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by gord » Wed Jan 07, 2015 6:04 pm

I personally would recommend that you keep your daughter in rec thru 10U. Perhaps your local rec league is fielding a select team that might provide your DD with the heightened level of play you seek?

But if you are committed to exploring the travel ball world and want to stay close to the SFV, you may want to look into the Choppers organization. I think they have a 10U team and are, IMO, the best organization based in or around the SFV. (Most of their teams play out of Santa Clarita I believe.)
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by SydsDad » Wed Jan 07, 2015 9:03 pm

gord wrote:I personally would recommend that you keep your daughter in rec thru 10U. Perhaps your local rec league is fielding a select team that might provide your DD with the heightened level of play you seek?

But if you are committed to exploring the travel ball world and want to stay close to the SFV, you may want to look into the Choppers organization. I think they have a 10U team and are, IMO, the best organization based in or around the SFV. (Most of their teams play out of Santa Clarita I believe.)


Thanks for the tip! I don't know much about select teams as I believe we are a C league. Do C leagues field select teams? I don't know much about them and have never heard anyone at our league mention it.
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by Fastpitchdad1 » Wed Jan 07, 2015 11:54 pm

SydsDad wrote:
Fastpitchdad1 wrote:
SydsDad wrote:Hey Everyone,

New to HeyBucket. In terms of SFV teams, can you give me an idea of who they are? I'm not sure getting to the OC works for us, but would definitely like to explore a higher level of play than our rec league.

Happy New Year and thanks!

Steve



What age group is your daughter? There are a few options depending and her age and skill level.


Thanks for the replies. The goal is to determine if travel ball is right for her and what our options may be. She is a 10U all star catcher. Her catching skills are great, but not sure about her hitting compared to travel girls. It's a catch 22. With better coaches and training she could improve, but if she stays at rec ball I am afraid she won't progress as fast. I have started private training which should help. She is a great teammate and very open to accepting instruction. She's also tough as nails!

Thanks again,

Steve



Check out the 10U tryout section
Batbusters-Valdivia out of Encino
SoCal Pumas out of Simi Valley
SoCal Choppers out of Valencia

These are local 10U teams
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by Nicelag » Thu Jan 08, 2015 4:23 am

SydsDad,

Not to be rude but if you are from a "C" league considering a move travel I might reconsider. Depending on your league this could be equivalent to jumping up 2 levels of play. May I suggest you start by finding a good "B" league in your area. In most cases there is a difference in the level of play, and sometimes it is significant. Then maybe consider travel next year if that's not enough. Either way I am in your shoes and here is my journey:

I know this is long, but I really don’t think that telling you “don’t play travel at 10U” will help you much. I have fought and fretted over this same decision myself. My daughter is a first year 10, an all-star, and very good player in a very good "B" rec league. She pitches, plays first and outfield and hits well. My first step in this process was to educate myself regarding the travel ball scene so as to properly weigh all of my options. What I found is that if you don't or haven't done this you are making a big mistake and more importantly doing your daughter a huge disservice!

I have been researching travel ball, and weighing the thought of going to travel or staying in rec for about a year and a half. First I wanted to find out if my daughter could not only play and compete in travel, but compete with the top half of the players on the better teams. Sure there are plenty of teams out there that she could be a star on, but that's not good enough at this age, in my opinion. I didn't want my ego to make a move that my daughter was going to ultimately suffer for in the long run. I have talked to many coaches, scouted many teams, been a practice player and actually played on a higher level travel ball team this past fall. I can honestly say that I’ve put myself through a crash course and have gotten a pretty good education.

First of all at the 10U level it is very important that you shop coaches and not teams at this point. Your daughter is not being recruited at this age so the big name i.e. So Cal Athletics, BatBusters, Firecrackers etc are just not as critical. What is critical is that your daughter gets the training she needs and learns the game. All of the big organizations have expanded to the point that they don't have the mystique they used to have, nor do they have enough quality coaches to run all of these teams. Bottom line is big organization does not mean good coaching anymore!

