soreshins wrote:Many 14u teams have better talent than 18u teams. In our area, 18u teams are made up of 16 and 17 year olds that are not good enough to play gold. Many 18u teams are down right pathetic. While defeating an 18u team may seem like an achievement it really is not a big deal.
In the gold division, you have a lot teams that have no business claiming to be gold and have no shot at qualifying for gold nationals. These teams should be "18u" but no one wants to admit their players are not good enough to play gold. I have seen 14u squads defeat lower tier gold teams. I have yet to see a 14u squad be able to stay in the park with a legit gold team.
You haven't seen it all, then. When I had 14U teams in 2004 and 2005, Bruder's Raiders won over 20 games against Gold teams and Campbell's USA Athletics were comparable. In 2007, Tyson's Corona Angels routinely beat up on Gold competition. When I was coaching Crunch Gold, they lambasted us while Lisa Fernandez was looking at OUR pitcher.
