USSSA Tournament Midwest College Showcase player info

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Dear Midwest College Showcase participant- the June 13th SGS Toledo Tune-up and College Showcase is fast approaching. This event hosted by Premier Sporting Events of Ohio in Conjunction with Suburban Girls Softball of NWO is totally for YOU! We designed this unique event to try to bring Midwest players to the attention of Midwest Colleges, we have 25 colleges signed up as of today and more committing every day, this has been a tremendous response from the colleges! Thanks to SGS for allowing this event to take place on saturday, and even more importantly not scheduling 16/18u games during the morning and evening sessions to allow interested players to participate. We limited the amount of players this year to test this format, and hopefully will expand even larger next year.



This unique dual session of skill/data collection [running speeds, throwing speeds etc.] which will be compiled into a player profile book for the colleges, and have PRIOR to the showcase games requires a tremendous amount of coordination and cooperation.

IMPORTANT INFO:

MORNING SESSION: Saturday June 13th. 7:30am Rolf Park, Cass Rd. Maumee Ohio, Quad A,B,C,D [left quad facing the pool]. Starts PROMPTLY at 7:30 am, registration and packet pick up prior to 7:30am. This session will conclude by 9:40am to allow all players ample time to make there next scheduled game. Make sure you have gloves, cleats, helmets and catchers gear, be ready to move move move on saturday morning!

EVENING SESSION: Saturday June 13th. games at 6:30pm and 8:00pm at LCRC, Michigan Ave., Maumee Ohio Quad 1,2,3,4 [front quad off Michigan] You will receive your game time, field and dugout assignment saturday morning. Be EARLY and ready to go, the faster we move, the more innings colleges get to watch you! We have tried to accommodate players at their positions indicated, some will play the whole game at one position, some will play 3 innings at two positions, and some may be moving every two innings to 3 different positions. Be FLEXIBLE, have great attitude and show the Coaches your willing to always do your best.

If you need more info, contact Mark@premiersportingevents.net or visit www.premiersportingevents.net for latest info.

 

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college list is growing every day! getting exciting!

 

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we now have over 30 midwest colleges attending! besides GREAT teams in the tune-up, great players and coaches, we think this will be a really fun event. Showcase games are at LCRC 6:30 and 8:00pm

We have player skill data collection session in the morning, ALL data will be compiled for the player and given in a booklet to the college coaches PRIOR to the game! we did this event to promote kids to colleges, come on out and watch some great players this weekend, and some great teams!

 

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what a great day, college coaches were complemtary on the first Midwest College Showcase, VERY well attended, things went fairly smootly and received many complements on how we had the data entered for the Colleges before the showcase games!

Kudo's also to Denny Rose our tournament director, nobody does it better then you Denny

 

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My dd participated in the showcase yesterday and she had a blast!!! There were a few delays during the skills sessions in the morning. They were primarily with her group (pitchers/catchers) on field 'B', but they were very minor and limited to the running evaluations.

The games in the evening were very well run and all the girls seem to bring their A game. My dd was on cloud 9 although she was a bit nervous when she found out that she would be pitching from 43'. A little warm-up with a catcher on her team and it was game-on, two innings of some of her best pitching to date. Best of all no earned runs and some new friends.

Very well done Mark & Denny!!!! We look forward to it being bigger and better next year.

 

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thanks for the kind words. we will work to make it better every year. We had some great feedback from the colleges for the skills session for data collection, and we'll implement those. The colleges were thrilled with the data in hand by the showcase games.

Next year we are hoping to have 3 rounds of games to accomodate all the players that we couldn't get in this year. thanks again!

 

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My DD played in the 8:15 pm game. She had a blast in the game and she also got to meet some new girls from Michigan and from other ohio teams.
My daughters team was luckky enough to be short one girls so everyone played the entire game except for the Pitcher(s) their choice.

The down side we were told the college coaches had left. We saw them at the early game because we had players on our team in those games. Did not notice anybody hanging around for the 8:15 pm. games. The lights were out in the booth above the concession stand. I would only hope they were there, if not it was a waste for the girls not to get looked at.

The morning session for stats seemed a little unorganized both from signing in and having non working radar guns. (Pitcher / Catchers) I realize this was the first year so I hope it was only working out the kinks.

All in all it was like watching an all star game - since the girls were all playing top notch ball.

 

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We had one of our players go to the morning session and she really didn't care for it as she decided to go eat in the evening as opposed to go to the games.

The girls through at about 7:30 AM then went to the stations. The girls ran from home to first, then they where told home to third. About half way out they where corrected it was home to home. Then she went over to hit, and got about 6 pitches off a Jugs machine throwing maybe 50 miles per hour. She is playing 18 U how many girls there are throwing 50 there or in college. Then she was put in the field to shag balls in my opinion. College coaches couldn't see any field or throwing drills. She told me she had one throw clocked at the near end, almost 2 hours after she got loose and it was 52 on the gun. The girl is 17, she hasn't thrown 52 since she was maybe 13 or 14. Last year at Chambersburg she got gunned at 63/64. Just maybe she was smart and lobbed on in there as her arm wasn't lose anymore from the long lay over. Overall the fields where great, games started on time. The umpiring was ok at best, we had a few that need to learn what obstruction is, and most obvious one was what the infield fly rule is.

At the games in the evening I stopped by after dinner, and saw maybe three coaches there at most, from small schools.

