16U FAN wrote:Observations from 14U Metro's. Spirited play all around, however, quality way below what I thought. Turns out to be a '98 tournament with the heavy hitters Lady Magic and Breeze '97 absent and to a lesser degree Grapes Vasquez.
My DN's team eliminated early, so I stuck around and watched many games. Breeze looked to be the best prepared and best coached team. Play tight defense, solid pitching and enough offense to win. No disrespect, but, if that is the best from Sac, then we are in a down year. Can't imagine them going to South Dakota and stacking up well against '97 teams from across the country. Next year, yes! Mashburn will do his regular good job preparing them, let's hope he can remain calm for once on the national stage.
The championship game for second place was hard to watch. Exciting, but, hard to watch. Here is a game to determine who is going to Nationals and at least EIGHT errors were committed, not to mention balls dropping in front of players, routine ground balls getting through the infield, poor coaching decisions and a bunch of walks. Grapes win an exciting game. Hats off to the Heat, they overachieved, hustled and scrapped their way to that game. The surprise team of the Metro's!!! Don't understand the Grapes, should have won the whole thing, coaches pulled their most effective pitcher at loleast twice that I saw. Comparing talent, they are as good if not better than every team there. Should have handled the Breeze and everyone else with ease. Talking to the parents and other coaches, this team is not the same since they let go the older coach go. Never the less, they fought back and deserve kudos for their wins.
By far, the most disappointing team was the Comets/White team. Each year, Laux takes a talented bunch of kids and seems to underachieve ( full disclosure, my DD played for him and it was the most miserable season of her career. Team imploded, never got along, no leadership to mention a few). This years team didn't play many times early this season as Laux wanted to wait for his older 14's to come back. Ill prepared and if you watch them, you quickly find out that this is ALL about the head coach. I stood twenty feet away from the first base coaching box and heard their assistant (male) complain and cut down Laux. I feel bad for the girls as this is becoming an annual event for Laux and his teams.
Second most underachieving was AASA. Losing to the Davis Demons!!! Great upset for the Demons, you shocked a lot of people and you deserved the win!! Coach Sylvan seems like a super nice guy and tries to please everyone. Not going to happen in todays world. Coach your way, Mr. Slylan!!!
Overall very spirited play, not great by any means, but, fun to watch, even if I did wince a lot!!!
All the girls battled in super heat and undoubtedly that contributed to some of the play. Congratulations to the Breeze and the Grapes and Good Luck to them in South Dakota.
I am not sure which games you watched but didn't see how the Grapes should have walked through everyone like you said. They have a good group of athletes but they didnt seem to be at the level of walking through anyone.
