How many is too many?

[jonriv]

See lots of posts a\regarding roster size. Ranging from 12-30 players. What is the right number. When is too many players. IMO, TB rosters should be fairly lean to allow the most playing time per player(12-13) with at least 3 pitchers

College roster should max out at 20- at least 4-5 pitchers?

Would love to hear what everyone thinks. How many and why?

[Sftbll4ever]

A college team can only travel with 20. I know a college team that will bring in over that amount, girls not knowing this and then end up redshirting for a year or two. Some, never make the roster.

[ontheblack]

First off, this really is an age specific situation. At 12s, there is no need for more that 12 players on a typical roster. At 16s and 18s, if you only roster 12, there will be more than a few games where you wont have enough players.

Ultimately this a question for each player and family to decide. My DD has played on rosters from 12 to 18. With a smaller roster there is more playing time. With 18, position and skill level generally determines playing time.

The question to be asked going into a situation with a large roster is how does the coach handle a large roster. Follow up that question with a little of your own home work. There are a few coaches who are very good at managing large rosters, but they also tend to have great depth of talent so there is not much drop off when they mix it up.

At the younger age groups (12s and 14s), large rosters tend to not have the depth, so when it comes to must win games, everyone knows who will be starting.

As for carrying 4-5 pitchers in college, that is fine for the coach, but not for the player. At least 3 of those pitchers will rarely see the circle.

I like the way CA KK handles their roster. 16 girls, 3 pitchers, all of whom could start for most 16u teams. I think all 16 have seen the dirt this week.

[fasterpitch92701]

Several years back we went to ASA Nats with 10, took ninth, but that was scary. NOT recommended. When a girl sneezed everyone went "oh $hi#"...

Personally, I think 15-16 is a nice number. It gives girls play time and you need 3 pitchers and 2 catchers (at least). Having many more players develops the not-enough-play-time scenario. Having versatile, strong players obviously helps and changes the "what if's". Girls need time on the field. With 20+ players you are, typically, not developing a team. How much time can coaches spend with each player on a team of 23? Rather, you are collecting fees and offering false expectations. Juuuuuust my opinion.....

[Goobie]

Regarding the large rosters at some colleges. DD was at a college camp in the southeast and the coach said the AD made him take a roster of 24 players. I am not a Title IX expert at all, but I wonder if some of the large college rosters are to get the female athlete numbers up at a school for some sort of Title IX equality requirement. Just throwing it out for discussion.

[Fredegar]

For TB, it seemed that roster-size often matches the age group. For instance, 12 players for a 12U team gives lots of playing time to all. As you move up to 14U, kids get busy with other sports, and you need a roster closer to 14. At 16U and 18U, you wind up with 16-18 kids per team to deal with injuries, proms, etc.

As for college, I've heard the same thing Goobie has heard ... larger Softball rosters help with the Title IX equivalency requirements. But anything more than 18, means there are several kids with little chance of ever playing, and more than 20 means some kids don't even get to travel with the team. Roster-size is definitely something to keep in mind when choosing a college.

[jonriv]

Does the travel with 20 rule(college) apply to annual Spring Training trips? Is it all divisions? I recall last year that my DD's team played St Thomas(from MInnesota) and they had close to 30 players there-they seemed to be coming out of the woodwork.

[Fredegar]

Tried to find information online about NCAA rules about max roster limits or max travel rosters. It appears there's no official limit to roster size. As for max players who can travel with the team, nothing about that either. So it may be left for each school to set their own policy that makes sense for their budget. Or not.

For schools participating in an end-of-season Conference tourney, many conferences subsidize a portion of the team travel expenses for that tourney. In those cases, each conference may have max roster limits regarding those expenses. Or not.

Or put another way, I don't know.

[Hawk17]

Tried to find information online about NCAA rules about max roster limits or max travel rosters. It appears there's no official limit to roster size. As for max players who can travel with the team, nothing about that either. So it may be left for each school to set their own policy that makes sense for their budget. Or not.

For schools participating in an end-of-season Conference tourney, many conferences subsidize a portion of the team travel expenses for that tourney. In those cases, each conference may have max roster limits regarding those expenses. Or not.

Or put another way, I don't know.

I believe that may be a conference rule or even school rule.

[Jayhawk]

At my DD's school there were 29 or 30 when she reported last August. We did not see this coming as this school had been showing rosters on the website of around 18-20 in years past.

By the time they got to the spring there were around 20-21 left as quite a few had transfered or just flat out quit during the winter. The coach had been honest with them once they got there so most of them knew where they stood pretty well by winter break. Most who were told they would not likely ever play ended up transfering. By the end of the season they had 17 healthy players. One had a career ending injury, another a career ending illnes (not life threatening), and a couple of others quit. During the post season they decided to only travel with 14 to 15 though they were allowed more. It was mostly around finals so the word was the coach did not want to take girls off campus who had no chance of playing. My DD was part of a large freshman class but by the end there was only her and one other frosh still active with the team.

The program did have what I believe is likely their most successful season ever. My DD did get to play a decent amount (40 ab, 30 ip) in two different spots (pitch and DP) and performed well. She had fun.

One interesting tidbit is that once everyone figured out how many girls were rostered it was the topic of most conversations that parents had when the fall scrimmages started. Apparently this was overheard when potential recruits started showing up. The head coach put out the word that he wanted noone associated with the program (players, coaches, parents, etc.) talking about the number of players on the team. Apparently it did affect him with some future recruits.

Anyone on the outside looking in would not have realized how many players there actually were in the beginning. Quite a few never showed up on the roster as they did not update the team's website roster until right before the spring games started. Quite a few were already long gone by then. If they saw the club play in the spring they would have actually thought the program was short as already mentioned they were only suiting up somewhere in the mid-teens toward the end.

It will be interesting to see how many are there when they start back up in two weeks. Word is that it will be a lower number than started with the team last year. Irregardless, my DD feels she is in a very solid position with the program going forward no matter how many are there.

As to travel teams I would say around 12 at 10U as a lot of families at that age do not know exactly what they are committing to and can't be relied on. We had what was probably our best player at the time miss most of ASA nationals once because her mom wanted to "take her to the lake" for a few days. At 12's and 14's it seems 11 is a good number. One of our favorite and most successful seasons was a season at 14's where we had only 10 the whole year. (all families committed and every kid pretty talented) 16's is a little tougher. Everybody is correct in that there are lots of other committments at that age that demand the kids time. At the same time that is when most of the recruiting takes place and when it gets down to it noone wants to be sitting when you have a number of college coaches at your game. It seemed to me that around 12 with a long list of available pick-ups worked best. 18's is even harder especially after they have made a college commit. We have had 14 on the team and had to get pick-ups darn near every weekend. We had a team this summer of girls who had either already played last year as college freshmen or were incoming college freshmen who were playing to stay sharp. Among other things we had one miss a days worth of games because she was getting a new tatoo.