Next, my wife and I began to scout teams in our area. I went on Heybucket, and found out where teams were playing in my area. This gave me the opportunity to watch several teams in one location. This is a great way to scout coaching staffs as well. During tournaments coaches tend to show their true colors, meaning you will find out if it's about the girls or about them. When I found a team or teams that played well I would wait for the coach to have some down time and talk to him regarding his philosophy, schedule etc. Some teams run off of the coach’s philosophies, goals and schedules, while the bigger organizations run off of an organizational philosophy and goals.

Once I found teams that played well and were well coached I would find out where they practiced so as to watch a couple of practices. Here you find out if they are good coaches, or are just able to coach good players. Lots of people can coach good players, but not near as many can actually coach or teach a player how to play the game. If you find something you like, talk to the coach, explain your situation and what you are trying to accomplish. Then ask if maybe you can be a practice player. Some coaches like this and some don't, but it is beneficial for a coach to do this at this age because if a player is good they can get a direct line to her. Be careful if playing rec while doing this as there are rules that can prohibit you from playing all-stars if you violate them.

This past fall we tried the travel ball circuit. The season went very well and answered several questions for me. We went in with a couple of goals. We hoped that she would have fun, and that she was as good as I thought she was. Good news was that she was as good as we thought she was, the bad news was she was as good as we thought she was. Surprisingly finding out that she was pretty darn good only made our decision harder. Sounds odd I know. The reason it made things more difficult is that it kicked that ego thing into high gear again, and when that happens your thoughts are cloudy with a chance of showers at best lol.

Now came the hard part, do we stay in travel or go back to rec ball for the spring season? This was very difficult and took a lot of thought. Even people from our rec league told us they would love to see my DD stay, but if we went to travel nobody would question our decision. There were several questions we had to answer for our DD and ourselves:

1. What did she want to do? – She loved the competitiveness of travel, but wanted to stay in rec at least one more year.

2. Why did she want to stay? – She wanted to play all-stars. She even asked if we could play travel ball, and then go back to rec for all-stars.

3. Why did we want to go to travel ball? – We welcomed the increase in skill level, and her level of play increased accordingly. We also basically got tired of people telling my DD not to throw the ball so hard. Though we told her it was her job to throw and the other players job to catch, she kept hearing the others and would only throw at 60%. We also got frustrated with her complacency knowing she could show up at 60% and still be better than everyone else.

4. Why should we stay in rec ball? – The excitement of all stars, and the comradery that is obtained through traveling with friends and the higher level of play.

After much thought and discussions with respected members of the softball community we made our decision to return to rec ball. The main underlying factors to our decision were:

1. We all enjoy the all-star season. My DD loves the almost 3 months of traveling with friends, the higher level of play and the fact that she is playing for something i.e. medals and trophies. We finished 2nd in 8U B state last year and she feels like she has some unfinished business.

2. Though travel ball is very competitive there is no brass ring at the 10U level (unless of course you want to travel to the mid-west or south often). Other than the occasional tournaments you are mostly playing “friendlies” in which there are no trophies or medals, and over time she got frustrated not playing for anything. Question is did we want to do two years of practices and friendlies where there is nothing at stake? My DD’s answer was “no, that wouldn’t be very fun”.

The bottom line is this, travel ball is not going anywhere, and there is plenty of time. In closing I would say that if the decision to move to travel ball at 10 years old is easy for you then you probably aren't looking at the whole picture objectively.

Oh, and be very careful playing for friends. It can be very difficult and often leads to the destruction of the relationship. Did I say not to play for friends? Good Luck
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by gord » Thu Jan 08, 2015 11:05 am

Syd'sDad - Select teams are new this year to ASA rec leagues in So Cal. They are intended for families looking for a higher level of competition for their daughters. Leagues are not required to form select teams, and I suspect most C leagues will not due to their relatively small size. You may want to consider a nearby B league that offers a select team option if you believe your DD is up to the challenge. I agree with Nicelag - it might be the more sensible move at this point. Good look with your decision!
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by PDad » Thu Jan 08, 2015 11:33 am

gord wrote:Syd'sDad - Select teams are new this year to ASA rec leagues in So Cal. They are intended for families looking for a higher level of competition for their daughters. Leagues are not required to form select teams, and I suspect most C leagues will not due to their relatively small size. You may want to consider a nearby B league that offers a select team option if you believe your DD is up to the challenge. I agree with Nicelag - it might be the more sensible move at this point. Good look with your decision!

