Spreading the Word on PGF

[xyzdude]

While it would be nice for more teams from the northeast to jump on the PGF bandwagon, you cannot ignore the cost factor either. I think many teams this year just decided not to do any nationals because of the cost.

Jon - you also have to consider the competitiveness of the teams in NE and the northeast. Most of these teams could go to PGF but would never be competitive there. That's pretty clear. How much money do you want to spend to go to a tournament where you are lucky if you win one game. Most of these teams would rather travel west to a tournament with a little lower profile to play the west coast teams - not as much to lose.

How about this idea? Have a PGF eastern nationals next year where you invite the top northeastern teams to play and have a series of qualifiers too. Then give the top 8 teams from that event an invite to the California event the following year. That may be the best way to raise the profile of PGF and get more eastern teams involved.

[jonriv]

That actually might work. It would allow teams to test the waters without the huge cash outlay- also serves PGF in that it gets the word out of who and what they are to a group that is not fully aware of them

Also avoids the potential of watering down PGF Nationals


My intention all along was not invite teams to Nationals for the sake of diversity, but to broaden the qualifier pool. Your issue of coast is real, probably one of the reasons ASA never drew a big Eastern crowd. One of the attraction of PONY is that families from the Northeast can usually drive to the tournament locations.

I would be careful of assuming that no teams from the East could compete. I am sure that UCLA was thinking the same thing when they were playing Hofstra. There are some excellent teams and players here- there just is not the depth of talent, infrastructure and tradition of SoCal- nor as many super competitive teams. I do think that there is certainly enough talent to have some teams represent the area very well.

If XYZ, PGF followed your plan, the manner in which organizations put teams together around here would probably change to meet the challenge- again all JMO

[CULater]

I disagree, there are teams at PGF and ASA that are just not up to par. If you look at the scores of all the games, there are scores that are not very competive.

You can't judge a team by a single game score and scores after the 1st rounds, winners and losers, aren't material because any team that won at least 1 game was 'up to par'.

Please, share with us which teams you feel were not up to par at PGF.

I am not going to single a team out. But there were teams in Huntington Beach and Oklahoma City that were not competetive with the teams they played, and surely could not play with the teams that finished in the top 10 of either tournament.

Congratulations - you didn't take the bait. I was testing you to see how far you would go to slam PGF.

It appears you've narrowed it down to 18u. I'd like to know the number of teams you identified. Depending on your vague criteria of "not competitive" and "surely could not play with" top 10 teams, that number could range from a few to a fairly large number. I personally would only consider a team as being not 'up to par' if they went 0-2 and lost by 8+ runs in both games - and I didn't see any that met my criteria in HB.

FWIW, I'd put my money on the top 10 at HB against the top 10 at OKC and I'd do likewise with the bottom 10 at HB against the lower half at OKC.

I didn't slam PGF, I simply stated that there were teams there that were not competive in HB and OKC. The 18HS/ Gold is watered down from previous years. That will happen when you go from one national with 64 teams to 2 nationals with 140 teams. Not every top team is going to select the same tournament, and you will have less competetive teams playing at both events.

[xyzdude]

I would be careful of assuming that no teams from the East could compete. I am sure that UCLA was thinking the same thing when they were playing Hofstra. There are some excellent teams and players here- there just is not the depth of talent, infrastructure and tradition of SoCal- nor as many super competitive teams. I do think that there is certainly enough talent to have some teams represent the area very well.

Jon - I didn't say that no teams from the East could compete, but the reality is that not many can right now. None of the teams that went this year did particularly well - not a perfect indicator because so few teams did go from the East and there is a certain amount of luck of the draw involved in any big event - but certainly we can agree that no team from the East was a significant factor in the event this year.

The Hofstra example is really to the point - we don't have many pitchers like Olivia raised in the northeast and until we do the west will dominate.

[xyzdude]

One of the attraction of PONY is that families from the Northeast can usually drive to the tournament locations.

PONY and the like minded plethora of other "national" tournaments feed the problem in the east in my opinion. We are training our players that at the end of the year you take a softball vacation. Our players do not learn to travel well. I can tell you from personal experience that this is a real issue on 18U teams. The teams that travel a lot learn to travel well. It would serve our level of competitiveness on the east better if teams traveled more often and the players learned the difference between a "trip" and a "vacation". Just my opinion...

By the way, the wife says that a trip is when you take the kids and a vacation is when you don't!

[jonriv]

One of the attraction of PONY is that families from the Northeast can usually drive to the tournament locations.

