Youth Basketball: The climb to an AAU National Championship (Part 3)

My daughter, CC and her team are making a run at a AAU Division I National Championship. I am following the process through this series of blog posts.

• (Part 1) Youth Basketball: The Climb to an AAU National Championship - Registration Process
• (Part 2) Youth Basketball: The Climb to an AAU National Championship - Tournament Qualifying Process.
• (Part 3) The Super Regional Step

Background

My daughter's 4th grade AAU team has been together since December '10. The team played up in a local winter league against 5th and 6th grade teams to prepare for the 4th grade AAU season. The girls took their lumps playing against bigger, more physical and more experienced teams, but they also won quite a few games while they gained confidence and toughness. 

The team also played in several 4th grade tournaments over the winter to gauge where they stood against their peers. These games gave CC's team a chance to work on plays without the intense pressure that older girls provided. The team won every 4th grade tournament game leading up to their eventual run at AAU Division I National Championship. In fact, they won almost every game by a margin of victory of 10, 20 and 30+ points. They were ready to start the climb to a national championship.

The AAU season started March 25th at the pre-qualifying tournament.

Pre-Qualifying Tournament

Fast Break

The Ohio AAU put on a pre-quaifying tournament the weekend of March 25th. CC's team entered the tournament to prep for the Super Regionals the following week. 

Note: Super Regionals, Districts and the National Tournaments all use a 30 second shot clock. It's highly recommended that teams who have not played with a 30 second shot clock play in a pre-qualifier to get used to the shot clock. Our 4th grade girls had never played with a shot clock before.

CC's team won all of the pool play games of the pre-qualifier including an exciting over-time victory against the host team. It was the first 4th grade team to challenge our girls. The host team then avenged their heart breaking loss in pool play to win the tournament championship game. That was the first loss of the season against a 4th grade team. I am pretty sure the team felt like the #1 UCONN women did tonight after losing to Notre Dame.

After the loss, there were no tears, but the team did leave with a feeling like they could have and should have won the tournament. After the game, the team was reminded that they would get a chance to take it back the next weekend in the Super Regionals. And they were also reminded that they would have their 5 ft. 9 in center back who missed the pre-qualifying tournament due to spring break.

Super Regionals

The Ohio District for Girl's AAU Basketball held a Super Regional Tournament this past weekend. Only 3 teams signed up for the tournament, so only one invitation to the Division I National Tournament would be awarded. (See Part 2 for National Championship Qualifying Rules) 

The pressure was on. To gain a bid for a Division I National AAU Title, CC's team needed to win the tournament and that meant beating the team that beat CC's team in the pre-qualifier.

4th Grade AAU Team

The team's center was back in action and the girls won both pool play games, but it was not easy. The pool play game against our new rival went into over time again. CC's team was victorious, but the win was meaningless because both teams would advance to the Super Regional championship game. 

The finals turned out to be a very physical game between two teams that wanted desperately to earn a Division I bid. Girls were getting knocked down and crying, coaches were yelling and fans were riding the refs. It was pure excitement and I think that we all forgot that these were just 10 year old girls playing a game that was meant to be fun. 

Super Regional Gold Metal

The lead changed hands back and forth all game long until CC's team put together some clutch shots done the stretch to pull away and win 33-24.

The Main Point

The climb to a Division I AAU National Championship is not easy. It will be a battle. I blog with unfounded confidence. I have no idea how good the teams are in other parts of the country in comparison to my daughter's team. It will be fun to watch it all unfold. Regardless of how it turns out this will be a great experience for my daughter.

Youth Basketball: The climb to an AAU National Championship (Part 2)

My daughter, CC and her team are making a run at a AAU Division I National Championship. I am following the process through this series of blog posts.

• (Part 1) Youth Basketball: The Climb to an AAU National Championship - Registration Process
• (Part 2) Youth Basketball: The Climb to an AAU National Championship - Tournament Qualifying Process.

How to Qualify


There are three ways to qualify for an AAU Basketball National Tournament

1. Place in the Top 4* of a Super Regional Tournament (* Depends on number of teams playing, see below)
2. Place in the Top 2 of a District Qualifying Tournament
3. Place in the Top 4 of the previous year's National Championship tournament

Step One: Find a Super Regional Tournament. The AAU website has a complete list of Super Regional Tournaments under the Events tab. Click here for the list.

