New USA age cut off for next season?

[IRdad09]

I think its the "fringe" cases here that will cause confusion or concern. My middle daughter is one of them. She has an October birthday. So now if this is adopted she can either move up to 11u with her friends and ultimately be playing "down" a year OR she can play 10u again, which is most likely where she really belongs.

 

[OhioKymn]

We have always considered our "season" August to July since as long as I have been involved. In fall, every second year team moves up. It hasn't ever been a problem that I have encountered.
Since travel teams are generally not ever made up completely of girls from the same school, what grade kids are in doesn't seem like it would be a big deal. When teams get to 16u, they usually put their grad year on their jersey sleeve anyway, right?
Really it just changes who is the "oldest" and who has the "bad birthday for softball". There will always be the girls with unfortunate birthdays, right now it is December, November. I have a daughter born in August, and her best friend is born in September. They would now become the players no longer on the same team, but in the same grade. It will just alter which girls are caught by the age cut off, I suppose.
The majority of us travel teams (in my area) are not Showcase teams. We are simply helping girls use softball to build their confidence as young women, learn valuable lessons about being part of a team, learn how it feels to win, and to lose, and most importantly how to act when that happens. So keeping grad years together to help college showcases doesn't seem like it should need to affect the whole travel ball system.

 

[daboss]

Please correct me but I seem to remember Little League having the birth date breaking point in the early fall. Is this correct? Do they still do it this way?

 

[Mike_Craig_-_Ohio USSSA]

Please correct me but I seem to remember Little League having the birth date breaking point in the early fall. Is this correct? Do they still do it this way?

Not sure on them. LL tends to revolve around a baseball first mentality so it would not surprise me if they did a May 1 date like other prominent baseball groups do.

My daughter's first year in rec ball was built around a May 1 age date cutoff because the group is a 50+ year old group that was originally baseball only for most of those years until about 2005 or so.

She used to have such a great b-day for softball on Jan 2. Now possibly not so much anymore.

 

[22dad]

As a dad of a fall birth dd. I would have preferred this. She was almost always a grad year behind the rest of her team

 

[Killak]

So getting back to this topic since I have had about 5-8 calls/e-mails on the subject this past week. Someone with a more clear head (mine is kicking into season mode so very day-to-day right now) "sell" me on the pros and cons with this type of date change?

I understand what it does to try to align with grad years for high school ages but what about the whole as the travel softball world does not revolve around strictly showcase events, although some people think that is all it is for from past thinking.

I would say this as a daughter of a Nov. '09 birthday. She doesn't care about showcase events. She just wants to play with her classmates. Every other year she moves up and they stay down and she has to find a new team. Right now she's one of 2 7th graders on a team with 10 8th graders. If she were to stay on that team next year then she would have to wait till Memorial day weekend to start playing since the 10 that will be freshman next year are not allowed to play travel ball in the spring until school ball ends in our state so her classmates get games in March, April and May that she doesn't get while she waits for her older teammates to finish freshman year HS ball (and I don't view "subbing" as a way to cure this issue). By adopting the change it gives her 2 more years of 14U, gets her in line with her class for the rest of 14u and then into 16/18U. Trying to get USA and USSSA in line with school grade level just makes sense. Girls can always play up if they want to. This realignment just helps those that just want to play with their classmates a lot and I think that gets lost in the shuffle of people concerned with showcase events over girls that just want to play.

 

[Stedman00]

actually, USSSA is not making this age change, just USA/ASA.

 

[Killak]

actually, USSSA is not making this age change, just USA/ASA.

Correct, which is why I think people want USSSA to also follow suit and adopt the change so there's not a 4 month gap between organization DOB requirements. Right now if it stays as is I think it makes for some interesting decisions for coaches for girls born Sept 1 - Dec 31 if they plan on playing both USA and USSSA tournaments.

 

[Stedman00]

i just gained an entire season with 9 of my 04 players born in sept, oct, nov & dec of 2004. We will be playing all USA/ASA and open sanction events next year.

 

[Mike_Craig_-_Ohio USSSA]

Correct, which is why I think people want USSSA to also follow suit and adopt the change so there's not a 4 month gap between organization DOB requirements. Right now if it stays as is I think it makes for some interesting decisions for coaches for girls born Sept 1 - Dec 31 if they plan on playing both USA and USSSA tournaments.

We have already been posting Age Charts for 2024 and they are based on 12/31 birth dates. Normally we do not make this kind of change with out discussing it amongst both our directors and board. Asking us to make a change just because someone else did isn't prudent.

For every person who is happy with the USA change, there are people who think it is primarily geared to showcase ages (14-16-18u) and bad for younger age groups. Notice the people wanting it the most who have bothered to respond are involved with high school aged girls.

 

[Killak]

We have already been posting Age Charts for 2024 and they are based on 12/31 birth dates. Normally we do not make this kind of change with out discussing it amongst both our directors and board. Asking us to make a change just because someone else did isn't prudent.

For every person who is happy with the USA change, there are people who think it is primarily geared to showcase ages (14-16-18u) and bad for younger age groups. Notice the people wanting it the most who have bothered to respond are involved with high school aged girls.

