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OT Travel Ball Advice

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SPAMM

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Following up on the Baseball Expert Question in a different way. We have a "make believe" grandson", through a God daughter relationship, who is 13, lives near Boston, a pretty good ball player, who like many, has baseball aspirations. He just made his first travel team, the Middlesex Reds. I was a reasonably good player when younger but stopped at 15 and that was 60 years ago. Everything I know about travel ball I have learned from CIS. My requests 1. What advice would you give to a travel ball player now and as he grows into high school to get the most out of it? 2. Can some one find an article, video, or PDF, or even just advice on "Being a first time Travel Ball parent" His father has little athletic experience and didn't play sports, let alone baseball, on an organized level in high school or college.
 
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Travel ball sucks. Losing means nothing to most kids nowadays because of it. There’s always another tourney the following weekend… and likely called a “World Series” of some kind. Smoke and mirrors.

And I won’t even get into the money grab aspect of it. The entire thing stinks in my opinion.
 
Travel ball is nothing but a money grab, but you better be willing to pay the price if you have aspirations because a huge part of baseball, basketball, soccer, hockey and lacrosse recruiting comes from travel sports as opposed to high school sports. There are exceptions in the case of kids who have 95 mph fastballs or are 7' tall, but the best players are in travel sports and its more efficient for college recruiters to go to travel tournaments than it is to go to individual high school games.
 
There is no reason to play travel ball before you get to high school. Unless that kid is the elite of the elite, he’s not gonna get any offers before then.

Run fast, throw hard, swing hard, hit the ball hard and far. That’s how you get scholarship offers. Work on that in the off-season, not travel ball.
 
My son is 8 and I’m actually thinking of putting him in 9u. I cannot take anymore rec nonsense. Half the kids are picking their noses or staring out into space or afraid of the ball. My only option for real coaching and playing with teammates who really enjoy playing baseball is travel, no?
 
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Canesfreak said:
My son is 8 and I’m actually thinking of putting him in 9u. I cannot take anymore rec nonsense. Half the kids are picking their noses or staring out into space or afraid of the ball. My only option for real coaching and playing with teammates who really enjoy playing baseball is travel, no?
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yes, and as he gets older you're gonna want somebody with pro baseball connections because those travel teams are the ones colleges and scouts pay attention to. sent you a PM on this.
 
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Wow! That’s a lot of travel ball hate! Travel ball is where a young player WILL play the best. Rec is good for T-ball and coach pitch then move on asap. It’s important to find a team with a coach who’s kid is either the best and there’s no doubt of that or has no kid on the team. Find a team that kids at the HS your kid intends to go to plays for. Play at the highest level their talent allows lots of playing time for. Get to majors PG and PBR if they can and play against freaks. The colleges WILL be there.
 
NC_Canes_11 said:
There is no reason to play travel ball before you get to high school. Unless that kid is the elite of the elite, he’s not gonna get any offers before then.

Run fast, throw hard, swing hard, hit the ball hard and far. That’s how you get scholarship offers. Work on that in the off-season, not travel ball
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NC_Canes_11 said:
There is no reason to play travel ball before you get to high school. Unless that kid is the elite of the elite, he’s not gonna get any offers before then.

Run fast, throw hard, swing hard, hit the ball hard and far. That’s how you get scholarship offers. Work on that in the off-season, not travel ball.
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Don't think so. Wait to arriving at high school and, unless Johnny is a stud, he won't be playing HS ball. Travel ball at 8 is indeed silly, but you better play at a higher level and not just rec ball before showing up for HS tryouts.
 
bacane said:
Don't think so. Wait to arriving at high school and, unless Johnny is a stud, he won't be playing HS ball. Travel ball at 8 is indeed silly, but you better play at a higher level and not just rec ball before showing up for HS tryouts.
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If you can’t make the high school team you suck.
 
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bacane said:
Says a lot about the HS team.
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No it doesn’t. There might be 100 high school teams in the entire country that require you to be legit legit to make the team. Half of those are some sort of academies that specialize in certain sports.

If your kid throws 90 or is right on track to, there is no need to throw year round. If your kid is an elite position player, I’m fine with them getting as many live AB’s as possible. But you don’t need to pay $5k a year at age 10-12 to travel the country. At that age there are not enough pitchers you’ll see that will prepare them for what comes next, to justify the money. That doesn’t start until age 14.
 