Step Two: Register for a Super Regional Tournament on-line. 

My daughter's team played in the Cincinnati Super Regional

Step Three: Compete in Super Regional Tournament and win games. 

• Teams are awarded invitations also called bids to the Division I, Division II, or Division III National Championships based on how well they finish in their Super Regional Tournament(s).
• The number of invitations awarded to the National Championship from a Super Regional is based on the number of teams entered in the tournament. The chart below outlines the number of bids awarded.

• All teams that receive an invitation to participate in a National Championship Tournament via a Super Regional Tournament need to play in their District Championship Tournaments to validate their bids. 

Step Five: Find a District Tournament to validate Super Regional Bid. Go to the Events tab of the AAU website for a complete list of District Tournaments. Click here for the list. (Note: At the time of this post, this link led to a coming soon message. If this is not updated yet, go to the website of your district. For a complete list of District websites click here. From your District website, you can get a list of District Qualifying Tournaments.


Step Six: Register for a District Tournament on-line. 

• If a team qualifies for the tournament via the Super Regional but can not play in the Districts, their coach must petition the tournament committee to validate the bid. The bid may or may not be approved.

Step Seven: Compete in District Tournament and place high. 

• The position that a team finishes in the District tournament will influence their seeding position in the National Championship. (I will cover the National Championship Draw in a future post.)
• Note for Coaches: If you qualified your team via a Super Regional, you cannot add players for the District Tournament. If players are added your team will lose their Super Regional bid and the team will need to re-qualify via the District Tournament by placing in the top 2 teams of the division in which you want to compete.

Step Eight

• If your team plays in a Super Regional but does not received an invitation for the Division level Tournament that the team was targeting, then that team can compete in another Super Regional.

Other Ways to Qualify

• A team can qualify for the National Championship Tournament without competing in a Super Regional if they finish in the Top 2 of the District Qualifying Tournament for division in which they want to compete for a National Championship. (Example: A team that finishes in the Top 2 of the Division I District Tournament will automatically qualify for an invitation to the Division 1 National Championship Tournament. Teams that finish 3rd or worse, can elect to play in the Division II or III National Tournaments. A team that is trying to qualify for the Division II National Tournament needs to finish in the Top 2 of the Division II District Tournament)
• A team that plays in the Division I District Tournament before a Super Regional and does not finish in the top 2 needs to play in a Super Regional to earn a bid. The team's finish in the District event that they played in will count for the National Championship seeding process. In effect, a team that plays in the District Tournament before the Super Regionals has pre-validated their invitation. 
• The top four finishers in the previous year's National Championship Tournament receive an automatic invitation to the current year's tournament.

The Main Point

The easiest way to qualify for a Division I invitation is to place high in a Super Regional Tournament. Tomorrow, my daughter is competing in a Super Regional.

Youth Basketball: The climb to an AAU National Championship (Part 1)

What does it take to make a run at a Division I AAU basketball National Championship?

Right now, I do not know, but I will be learning about the process as my daughter's 4th grade AAU team goes through the process from AAU registration to qualifying tournaments to the National Championship tournament in Orlando, Florida August 1-8. I assume that they will qualify.

Over the next 18 weeks, I will blog about the journey so that coaches, players and parents can learn about the process with me. I will share tips and tricks about how to register, how to qualify, what to pack, where to stay, where to eat, and how much it will all cost.

Phase One - AAU Membership Registration

All athletes and coaches must be members of the AAU. The coach of your team will either register the individual players and the club or will instruct you to register your athlete. 

'

All participants including athletes and non-athletes such as administrators, bench personnel, coaches, instructors, managers, scorekeepers, tournament director, volunteers, etc. must be current AAU members to participate in all AAU sanctioned events.

Registration for AAU membership is available online with a credit card (Visa, MasterCard, Discover, American Express). It is easy to register and print out the AAU Membership card. 

The cost of a membership is $12 for athletes and $14 for non-athletes. There are also membership fees for clubs.

All athletes and coaches must show their AAU membership verification at the registration of all AAU sanctioned events. 

Note: Each athlete must be able to prove his or her age and grade for all AAU sanctioned events. You can find age / grade requirements here. 

Proof of grade must be available for review by AAU representatives at all AAU sanctioned events. 

