An Idea to help all future/ current Travel ball players, parents, coaches and organizations! NE Ohio

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Ok.. Lets see if this will work and what kind of feed back I will get here...

I have Kent State Universitys varsity softball complex reserved for August 10th for a massive all ages COMBINE! Starting from 8am till 9pm! The cost of this entire day is $450. Which will be divided by how many teams/ organizations want to participate in this event. We will have for all of us to use: The game field with bases, lined. The hitting cages with electricity for pitching machines. All 3 pitching lines for pitcher and catcher work. The area behind the right field fence for other workouts. There will be consessions all day by KSU. The idea is to have teams/ organizations come and set up a ' booth' with all your info and maybe a jersey, helmet..ect.. Have all the players of that age group go though drills, tryouts.. ect.. Then at the end of the workout, the players will then walk by each booth that offers a team for their age group and get this teams/ organization info. Or offer them a business card on the spot if you really want her. Let the player decide where they want to play that year. This saves parents from driving all over Gods half acre to 100 tryouts, saves the teams/ organizations from having to set up 100 tryouts, gives the kids a chance to play on a College field.

This is just an idea in the making! If there are teams/ organizations out here that think this could work, lets give it a shot!!

Bill 330.861.9950

 

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I think it's a great idea. I think it should be advertise other than just here. Maybe make a flyer and ask coaches on here to take them to tournaments and pass them out.

Will there be people there running it so that the coaches are free to walk around and watch? And will/should the players have an individual number, kind of like a marathon racer so that the coaches can track players they are interested in?

 

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Like a job fair... this could get very interesting.... LOL

 

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Kudo's for thinking outside the (batters) box...

If this is an All Ages event, it could get confusing.

Also, if a coach is only looking for the proverbial "one or two players to complete the roster", will they show up?

My 2 cents worth.

 

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Question is, will the Southern teams participate? And how do you advertise it to those who have no clue what OFC is?

 

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Question is, will the Southern teams participate? And how do you advertise it to those who have no clue what OFC is?

only if it improves their spot in the polls...

 

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only if it improves their spot in the polls...

Just don't post scores and all will be fine!

 

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Billy, Why dont you make it more than a combine,bring in some People that do lessons,sell softball equipment and some pro players for autographs This might help to parents make some good choices in the development of there children as players and keep the kids busy between sessions.

 

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only if it improves their spot in the polls...

And I thought you didn't have a sense of humor. LOL

 

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Just don't post scores and all will be fine!

And one last thing. Make sure they all wear a facemask.

 

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And one last thing. Make sure they all wear a facemask.

And make sure they dont pay with a rubber check

 

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It will take more than just me to do this.. We will need teams and organizations that want to be involved. To answer some of the questions here, I was thinking... 10u from 8am to 10:30, 12u from 11am to 1:30, 14u from 2 to 4:30, then 16u from 5 to 7:30. So around 3 hrs per age group. this gives time to go to booths or tables to get info before the next session starts. I think if the head coaches bring their assistant coaches to work the combine and work their tables, the Head Coaches can walk around and grade players. Also maybe bring an already committed player to work their table. There are a bunch of different things we can do... Also lets invite anyone to does private instruction out to set up a booth or table as well. I think for players looking for a hitting coach or pitching coach this would work out great. I think this would be best served to NE Ohio teams because its in this area. There are a lot of great softball minds on here! We can make this happen for all if we all agree to work together. If we can get 10 teams/organizations, we are only looking at 45$ each for all day. I think we can!

 

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Better yet, why not have a podium equipped with shackles (for arms and legs) and an auctioneer. Then parade the players one at a time up to the block and auction them off to the highest bidder say like the 1800s! Are you guys really serious?

 

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How do you prevent other organizations who don't contribute from coming in and scoping out the talent and making offers in the parking lot or on the spot? I think this is a great idea for girls, not sure its a great idea for the organizations. It's hard to make a sale at a trade show.

 

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For us in the south still using aluminum bats can you get it broadcast on ESPN ? I might want to send a pony express letter to some kid. JK .. not quite sure what to think about this one.

 

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Well the way I read this is that players pay but not coaches?

He wrote "If we can get 10 teams/organizations, we are only looking at 45$ each for all day"

 

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Better yet, why not have a podium equipped with shackles (for arms and legs) and an auctioneer. Then parade the players one at a time up to the block and auction them off to the highest bidder say like the 1800s! Are you guys really serious?

Leave that for the southern organizations.

 

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There is no reason why the southren teams organizations cant do the same thing.. There are Universities in the area Im sure would rent you the field for a day to do this to help players, parents, teams, instructors, organizations.. ect. I would be happy to see this just work for a year up here then make adjustments to it the following year. As for teams coming in that didnt chip in and 'cherry pick' Im sure with all the great softball minds here we can come up with a way to stop it. everyone knows everyone in the softball world right? point them out and I will ask them to leave. after all, we are renting the parking lot too! If they wanna stand on Summit St and try this, lets hope a player wont walk into on coming traffic to get info from a coach..

 

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Any team or organization interested in this should contact me asap. We will all meet at KSU with the rep of the field house and divide out the 450$ this way we all know the money we paid goes right for the rent. So August 8th, Thursday night we collectively meet, pay for the grounds and brain storm the area for set up, how to stop cherry pickers....ect.. for Saturday morning. Here is my #
330.861.9950

I will be at NSA States in North Ridgeville this weekend.

 

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I think this is a very intriguing idea. You should be able to reduce the cost to the teams further (or to nothing?) if you charged the "vendors" a fee. It potentially addresses many of the issues that parents have in trying to figure out the logistics of getting their DD's to all of the tryouts they want to, assuming of course they could make it that day and the weather holds out.

With that being said, I think a lot of organizations would see this as "risky", partially because it's a new thing and partially because it would have to be run extremely well. It's also likely to be seen as risky to some of the players and families because you can be sure that all of the teams are going to want a shot at the stud players, and that means the "B" players might not really get seen, or be waiting forever to hear back, not to mention you'd have to address how to handle post-combine discussions with players by multiple teams.

If you go through with it, I wish you luck, and would love to hear back eventually from the coaches and parents as to how it worked.