NC_Canes_11 said:
No it doesn’t. There might be 100 high school teams in the entire country that require you to be legit legit to make the team. Half of those are some sort of academies that specialize in certain sports.

If your kid throws 90 or is right on track to, there is no need to throw year round. If your kid is an elite position player, I’m fine with them getting as many live AB’s as possible. But you don’t need to pay $5k a year at age 10-12 to travel the country. At that age there are not enough pitchers you’ll see that will prepare them for what comes next, to justify the money. That doesn’t start until age 14.
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Ok, if you have a kid throwing 90 - or on track to - playing rec ball and about to enter high school then you have a rare gem. Good luck.
 
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ChinstrapCane said:
Travel ball is nothing but a money grab, but you better be willing to pay the price if you have aspirations because a huge part of baseball, basketball, soccer, hockey and lacrosse recruiting comes from travel sports as opposed to high school sports. There are exceptions in the case of kids who have 95 mph fastballs or are 7' tall, but the best players are in travel sports and its more efficient for college recruiters to go to travel tournaments than it is to go to individual high school games.
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bacane said:
Ok, if you have a kid throwing 90 - or on track to - playing rec ball and about to enter high school then you have a rare gem. Good luck.
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If your kid is that good as a pitcher he can not play anything outside of middle school ball and just work with a pitching coach until he’s high school and be better off than almost everybody else.
 
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@SPAMM

It’s great that he’s getting into travel ball.

1) Make sure it’s a healthy environment. Poisonous environments don’t have development and that’s why you play travel.

2) This isn’t little league. If he struggles then he’ll lose his job per say. Everybody needs to understand this or No. 1 starts to grow. It’s the coaches jobs to win and keep going to better tournaments.

3) At high school age, he needs a team that focuses on showcases and getting him in front of scouts of all levels. If the team he grew with can’t provide that and it’s his goal to play higher level ball then you need to find a team that does.

4) Be careful with burn out. Don’t be afraid to tell the coach that you pre planned a trip or an activity once in a while. It’s his job to field a competitive team, not your kids job to be his A-Rod.


He’ll have the time of his life. I promise.
 
Lmao at all the dads thinking that travel ball will make their kids into better baseball players. Cool uniforms, meaningless trophies, and 7 games a weekend isn’t going to make a Joe into a pro. If
Your kid is good enough, he’s going to play at the next level. If he’s good enough there, then he’ll play at the level after that. If he’s not good enough, all the travel in the world isn’t going to make him into a baller.
 
Looking back as I grew up in travel ball from 9years old through high school and played in college.. at the younger age it’s good for a more competitive and learning environment. Back in the late 90s rec ball was a joke. Travel ball you learned a lot at a young age with a good coach… once you hit 14 I could see playing less travel ball till highschool as your growing a lot and really should play multiple sports imo.. cooperstown is a fun one when your younger to go to if you can afford it and your team is actually really good. I wouldn’t go if your team is shaky.

Highschool in south Florida baseball was very competitive (can’t speak on currently). Travel ball in highschool is necessary and once your kid is good enough then to the perfect game tournament and east Cobb Georgia always had a big tournament in the summers littered with college scouts… personal training and working with ex pro players(they are all over south Florida)

PS.. if your kid isnt elite in Florida and doesn’t get any offers. Look for other states to apply to. Kids in Florida that couldn’t get offered a walk on could play in the northeast/midwest and be studs on teams.
 
Ok my son is 7 and he's in both rec and travel ball (started travel ball this year). He has the same coaches for both teams and it's essentially the same players, too. Basically our rec team is pretty good and the coach wanted to put them on a travel ball team so they could develop more as a group with more innings.

In rec league, the overall skill level is weak and the kids don't care. Also, lots of parents aren't engaged whatsoever and spend the entire game discussing the best spaghetti sauce or the upcoming festival in city. No one is paying attention.

In travel ball, the skill level is MUCH better and you don't have kids chasing butterflies or throwing their caps in the air when the ball is rolling toward them. However, it's expensive and every parent seems to think each out or bad call is going to cost their 7 year old a scholarship to all 16 SEC baseball programs and wants to argue to death over it. The only thing worse than poor trash is wealthy trash. And like another poster said, the kids don't really care about W-L's because it's always one tournament after another - and the "World Series" is just a collection of teams that wanted to pay the entry fee....it's not about the best teams.

Rec ball - poor talent/coaching with parents who don't care - doesn't hurt the wallet
Travel ball - better talent/coaching with parents who care too much - really hurts the wallet
 
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