• To prove your athlete's school grade, make a photocopy of the athletes’ report card for the current school year which shows name, grade and school. 
• To prove your athletes age, make a certified copy of birth record from the State, County, or Municipal Bureau of Vital Statistics in the place of birth. Hospital records are not acceptable. Other approved forms to prove age including passports can be found here.

The Main Point

The most viewed series of posts that I have written was concerning the Cooperstown Dreams Park baseball tournament. Readers found those posts very helpful. I intend to make these posts equally worthwhile.

Youth Sports: How Do Single Parents Do It? (Three)

Through the first 90 days of the year, my kids have played in 69 games and participated in 57 practices. Crazy I know. During this time, my wife and I logged 3006 miles in the car going to and from practices and games.

A schedule like this takes lots of coordination and lots of team work.  My wife and I are a team. Every morning we look at the schedule and figure out how we are going to work together 1) to help the kids get their homework completed, feed the kids and get the kids to their sports commitments.

I am the homework helper and my wife does most of the cooking.

If you are a single dad, a stay at home dad or the dad of a with a workaholic wife and your kids are as busy as mine, check out the time saving parenting tips on ManoftheHouse.com.

Here's a taste of what you will find on the ManoftheHouse site, cooking tips for quick meals from a friend of mine, Todd Jessee aka The Cheating Gourmet. Quick is the key.



The Main Point

Sometimes you need to be creative to figure out how to manage a busy youth sports schedule.

Youth Baseball: Cold Bats

Baseball started in Ohio, perhaps a week or so too early. The temps were cold all weekend. The bats were certainly cold all weekend. And yet the coaches provided some warmth.

Temperatures were in the 30's for Friday night's contest. The doubleheader on Saturday started at 4pm with cold grey skies and the final pitch of game two came at 10pm with snow falling. The biting wind was a constant companion the entire weekend.

I was only keeping score and I was in pain. I couldn't get my fingers to work to record the happenings on the field, let alone throw a baseball or swing a bat. I could only image the pain my son was feeling as the bat hit the ball or a fastball popped in his catchers mitt.

Ironically, the opposing pitchers were throwing heat while our bats were seemingly frozen to the shoulder's of our kids. Catching up to a 75-80 mph pitch in warm weather mid season is very hard, trying to do it early in the year in the freezing cold is almost impossible.

Our team lost 3 games by a total of 40 runs to three of the best teams in the US.

The most valuable player on our team was throwing heat too - a 115,000 BTU electric blast heater in the dugout. The heater kept an intolerable situation somewhat bearable. HeatMax Hot Hands helped too.

The Main Point

After a 16-0 loss on Friday night, the team gathered in the outfield so the coach could talk to the kids outside of the parent's earshot. This was nothing new for my son. His former team did this after almost every game, win or lose.

The meeting went on for 10 minutes or more. The parents waited patiently in the cold.

Finally the meeting broke up. And there was something new for my son. He emerged from the huddle with a smile and he was not the only one. The entire team looked upbeat. What? No sprints? No one was berated?

We have a coaching staff that is focused on player development and building confidence. That made me feel warm inside.

Basehit

Circle of Moms - 25 Best Daddy Blogs - Vote for Stats Dad

If you enjoy reading the blog.

If you think that my youth sport tips are useful.

Please vote for Stats Dad as a Top 25 Dad blog at Circle of Moms. Click here to vote.

Thanks for your support

Youth Sports: Genetic Testing Young Athletes

The same day I wrote a tongue in cheek post about cloning athletes, I stumbled upon an Associated Press article called Could gene tests tell if kids can be sports stars. A coincidence, I think not.

Crazy Youth Sports Parents Series

In the article, I learned that parents are actually testing the genetic make-up of their kids to determine which combination of the ACTN3 gene and R577X mutation their kids have.  The combination is associated with fast versus slow twitch muscle fibers.

Supposedly, the relationship between the ACTN3 gene and the R577X mutations may determine the type of athlete your kid was born to be. Do you want to know if your kid has the genes to be an endurance athlete, a sprinter / power athlete or is your kid suited for both? A test by Atlas Sports Genetics can tell you which combination your kid has.

What the test will not tell you is if your kid will be a superstar.

~30% of the population has the sprinter / power combination
~18% of the population has the endurance combination
~50% of the population have markers for both

These are the only combinations a person can be.

There's no combination associated with super athletes and only 1% of the population are professional athletes.