Thanks to Denny for all his hard work it is appreciated. We did see some college coaches there which was a plus, but I think our girls are more looking for more organization from the showcase aspect.

 

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The Tune Up was run well, as it usually is. The umpiring, that we had, was very good. It was a great experience for our girls and look foward to coming back in the future.

The Showcase was a disappointment. The morning session was disorganized and one of the jug guns was not working properly, and they knew it, but continued to use the numbers it generated.

During a timed running session, they called out the players number and when she stepped foward they yelled go. They rushed everybody through each station. They told the girls it was so they got to their first games on time. Guess what? They finished a half hour early.

We will not particpate in the Showcase again but look foward to returning to next years Tune Up.

 

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I thought the morning skills sessions were a joke. The games were better but coaches were gone by the late games. That being said we had college coaches watching every game we played on Friday and Saturday. I think there were a couple looking on Sunday as well. Our first game Saturday had at least 5 coaches watching that I could id. Very cool.

Larry Elwell
Michigan Elite Red 16u

 

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responses:

First off thank you for your comments, we grow from criticism.
There was not a radar gun issue, our coach accidentally clicked over to KPH instead of MPH, we sub'd in another gun and reset the original one. All guns were calibrated and were within one mile a hour for accuracy

College coaches gave a much better way to do hitting, and how they'd prefer it, and it will be implemented. They also gave two other suggestions which will be implemented also.

There were 19 college coaches at the evening event, and most stayed till mid way of the second showcase game. We had 32 total colleges during the sessions, and the morning ones all watched select games, as did many of the evening coaches.

Our feedback has been around 10 to 2 positive, but we want 12 to 0

Please note: our organization used to host a well known college recruiting camp, that we all worked at. We felt we could provide something MUCH more cost effective: 1. nobody had to come in town on thursday to do the event. 2. our price is at least 35 percent cheaper then most, AND we give everyone showcase games to boot! 3. ALL player data was inputed and given to the college coaches at dinner to analyze prior to the game. They said they never had that treatment before and were thrilled.

We want to be the best, we will work at it, and consider ever criticism. Next year we will mail the morning registration prior to the event, all players wil do is come up, check off attach their number to their shirt.

Our organization by limiting teams and shutting down fields at 16/18u level lost significant revenue to host this event, but they did for the reason they always do things, to promote girl's fastpitch in NWO at a cost effective manner. Thanks for the comments, and feel free to send any others to mark@premiersportingevents.net

Interesting note on the "how fast my kid threw issue" Doug Gillis ran a college session with 200 prospects, his asst. told me no pitcher threw 60 miles and hour,
and the average good pitcher was 54mph.

We WILL improve the skills session, we have good ways to do it, BUT the thing the College Coaches wanted from it, we produced: running speeds, over hand throw speeds, pitcher speeds [we'll do more with 3rd pitches next year] and catcher "pop" times. AND we produced that information, WITH your player profile to the coaches BEFORE they saw your player in the evening games. Not being defensive here, please understand that, but we geared this event to get colleges what they REALLY want to evaluate your DD, and we did the whole thing for 65.00!

 

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Not sure that was the only radar gun issue with the running times. Kid that was timed at WSU camp at 2.74. Was timed at 3.2 , so something is off. This kid is very fast , second fastest time at WSU slapper camp. Not my dd, this is a JR. from our 16U team.

 

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In reality, very few of these showcases get accurate data from the skills being done. If there are coaches there, your girl hustles every time, tries to get every ball at her, doesn't mean she will get them, or doesn't mean she will hit every ball, the coaches can see the determination and natural skills they may have. They will get on that coaches radar screen. It also goes beyond the field, does she respect mom/ dad, other players kick the dirt if she misses balls etc etc etc... The skill data is just one component and I am sure all of the venues try their best...

Learn from the ones you like, learn from the ones you don't and use it as a lesson, but remember, much depends on what they see on what's inside the ladies....

 

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Whenever you do times using a stop watch instead of an optical system there is plenty of room for differentiation. When I was watching my dd run it seemed as though some of the girls were waiting for a "ready, set, go" instead of just "go". I saw several take off way late and many more stumble coming out of the box due to the lose field.

When we do timings at our tryouts we use 2 stopwatches to try to eliminate the error on the clockers reaction time and we have them do each leg three times to get an average. I wasn't paying attention to how many times they had then run each circuit. Most importantly it was EARLY, damp and I didn't see any of the girls warming up their legs, my dd included.

 

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thanks for the continued observations, it is what will help us grow:

Running field: IMO, our worst effort out there by far, we have ways to improve it. I agree, hand held stop watches is subject to human error, the dual watch method would be better, maybe we can do that next year. We did tell our timers to not start the watch till them made their first move, if they didn't do that, i'll straighten them out next year!

Coaches were using that Data as comparison, not as Gospel. Maybe we should do a MPH run speed? not sure if that would translate well though. We were so concerned about the accuracy of our guns though, we calibrated them to the Oakland University Jugs gun. He was so impressed about how accurate the were at that low cost, he was ordering some.

 

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We really appreciate your comments, and NEXT year we will improve our two biggest weaknesses which were hitting and speed timing fields. Per college advisory board, we'll have those two fixed! They did love our data info being to them BEFORE the games at night, many came to our hospitality room to study that info before the games.

Also we'll try to give the best value we know, and still do BOTH sessions for way less then 100.00 bucks! thanks again, and keep those suggestions coming!