PONY and the like minded plethora of other "national" tournaments feed the problem in the east in my opinion. We are training our players that at the end of the year you take a softball vacation. Our players do not learn to travel well. I can tell you from personal experience that this is a real issue on 18U teams. The teams that travel a lot learn to travel well. It would serve our level of competitiveness on the east better if teams traveled more often and the players learned the difference between a "trip" and a "vacation". Just my opinion...

By the way, the wife says that a trip is when you take the kids and a vacation is when you don't!

I think you are right on- there are way too many play-cations

[Makina]

Love the idea about crowning an East Coast champion. We can then get the TV people to pay for the East Champion playing the WC Champion in Oklahoma City (Not!)?!?! And then maybe ESPN could sponsor a PGF Champion vs the ASA Champion!!

[Manny]

Those comparing ASA to PGF and vice versa miss the point...their objectives are not the same.

ASA is the body recognized by Congress as the sports' representative. As such, ASA's mission has been to create a long-term system that exports best practices from softball hotbeds (like Southern California) to the rest of the country. The whole country! And over the last 15-20 years ASA has done a great job of promoting the sport to the point that the "level of play" gap has narrowed significatly from geographic region to region. Agree?

This became clear to me in 2007 when locals kept coming out to see the team from SoCal practice...those coaches could not get enough. Became even clearer when the team that knocked my team out was from Illinois...and they won the whole thing.

Why would a team from SoCal travel to somewhere hot and humid and rainy and boring...simply...to prove that they are the best. Why would a team travel to SoCal to get waxed and go 2 and Q...simply they would not...so no exchage or distibution of best practices if event held in SoCal. Not 10 years ago. Maybe now. Get it?

Basically ASA sets up the struture that grows the players...from T-Ball, rec, travel and our National Team.

PGF's mission is to bring the best teams together. PGF offers a very attractive option to the "Premier" teams in the Country as it meets the short-term college exposure needs of the participating teams and because it is bringing the highest level of play...PGF is expanding the sport. PGF is also forcing ASA to adapt....good for softball.

The sport of girls' fastpitch softball benefits in the long term when more young ladies and families are introduced to the sport and strive to be the best softball player they can be...a fine balance between introduction, development, diversity and elitism.

Play ball!

[Midwest]

I would like to see PGF promoted more. The Qu. I have, why not have Fall Qualifications for the older levels ( 14, 16 & 18hs ). These could be spread through out the country. I know of only one fall qualification last year in Indiana for PGF, beleive it was for 14u. I think they should have these qualifications sometime in Mid Oct. to give time for teams to play with one another. They should still have other qualifications in spring and summer. This way a few teams at each level can make plans in the winter instaed of 8 weeks prior or sooner.

[SeanH1122]

We had qualified for PGF last year in Indiana and our parents and players voted to go to ASA in Chattanooga instead. This year we were lucky enough to host a qualifier in Minnesota and qualified. We decided to go and our parents, players and coaches loved it! Keep in mind I have gone to ASA Nationals 7 out of the last 8 years (one year we didn't qualify ASA and went to USSSA). I am also a big fan of ASA and think they also offer a good product. Here are some of my thoughts.

Weather
Pretty much every day we the low was 63 and the high was 75%. The sun usually came out about 10:00am and stayed the rest of the day. NO RAIN! Pretty much every other place in th country it is between 90-100 degrees and muggy. The weather was fantastic at PGF.

Competition
We were 1-2 in pool play and 2-2 in bracket play. I think we would have finished tied for 25th out of 64. Last year with a similar team we finished 17th out of 170 in Tennessee. The competition is overall better at Premier. ASA does have more than twice the number of teams which means there are still quite a few good teams but also quite a few that aren't that good. To me personally I don't mind having a couple easier games as it is then easier to get some kids that might not be playing a lot into the games. So I like both for competition.

Fields
This is subjective as some ASA Nationals I have been at have had great fields (Chattanooga) and some haven't been that great. The fields at PGF were very good especially in Huntington Beach and Irvine.

Check-In
I thought it was easier to check in at PGF. Once I learned how to navigate the site it was pretty easy. ASA isn't too bad either.


Opening Ceremonies & Coaches Meetings
PGF blows ASA away. Our girls loved seeing Jenny Finch and Baby Bash? It was the perfect length.

I personally like both ASA and Premier but will be attempting to qualify for PGF with our top teams. We want to play the best of the best and those teams are at PGF. Our girls liked spending time at the beach once we were eliminated and also had a blast having a campfire at the beach on one of the nights. I also loved the chance to play extra practice games as well as 3 pool games.

P.S Thanks to Hey Bucket! I used this site to pick-up a player that did a great job for us. I also heard from several other players after the deadline.

Thanks!

Sean Hall
MN Sting Director