In my opinion, these numbers make the test somewhat meaningless and a questionable use of money.

The Main Point

If you want athletic offspring don't test your kids after they are born it's way too late by then.

Instead, test your future spouse before you have kids. And I'm not talking about testing them with a swab on the inside of their cheek. No, you need to take them on to an athletic field, court or track and put them to the test. Think NFL combine style.

Are they big enough, fast enough and strong enough to produce future stars. Do they have the mental make up. Do the have an inner drive to work hard and a desire to win. Yes I am talking psychological testing.

You might also want to hire some scouts too because you'll need to do your due diligence. To get the best match you will need lots of research into the athletic history of potential suitors and their lineage.

When you and your staff find the right person, marry and procreate.

Of course your spouse is only one side of the equation. Maybe you're the problem and if you are considering testing your kid you probably are the problem.

If you're not athletic I would recommend adopting an athletic kid like Michael Oher. Michael Oher was the homeless boy who became an All American football player and NFL draft pick with the help of adoptive parents. His story was made famous in the movie The Blind Side. Your scouting staff can help identify potential kids to adopt too.

Seriously, even if you have the right genes and your spouse has the right genes there are so many other influencing factors that will determine if a kid will become an elite athlete.

Youth Soccer: Brasil / USA pen pals

Two worlds apart people helping people.

Trace, the administrator of my daughter's soccer team website has a friend in Brazil named Eric. Eric teaches English to Brazilian students. The two talk soccer regularly. Trace sends Eric videos of our youth soccer team. Eric has been sending notes of support to the team via Trace.

Together they came up with an idea to support each other. They are in the early stages of establishing a dialogue between Eric's students and our U10 soccer players.

Students in Brazil are encouraging the players on my daughter's soccer team via email notes.

The girls on my daughter's soccer team are sending notes back in English. Notes that help the students in Brazil learn the language and some things about our culture. Through the exchange, our kids are learning a bit about the culture in Brazil. And who knows maybe our kids will learn some Portuguese.

Pretty cool.

Hi Girls!

I live in Brazil and I saw the website and the videos of your team! I liked so much!

You are very good players and I'm very happy to know there are girls like you, lovely about soccer like me!

 In Brazil, as anybody should know, we love soccer! But here, girls teams don't have many incentives yet...

So, is pretty cool as you can see girls who are dedicated to soccer.

I  hope you can achieve all your goals!

Good luck on the next tournaments!

Kisses,

Clara

Hi Clara

My name is Jess  #7.  First let me say thanks to everyone for all the 

encouraging words.  My team will do all we can do to bring home another trophy.

We play our first tournament of the seaon next week, March 12 -13 and we are all excited.  

It is really neat to have some supporters from Brazil, my favorite soccer players are also from Brazil,  Adriano and Rogerio Ceni.

Bye for now,  : )

Jess #7 

The Main Point


I am thrilled with the opportunities my daughter has to play sports. I realize that many women around the world are not as lucky. I am thrilled that my daughter can exchange notes with fans thousands of miles away thanks to a nice idea by two guys worlds apart and the power of the internet.

Youth Soccer: Cloning Athletes

I think that cloning talented athletes is an objectionable idea. 

But I wouldn't object if my 10 year old daughter wanted to follow the footsteps of her cousin, Dineen Sampson. Dineen won Academic All-Conference honors playing Women's Soccer in college.

My Daughter - Yellow Adidas Jersey - Stops Striker in All White

My Niece - Yellow Adidas Jersey - Stops Striker in All White

The Main Point

Freaky. 

Youth Sports: Mouth Guards Are Recommended

My daughter is average height for a 4th grader, but considered short when she is on the basketball court playing with amazingly tall 4th grader AAU ballers. Her face is often at the height of swinging elbows which puts her at risk of bloody lips and lost teeth.

There is a great post on www.girlsplaysports.com called Mouth Guards are a Must... It is a must read of parents of all athletes boys and girls.

The Main Point

I need to get my daughter to wear a mouth guard. She has had 2 bloody lips since the AAU season started 3 months ago. Luckily she has not lost any teeth. She has also taken a charge and fell back and hit her head. Read Youth Basketball: Busted Lip

According to the post on www.GirlsplaySports.com mouth guards are proven to reduce the risk of concussions too.