Hmm, what are the odds a new player to a league will get on the select team? I guess there's a chance they can work their way on during the course of the season...

I do like the idea of first looking into more competitive leagues. They should have some idea about other leagues from all stars. As a C league, they probably played against some B "silver" teams.
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by godisgood » Thu Jan 08, 2015 9:09 pm

Nicelag wrote:SydsDad,

Not to be rude but if you are from a "C" league considering a move travel I might reconsider. Depending on your league this could be equivalent to jumping up 2 levels of play. May I suggest you start by finding a good "B" league in your area. In most cases there is a difference in the level of play, and sometimes it is significant. Then maybe consider travel next year if that's not enough. Either way I am in your shoes and here is my journey:

I know this is long, but I really don’t think that telling you “don’t play travel at 10U” will help you much. I have fought and fretted over this same decision myself. My daughter is a first year 10, an all-star, and very good player in a very good "B" rec league. She pitches, plays first and outfield and hits well. My first step in this process was to educate myself regarding the travel ball scene so as to properly weigh all of my options. What I found is that if you don't or haven't done this you are making a big mistake and more importantly doing your daughter a huge disservice!

I have been researching travel ball, and weighing the thought of going to travel or staying in rec for about a year and a half. First I wanted to find out if my daughter could not only play and compete in travel, but compete with the top half of the players on the better teams. Sure there are plenty of teams out there that she could be a star on, but that's not good enough at this age, in my opinion. I didn't want my ego to make a move that my daughter was going to ultimately suffer for in the long run. I have talked to many coaches, scouted many teams, been a practice player and actually played on a higher level travel ball team this past fall. I can honestly say that I’ve put myself through a crash course and have gotten a pretty good education.

First of all at the 10U level it is very important that you shop coaches and not teams at this point. Your daughter is not being recruited at this age so the big name i.e. So Cal Athletics, BatBusters, Firecrackers etc are just not as critical. What is critical is that your daughter gets the training she needs and learns the game. All of the big organizations have expanded to the point that they don't have the mystique they used to have, nor do they have enough quality coaches to run all of these teams. Bottom line is big organization does not mean good coaching anymore!

Next, my wife and I began to scout teams in our area. I went on Heybucket, and found out where teams were playing in my area. This gave me the opportunity to watch several teams in one location. This is a great way to scout coaching staffs as well. During tournaments coaches tend to show their true colors, meaning you will find out if it's about the girls or about them. When I found a team or teams that played well I would wait for the coach to have some down time and talk to him regarding his philosophy, schedule etc. Some teams run off of the coach’s philosophies, goals and schedules, while the bigger organizations run off of an organizational philosophy and goals.

Once I found teams that played well and were well coached I would find out where they practiced so as to watch a couple of practices. Here you find out if they are good coaches, or are just able to coach good players. Lots of people can coach good players, but not near as many can actually coach or teach a player how to play the game. If you find something you like, talk to the coach, explain your situation and what you are trying to accomplish. Then ask if maybe you can be a practice player. Some coaches like this and some don't, but it is beneficial for a coach to do this at this age because if a player is good they can get a direct line to her. Be careful if playing rec while doing this as there are rules that can prohibit you from playing all-stars if you violate them.

This past fall we tried the travel ball circuit. The season went very well and answered several questions for me. We went in with a couple of goals. We hoped that she would have fun, and that she was as good as I thought she was. Good news was that she was as good as we thought she was, the bad news was she was as good as we thought she was. Surprisingly finding out that she was pretty darn good only made our decision harder. Sounds odd I know. The reason it made things more difficult is that it kicked that ego thing into high gear again, and when that happens your thoughts are cloudy with a chance of showers at best lol.

