there would be good competition.

I wish everyone thought like you BBFam... :-)

-Adam

quote:

Originally posted by Midlo Dad:
...And around here, there are no AAU personnel to speak of, whereas with USSSA, there's a state rep who will bust his hind parts to help you.

MidloDad,

I have found the EXACT opposite in VA. The USSSA guy for the state is not very strong while AAU bends over backwards for teams.

In my area this is practically hardly any AAU but USSSA. Most teams will play both but will mostly play USSSA b.c. it is cheaper and less of an hassle. The only problem i have seen with USSSA is not to many other states have it like if you go to a national tourny most teams are from the same area. AAU i have found will get more teams from wide areas in a national tournament

USSSA is the best game in town this year
in the Sacremento area,but Super Series
Triple Crown,BPA & AAU all have tournaments
here or close by.

Redbird,

I'll confess my info is maybe 2 years old, so I'm glad to hear that AAU is doing a better job in VA. Lord knows there was room for improvement.

In the old days, you had to pretty much go in person to their office in a warehouse district in Richmond to get anyone to answer a question for you. There was a very helpful lady there -- one person to cover all AAU activities in all sports. The rest of the program involved trying to get teams to organize and run tourneys and collect fees for AAU. They held a meeting every February at a hotel near their office and the main topic of conversation was usually, who's going to step up and host our state tourneys for us?

I talked to the guy who ran the states in Hampton/Newport News a few years back -- I think it was 2004. He was left to do it all himself, then at the last minute the AAU guy swooped in and decided to redo all the seedings, pools, and schedules -- twice in the last 24 hours before play began. It created mass confusion.

After the first redo, our team was set to play its first pool game at 8 p.m. on Friday night of the tourney weekend. Our boys didn't get out of school in Richmond until 3 p.m., so we were going to have to hustle to get them home, changed, packed and down I-64, but we had it covered. I took the day off work to go down ahead of the team and attend the coaches' meeting. At that meeting, a new schedule was distributed and suddenly we were supposed to play at 5 p.m. Luckily I wasn't the only one affected, so the meeting turned into a riot without my having to say anything. So, then the "official" AAU guy bailed and let the local guy take all the heat. (Our game got moved to the end of the Friday schedule and we played at 9:30 that night.)

To his credit, the local guy did a nice job the rest of the way. It rained some at the tourney's end, and he provided all the grounds crews, everything. I think his team got to keep a few thousand dollars out of the tourney revenues as their reward for doing all the work.

USSSA went the extra mile for us lots of times. The main guy is based near Petersburg so maybe our proximity helped us get better service. I know he personally helped organize fall travel leagues in the Richmond area. NEVER have I seen AAU do that. I don't know that they've ever had staff to do that.

I still am on the USSSA e-mail list and they appear very active. There never was an AAU list, never heard from 'em, still don't.

I don't know what the rates are these days, but if you need team insurance and you just want to play from tourney to tourney, I would recommend you at least check into the USSSA options because you'll save your team budget a few hundred dollars at least. I took a team to East Cobb last summer and I got the insurance PG/WWBA required from USSSA. It was by far the least expensive option.

Here in New England, AAU ball IS travel ball. There really is no other organization that has any kind of presence. That being said, Triple Crown does sponsor some tournaments in Branford, CT during the summer.

I've been very happy with my involvement with AAU baseball over the past 2 years. Very well run, very competitive. And the New England AAU league has tripled in membership since 2004.

ECTB, which runs USSSA out of Pennsylvania into New Jersey and New York has started running tournaments in Connecticut.

We have been playing travel ball in TX for several years and I don't think that I have even seen an AAU tournament here. Mainly USSSA a little Super Series and Triple Crown.
We are planning on going to Steamboat this year for Triple Crown WS

AAU = $60 Youth Club Per Membership Year plus individual player registrations with both AAU national, and the the local franchise... For us in Florida it's Sunshine Athletics - Ran by for MLBer Chet Lemon & and his wife Gigi... $10 per player per season and coach for Sunshine, we had 12 players, and 5 coaches = $170 per season... I think it's $12 for the AAU national fee per calendar year, per coach and per player, so that's an additional $204... Plus you had to pay $50 to go to the AAU Manager's meeting so you could make your doubleheader schedule (they also “announce” their tournament schedule at this meeting, so you can’t pre-schedule). Oh yeah, There is also a $10 insurance fee per location so we practiced at 2 different locations, and our doubleheaders were at another, so that was another $30 per season... Another thing we had to do was if we had kids tryout, they had to sign-up for and AAU membership on-line ($12), and if they were good, and we wanted to use them for a weekend doubleheader, I had to run to Sunshine's local bank, with their deposit # and deposit $10 in their Bank Account before Friday to get them on our roster for a Sunday DH... Plus, you had to use “Sunshine Athletics” Diamond Baseballs for you doubleheaders, which are $28.95 per dz.