I have seen some kids wear mouth guards for basketball and soccer. I would guess about 2 out of 10 at the most. If my daughter started wearing one, she be the only one on her current basketball team wearing one. No one on her soccer team wears one this year either, although two girls did last year.

She is proud and will resist wearing a mouth piece until someone else wears one. She will need to convince her best friend to do it with her.

Youth Soccer: Not Playing Up to Her Potential

What do you do when your young athlete is not playing up to his or her potential?

I say bite your tongue until your son or daughter wants to talk about it. That's what I did this weekend and it seemed to work.

This past weekend, we went to Columbus for an elite level invitational soccer tournament.

My daughter has not been very thrilled about soccer since last fall. In fact, she has mentioned on more than one occasion that this is her last year. How quickly things change, last year she was all about soccer. At that time, she was a star on her team,  a scoring machine.

Fast-forward to a new coach with a new system and a new group of girls. Things are radically different. While others have flourished in the new environment, but my daughter has not and her love for soccer has waned.

With her confidence at a low point, she gets frustrated quickly. The high level of determination that she used to bring to every game has diminished greatly. Instead of battling through defenses, she now gets knocked off the ball and on to the ground with ease. To make matters worse, she has been stopping play regularly as she cries on the ground.

Crazy Youth Sports Parent Alert

This has been a bit frustrating for me and my wife to watch. I actually lost some self-control for a split second Saturday when I yelled, "GET UP, YOU'RE NOT HURT." I immediately regretted my comment even though I knew it was true.

She did not contribute much in the two games on Saturday. I was secretly wondering why we even came up. After the games, we drove in silence to the hotel. I was kicking myself for feeling agitated by her play. "She is 10" I kept telling myself as I bit my tongue and search my brain for something to say. By the way, we don't sugar coat things. We do not tell our kids that they played well if they didn't. My daughter is smart and self-aware. She knows when she has not played well and doesn't like to talk about it when it happens.

Her spirits were lifted after spending time with teammates in the hotel pool and at dinner. At night, she was ready to talk.

She said, "Dad, it is not fair that I did not get to play goalie at all today."

Oh that is what was bothering her. I asked her if she thought the other goalie did well in the games.

She said, "yes she played great, but we should be splitting the time."

I said, "Honey, the goalie has to be the toughest player on the field. It takes lots of bravery. It takes lots of determination. You have not been showing the coaches how incredibly tough you are lately. You've been getting knocked down and crying a lot. I think that the coach wants to protect you. He probably thinks that you get hurt easily. Listen, I know that you're tough. Your mother and brother know you're tough. You know you're tough. So if you want to play goalie, you need to show the coach that you are physically and mentally tough again. Until then make things happen on the field by hustling, staying on your feet and making good passes and shots."

She did not say anything in return, but I knew she was listening.

Tough 1V1 save before getting drilled

As fate would have it, the team's primary goalie couldn't play on Sunday. She suffered an ankle sprain making a tough save late Saturday. On Sunday morning, my daughter, CC, started in goal. She played with absolute toughness and made some tremendous saves. She only allowed one goal all day and her team won both Sunday games.

After the game,  I just ran up to her with a big smile on my face and gave her a big affirmation hug because I could tell by her eyes that she was very proud of herself.

On the car ride home, she said that she wants to get an official club goalie jersey for next season.


Next season? I thought she was done with soccer.

The Main Point

What do you do when your young athlete is not playing up to his or her potential?

1) Think about your young athlete's age and situation. Do you really need to do or say anything?
2) Don't shower them with disingenuous praise. Kids are a lot smarter than parents give them credit for. They know how they did. They know where they rank. They probably know that they could be doing better.
3) If you need to talk, talk about aspects of the game that your athlete did do well.
4) Look and listen for clues that they may not want to talk about it at all. Kids put pressure on themselves, they don't need added pressure.
5) Wait, if you are generally supportive and rational, your kid will eventually engage with you about the frustrations they have regarding the sport they are playing. They will seek your wisdom on their terms in their time. If you are typically an ass - they will probably not approach you. Then you need to answer this question Are you playing up to your potential as a father or mother?
6) Finally, be prepared that they may be just fine playing below their potential and having fun instead. It probably will not change their lives that much.  Only 2 to 5% of HS Athletes play in college. Less than .5% of HS athletes play pro.

