Nicelag wrote:Spazsdad wrote:And I believe this could be cleaned up if TB behaved like other club sports. Teams are ranked; i.e. Gold, silver, bronze, etc and that is who you play against on the weekends. If you have success you get moved up, if you don't you get relegated down. That way you don't have new, inexperienced teams losing 15-0 and accomplishing nothing while strong teams are challenged to stay on top. Also, players are rostered for a season and you stay there or don't play. No hopping teams.
Of course that would take either one sanctioning body or cooperation between existing ones and don't hold your breath there.
Agreed. With the large number of teams in 10U now, and the huge disparity between many of the teams talent wise, it would definitely be beneficial.
Nicelag, I believe it was you that made the point in a post recently that every parent of a 10U Rec player thinks their kid is All-Star caliber. That is so incredibly spot-on and truly underscores why 10U travel ball has taken off.
I haven't been to a single 10U travel ball game, but I can only imagine how poor the quality of play must be for most teams and how wide the disparity level must be between the few top tier teams and the rest.
My first thought is that some of these kids are going to get hurt. And my second thought is that every single 10U parent whose kid is currently playing travel ball and reading this post thinks their kid is okay because they're in the top tier.
It's just tragic. My kid played Rec, including All-Stars, through her first year of 12U (she had turned 12 in January and played thru June). Anyone who thinks their kid needs to play travel ball before that is sorely mistaken. Her fondest memories are of her Rec days and today she is good enough to play with/against anyone in the country at her age.
That may sound like a brag and part of it is, but most of it is to make the point that if your kid's got the goods they've got the goods and don't need to be rushed into travel. Let them enjoy their childhood and play with their friends and represent their local town instead of feeding your overly competitive adult ego, you won't be sorry that you did.