So AAU’s final number’s for just league fees, and to play doubleheaders is:
$60 + $170 + $204 + $50 + $30 + $57.90 = $571.90

USSSA = No individual player registration fees, $35 USSSA Team fee (annually), $135 USSSA Insurance fee - which covers the team everywhere, and $100 Florida Travel Ball (USSSA Franchise) League Fee. You can use your own balls, so I’ll put in $25 per dozen for Diamonds. Also, USSSA Tournaments are announced prior to the FREE Manager’s meeting, so you can get a jump on field rentals and such…

So USSSA’s final number’s for just league fees, and to play doubleheaders is:
$35 + $135 +$100 + $50 = $320.00

I didn’t mention some other factors that sway the bar in USSSA’s favor, like Customer Service… USSSA (Florida Travel Ball) will ALWAYS bend over backward to assist you to their best ability… Sunshine Athletics has no Customer Service whatsoever; they will always go out of their way to make your experience a miserable one. AAU National is much better than Sunshine’s Customer service, but doesn’t even sniff USSSA’s. The USSSA website is easy and straight-forward to use for managing a single roster, re-registering, and such - it’s a breeze… AAU has it’s own website where you have register your Club each year and you're assigned a different team number every year, then register each individual member, then provide their cards and their AAU registration ID numbers to the local franchise so they can provide them another local registration ID number and laminated picture cards (which come after the season is almost over)… I spend NO time at all with USSSA’s website or on the phone with them, and I spend A LOT OF TIME fooling around, calling, hassling AAU/Sunshine Athletics to get things right.

Of course, all this is before any Uniform/Tournament/Field/Umpire/etc. fees you may or may not run into…

In my experience, once USSSA moves in, they start stealing business from AAU. In Florida the DIRECTOR of the state AAU office has his own teams in each age group. (Can anyone say conflict of interest?) If you were an umpire-who would you favor? The guy who's organizatiuon hires you, or some coach/team you may never see again? AAU usually has more inferior umpires, and you get seeded in tournaments based on how many "points" (read AAU games you play) you have. Consequently, you may have a team of cherry picked players getting a lower seed than a "neighborhood" team that plays aau doubleheaders every weekend. USSSA is the best thing that has happened in Florida youth baseball in a long time!

quote:

Consequently, you may have a team of cherry picked players getting a lower seed than a "neighborhood" team that plays aau doubleheaders every weekend.

They're rewarding the teams that do more business with them. It's not an unusual business practice. Every heard of frequent flyer miles? What does it matter where you're seeded in pool play? If you win two of three, or better in pool play you get a good seed in the elimination round.

I've been doing this probably longer than anybody on here. We started in 1992 (won 15&U AAU Nationals that year when it meant something). USSSA sucks like all the rest of them at the national level. I've been to the Elite 24 the last couple years and it was run atrociously, with complete disregard for the teams and their concerns (poor field conditions like not dragging the stadium once after the first game and proper rest when they had time slots when they got to the end of the tournament).

It's very simple- they are all about money, period. What to do? Good question. I think I will start a thread about that in the next few days.

quote:

If you were an umpire-who would you favor? The guy who's organizatiuon hires you, or some coach/team you may never see again? AAU usually has more inferior umpires,

I dont favor anyone.......certainly dont care who hires me........there is enough baseball that I and many other dont "owe" anything to anybody....

The only thing I agree with in that statement is that an "inferior umpire" is one who cares who hires him because his lack of ability keeps him from the better games..

quote:

Originally posted by ncball:
I've been doing this probably longer than anybody on here. We started in 1992 (won 15&U AAU Nationals that year when it meant something). USSSA sucks like all the rest of them at the national level. I've been to the Elite 24 the last couple years and it was run atrociously, with complete disregard for the teams and their concerns (poor field conditions like not dragging the stadium once after the first game and proper rest when they had time slots when they got to the end of the tournament).

It's very simple- they are all about money, period. What to do? Good question. I think I will start a thread about that in the next few days.

At the local level a tournament will be as good as the people organizing it. The brand name is irrelevant. When SATB (Delaware) changed from USSSA to CABA it didn't change anything. When ECTB (Pennsylvania) changed from AAU to USSSA it didn't change anything.