Youth Sports: Parents Be Nice to Youth Athletes

A poster was framed and conspicuously placed by the entrance of a elementary school gym door. The message was aimed at Crazy Youth Sports Parents.

There was one poster for boys and one for girls. This is the girls version.

IF THIS SHOE FITS

Please don't curse that girl down there

Please don't curse that girl down there,
She is my daughter you see,
She's only just a girl you know,
She means the world to me.

I did not raise my daughter, dear fan,
For you to call her names,
She may not be a superstar
And those are grade school games.

So, please don't knock those girls down there.
They do the best they can.
They've never tried to lose a game.
They're girls, and you're a man*.

This game belongs to them, you see,
You're really just a guest.
They do not need a fan that gripes,
They need the very best.

If you have nothing nice to say,
Please leave the girls alone.
and, if you've forgot your manners,
Why don't you stay at home!

So please don't curse those girls down there,
Each one's her parents' daughter.
And win or lose or tie, you see,
To us, they're number one!!!

The Main Point

Some teams as young as 8 and 9 years old are so good that parents / fans forget that the athletes are young kids. Crazy Youth Sports Parents please do not lose perspective and try to stay positive.

*Note - I have seen and heard many women who would have inspired the author of this poem too.

I tried to research the author of this poem - I could not find any reference to it anywhere. If you know who wrote this I would love to give them the proper credits / links.

Youth Sports: Should Your Kid Specialize in One Sport

The question is should your kid specialize in one sport?

First a definition of specialization. Specialization in youth sports is year round training in one sport and one sport only. My oldest son specialized in soccer from age 12. (More on that later.) Some parents select a sport for their kids to specialize in at ages as young as 5.

The alternative to specialization is sampling according to Sharon Chirban, Ph.D, a Psychology Instructor at Harvard Medical School, in a piece for the Huffington Post. Sampling in this case means involvement in multiple sports.

She argues that the dangers of specialization outweigh the advantages. Read Specialization Vs. Sampling in Youth Sports: Which is healthier?

She talks about the physical side:

Overuse injuries are among the biggest risks to young athletes who play a single sport. Training and working the same muscles and joints year-round allows no time for the child's body to rest and recover -- which is essential for healthy development.

She talks about the mental side:

In fact, the psychological threats of sports training can be just as serious as the physical injuries. Children who spend too much time training for a particular sport year-round often find themselves experiencing burnout before they reach high school, leading them to withdrawal from sports. Additionally, the increased pressure and stress that comes with this highly intensive and competitive training can be mentally wearing for young athletes.

What she doesn't talk about is my daughter's situation:

My daughter specializes in two sports year round, select soccer and AAU basketball. She also samples in CYO volleyball. She is getting the cross training benefit of sampling and the specialization benefit of year round training.

                     

What she is not getting is time for her body to rest and recover. And my daughter is not alone. Most of the star players on her elite teams are gifted multiple sports athletes who play multiple sports year round.

I worry about specialization. How can you tell at age 10 what sport will provide the most enjoyment, success and confidence / character building long term?

I worry about not specializing. If she does not participate in year round select soccer or basketball other players who do specialize will advance ahead of her.

I worry about overuse injuries. Cross training allows her to develop many different sets of muscles, but she has little time to recover.

What to do?

The Main Point

We are allowing my daughter to play multiple sports year round. We do not want her to specialize at this age. We also do not want her to fall behind in one sport or another. We are not as concerned about overuse issues because my daughter's motor is running non-stop whether she has an organized game or practice or not. She rushes home after basketball games to play basketball on our little basketball court on the side of the house. On days off she begs me to go to the gym where there is an indoor basketball court. I could not slow her down if I tried.

Back to my older son who specialized in soccer. He was a small and agile in his younger years. He would have been considered a finesse player. A midfielder who could defend the middle third and distribute the ball. He was good enough to make the freshman team of his HS. Then he started to grow and the growth robbed him of his speed and agility. The key to HS soccer is speed so he did not advance to play on the JV or Varsity teams. He grew to 6ft 3in. Perhaps volleyball would have been a better choice.

In the case of my daughter, what would you do? Let her play multiple high level, high stress sports year round or specialize in one. She is equally good in both sports.

Youth Sports: They Do Not Last Forever

Youth sports careers can come to an end with one decision by a coach.

