Grades During Softball Season

[jonriv]

It has been mentioned in a few posts that players were taking time off to "focus on grades". On the surface this seemed to be a noble and seemingly smart decision. Especially for a student that needs to get their grades up. The more I thought about it, it did seem to be contradictory to what my own experiences have been.

My own daughter always seemed to get better grades(High School and College) in season than during the off-season. I always felt that the demands of the schedule forced the student to better ration their time. During the recruiting process, just about every coach echoed the same thing.

I did a quick web search and the research take seems to contradict what I thought:

http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10. ... lCode=jsea
http://articles.latimes.com/1988-11-30/ ... e-athletes
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/ ... s-compete/

What have your/players experiences been? Does the level(DI, DII, DIII) have any bearing? What about the travel at some of the Big College programs?

[GIMNEPIWO]

My DD's grades were never an issue ... The two youngest though (twins) freely admit the only reason the got good grades in HS was so they could play softball ... One of those played in college and I believe that is the only reason she got good grades was so she could play softball.
Coaching HS ball I have had several incidents of grades vs softball or student athlete vs athlete student ... I preach from the parent meeting on about time management, priorities and commitments ... The most recent situation that comes to mind is a parent phoning me that they were making their daughter quit softball because her grades ... I offered another avenue ... I suggested to her mother to allow me to try to handle it by suspending her daughter from the team for 10 days ... She had 10 days to make up her assignments or whatever she needed to do to improve her grades ... If the teachers told me prior to those 10 days that she had completed the missing assignments and improved that she could rejoin the team, no harm no foul ... The parent and young student athlete accepted my challenge and she rejoined the team within 7 days ... Their family moved over the summer so I do not know if there was a lasting effect.

[CatcherDad99]

My DD struggled early on in school. Once i made her realize she need grades to play college ball she bucked down and really focused. In high school it didn't mater season or not she got mostly A's but she worked hard and it never came easy
.
She's now in her freshman year of college and she did horrible in the off season. The first year college freedom bug hit her hard. So bad she came close to loosing her scholarship and was barley eligible when season came on. So far she's done good during the season BUT missing classes on travel days and having to make it up doesn't make it easy. Maybe the season keeps them so busy they have no choice but to stay on schedule and keep up with the work.

For my DD i know she had a little wake up call last semester. She has worked harder than most to get where she is. Seeing how easily it could have been gone was good for her IMO. I don't see her falling off again BUT i do think there is something to having to keep up with school during the season because there is no time to play catch up in their busy schedule.

[GIMNEPIWO]

I just remembered something that helped one DD in college during the season... The Coach had a 48 hour rule ... No partying within 48 hours of a game ... I recall one season that rule left one day open

[CatcherDad99]

I just remembered something that helped one DD in college during the season... The Coach had a 48 hour rule ... No partying within 48 hours of a game ... I recall one season that rule left one day open

They have a 24 hour rule lol. But they have weights at 6am some days and i can't imagine that would be fun on a hang over