Now came the hard part, do we stay in travel or go back to rec ball for the spring season? This was very difficult and took a lot of thought. Even people from our rec league told us they would love to see my DD stay, but if we went to travel nobody would question our decision. There were several questions we had to answer for our DD and ourselves:

1. What did she want to do? – She loved the competitiveness of travel, but wanted to stay in rec at least one more year.

2. Why did she want to stay? – She wanted to play all-stars. She even asked if we could play travel ball, and then go back to rec for all-stars.

3. Why did we want to go to travel ball? – We welcomed the increase in skill level, and her level of play increased accordingly. We also basically got tired of people telling my DD not to throw the ball so hard. Though we told her it was her job to throw and the other players job to catch, she kept hearing the others and would only throw at 60%. We also got frustrated with her complacency knowing she could show up at 60% and still be better than everyone else.

4. Why should we stay in rec ball? – The excitement of all stars, and the comradery that is obtained through traveling with friends and the higher level of play.

After much thought and discussions with respected members of the softball community we made our decision to return to rec ball. The main underlying factors to our decision were:

1. We all enjoy the all-star season. My DD loves the almost 3 months of traveling with friends, the higher level of play and the fact that she is playing for something i.e. medals and trophies. We finished 2nd in 8U B state last year and she feels like she has some unfinished business.

2. Though travel ball is very competitive there is no brass ring at the 10U level (unless of course you want to travel to the mid-west or south often). Other than the occasional tournaments you are mostly playing “friendlies” in which there are no trophies or medals, and over time she got frustrated not playing for anything. Question is did we want to do two years of practices and friendlies where there is nothing at stake? My DD’s answer was “no, that wouldn’t be very fun”.

The bottom line is this, travel ball is not going anywhere, and there is plenty of time. In closing I would say that if the decision to move to travel ball at 10 years old is easy for you then you probably aren't looking at the whole picture objectively.

Oh, and be very careful playing for friends. It can be very difficult and often leads to the destruction of the relationship. Did I say not to play for friends? Good Luck



I thought this advice was for picking out a college for your daughter. It's only 10U, we live in the San Fernando Valley and started out with a local team from the Valley at 10U. Eventually we like other families started making the hour, hour & half drives for weekend practices. I don't enjoy the long drives but it pays off to have my daughter play for a top team and organization. I agree we do need So Cal A's, Corona Angels, Batbusters here in the Valley. But we lack coaches with travel ball experience. If you want to make the transition to travel I would say do it even at the 10U level. It's never to early for your daughter to learn how to compete at the highest level.
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by tbjd33 » Thu Jan 08, 2015 10:33 pm

Well... I say all you 10u parents come back in 3 years and resume this tread.

Best thing anyone can do for a 9/10 year old is to work on skill and help increase their love of the game.

Elite travel is tough and cost $$ (driving, coaching fees, training, hotels, airplanes, camps, equipment and etc). None of it starts until 8th grade. Sorry about grad year not age... That's what matters people. No reason to overwork young DD's.

On the coaching side there are plenty of coaches in the greater SFV. True problem is there aren't coaches with COLLEGE coaching connections. None are Richardson, Stith, Tyson, Denio and so on. Gonna be a while before that changes as far as I can see. Too many dad coaches!
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by Nicelag » Tue Jan 13, 2015 11:50 pm

Don't think many "C" leagues will be opting for the ASA Select route. Reason being that if the league chooses to participate in the Select program then their A all-star teams (10 & 12U) will have to play in the "B" division. That in itself is steering a lot of "C" leagues away.
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by SydsDad » Sun Jan 18, 2015 10:16 pm

I appreciate everyone's responses. I have decided to focus on rec ball for my daughter for the next 2 years and revisit travel ball before her second year of 12u to see if it makes sense. We had a couple girls from our league join the new Batbusters team in Encino, but our league "family" didn't give us the heads up and I hadn't checked Heybucket in a while to see the tryout dates. It caused me to think hard about what our plans are and we decided to continue her private lessons and enjoy watching her have fun for a while.

If anyone needs a great catcher until March 31st let me know.

Happy New Year!

Steve
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