My son was working out with his personal baseball trainer last night. His trainer is an ex-Met organization catcher who is now a coach for a local high school team. My son's select baseball team and this local high school have formed a partnership. As part of the partnership, the school provides some coaching support and allows the team to use its facilities. The goal is to help develop more talent for the school, a school that has won numerous state championships.

Typically the facility is empty when my son works out with this coach, but last night the facility was loaded with high school freshman. Freshman players who were trying out for one of the HS teams (freshman, junior varsity or varsity).

Yesterday was cut day.

After the practice was over, the two head coaches set up chairs at the mound end of a pitching / hitting cage. Two chairs were facing the plate and one chair was facing the mound. The coaches took their positions in the two seats facing the plate. All if the kids assembled outside the cage behind home plate and waited to be called. As each was called in, they would walk the 60ft 6 inches and sit in the chair facing the coaches. Some walked with confidence and some walked with hesitation as they approached the seat and their baseball fate.

I talked to the coaches after the process was over. They both said that they love coaching baseball and dread cut day. It's a painful experience for both the players and the coaches.

The Main Point

Season is Finally Over

Only God knows when your son / daughter will play in his / her last game. Youth sports dreams can be end quickly - especially if you go to a very large and competitive high school. As such, kids should lead a balanced life. My kids are sports fanatics and play non-stop. They play at very high levels for their current ages and have high expectations to play in HS and maybe even college (A big maybe). My kids are too young to predict the future. Some kids get more athletic compared to peers as they get older and grow and others who dominated in the younger age bracket leagues regressed in comparison.

Watching the freshman kids walk off with their heads down, holding back tears made me think that I really need to prepare my kids and myself for the day that youth sports are over.

A note regarding the differences between select baseball and recreational ball. 
My son is two years away from trying out for the HS team as a freshman. I asked the coach how difficult it is to make one of the teams as a freshman. He said that most of the kids who play high level select ball have no problem making the team. In fact, he said that it is really easy to spot these kids.

He said that the toughest part of cut day is dealing with the rec ball kid who was a superstar on his team. Typically these kids think that they are good and probably are compared to other rec ball players, but the rec level players are not nearly good enough to compete with the select baseball player.

Youth Volleyball: Son Did Not Make the Cut

It hurts when you get cut when you are trying out for a team. You feel embarrassed. You feel sad. You feel like a loser. You question yourself on what you did wrong. You make excuses. You look for any reason that can justify the obvious injustice, perhaps it was an injury or politics or whatever.

On Sunday, my son, Nic, tried out for his school's volleyball team. Last year, he chose to play on the B team because he did not think that he could not commit to the A team and play 75 baseball games. Baseball was / is his main sport.

Nic found the B team to be completely frustrating. The season was summed up by one frustrated parent who yelled out during a game, "THE OBJECT OF THE GAME IS TO HIT THE BALL BEFORE IT HITS THE GROUND"

It turned out that Nic had very few conflicts between volleyball and baseball last year. Volleyball practice was held after school and baseball practices were in the evenings. Furthermore, volleyball games were typically played during the week, while most baseball games were on the weekends. As such, this year, my son decided to tryout for the A team with hopes of eventually being the team's setter.

I tried to talk him out of trying out for the team. I expressed my concern about being overscheduled. I suggested to him that he concentrate on baseball and play in a few junior PGA tournaments to prepare for the golf season. He listened and understood, but he wanted to play volleyball with his friends.

After the tryout, he was very confident that he would make the team. I was very confident that he would make it.

The list came out this morning before school started. My son was on the B team list. He did not make the  A team. He was embarrassed. He was sad. And he was dreading going to school and getting teased.

I had an empty feeling in my stomach. Do youth sports parents feel their kids pain or are they reliving pain from the past?

The Main Point

The felt the same way when I was cut from my HS baseball team as a 9th grader. Fortunately, when that door closed, another one opened. I started playing lacrosse. I believe that lacrosse changed my life. I took a beating every practice and game. It made me tougher. It challenged me to push myself and overcome fear. It prepared me for life.

Getting cut from the volleyball team just might turn out to be a life changing event for my son. Who knows.

Another good thing - My daughter is scheduled to play 60 basketball and soccer games between Mar 1 and August 8. My son is scheduled to play 60 baseball games between Mar 1 and Jul 15. We are not sure how we are going to do this, so it was somewhat of a relief that we do not have to fit volleyball into the schedule.