The change affects girls with birthdays in 4 months (sept-Dec). I would encourage you to talk with parents of girls with those birth months more than anyone else because that’s who the change affects. It doesn’t affect girls born in the other 8 months. I can tell you just from talking to some parents and coaches where I live they would love for their kids to be grouped back more with kids in their own grade. 8u/10u I’m sure it’s not much of an issue but if you talk to a parent of a December 09 kid who’s in 7th grade playing first year 14u against high school freshman you may get a completely different response. Or an 8th grade 2nd year 14u who can’t play till June because travel ball can’t start till school ball is over. I’ve already talked to enough 12u/14u coaches and parents where we live that like the change and will just put teams together based on the USA rules and skip usssa events all together. Maybe Ohio is different but where we live you can’t play travel ball in HS until HS season is over so some of these 2nd year 14u girls with sept-Dec birthdays are waiting till June to start playing while their classmates are playing starting in March. Just my perspective on it as my girls don’t play showcase events and just want to play with their friends, which I believe is probably a vast majority of girls who play as is. It’s never made sense to me why baseball age date is April 30 and softball is December 31 so if someone knows that backstory I’d love to know.

 

[Captain_Thunder]

Everyone can still play any sanctioning event. Just need to be aware for tryouts in August.
I think it is a great idea and I think eventually everyone will follow soon.
My oldest daughter had a December birthday. She played on a 12U team as a 5th grader, when the majority of the team were 7th graders.
I think there is a big maturity level difference at that age. Girls in 5th grade are still playing with dolls, 7th grade girls are discussing boys and other things at that age.
I think it works even better for the younger ages for this and several other reasons.
My 97 team had as many 98 players on it during our 18U years because of the school grades. If they are already with the grades, there will not be that need to change more as they get older...

 

[ChrisDennis13]

I have a early Sept. daughter. Unless all the governing bodies change, I see no reason for us to change. She will just "play up" with the team like she would have any other year. Their is a noticeable difference from our Jan/Feb/Mar girls and the few Sept/Oct girls we have on the team, those few months do matter, but I see no harm in letting her continue to play with those girls.

Also, we have always played the next age year in fall ball. it just makes sense, it gives the girls time to adjust and gives the coaches time to she what they need to work on over winter practice.

 

[Mike_Craig_-_Ohio USSSA]

To put it to rest, USSSA sent out an email today with the 2024 age charts included that start on 12/31 birthdays. This is not going to happen for this next season in USSSA.

 

[CoachTEA]

Personally I like it because I won't be say my goodbyes to my younger '04s and I get to watch them play another summer!

 

[Mike_Craig_-_Ohio USSSA]

So I have been doing some digging to find out if other groups are also following suit with USA Softball and so far can not find another group doing the age cutoff date change. NSA, USFA, FASA, PGF, TCS, and the Alliance are amongst the ones who have stated they are not changing the date. Now honestly I figured that PGF and TCS would have since they have probably the strongest showcase events in the country and this new age cutoff would seem to favor showcase teams by keeping them together by graduation date. I can not speak for all of the independents either but was told by a well placed source in the Kremlin that D1 is not following suit nor is For the Girls (Marc Fiorelli).

The Alliance one is interesting because a bunch of events that use USA rules and sanctioned officials have aligned themselves with the Alliance events as qualifiers.

Now something interesting that I heard thru the softball rumor mill is that a couple of USA state directors are getting cold feet about this change especially ones where the competition is not changing and has a much bigger market share than USA Softball. And also that supposedly a couple of these state directors are saying they will not honor the new date this fall? Who knows? They do not answer to me and this might drive them to a competitor if they feel it will hurt there events thru USA.

To me not honoring an age group change would have to cause insurance problems since USA has changed code and a director decided not to follow the code change. It would be like permitting non approved equipment in the game because you just wanted to get a couple of more entries because they want to use that non-approved equipment. Not a smart move on someone's part.

 

[flygirlsdad]

Seems more teams have begun listing their grad year after their organization. This aligns with USA softball. Seems most of the showcases in Ohio follow USA to include Buckeye Recruitment, Sheer Madness, Lasers etc. Scenic City is now under Alliance which has been noted uses USA. Will showcases ever go to listing teams by grad year as opposed to age grouping? It appears to me the biggest potential issue, at least in Ohio, would be a team playing USA and showcases during the season then wanting to enter PGF, USSSA, or another sanction to finish up.

 

[daboss]

Extremely interesting information from Mike Craig. He makes some interesting points about the changes that I had not put much thought into. The equipment thing in-particular is of interest. With only about a month to go before the mad dash for tryouts, organizations may be in a pickle trying to formulate rosters.

I don't do this anymore but I would be interested to hear from others how they plan to host tryouts. There's going to be some girls on the fence due to the conflict. How are you going to decide?

 

[OhioKymn]

I am in that exact situation. We have 12 teams in our organization that are (mostly) straight birth year. In a few cases, the team as a whole would need to move up, but the coaches kid *could* now stay down another year with his late year birthday daughter. If the coach stays down though, he is signing on for a season of only USA tourneys next year.

I, too, have reached out to a few USA tourney directors in my area and the feedback is that they may drop USA, and go unsanctioned in order to *not* have to deal with this mixed age issue. If that is the case, then my coach that may have stayed down will not have any local tourneys.

I also run USA tourneys at my park, and I plan to just go unsanctioned next year. Therefore, teams with those late birthday older girls (USA teams who used the new ages) would now *not be eligible to play in my tourneys. It will be interesting to see if I draw fewer teams next year.

 

[Passion4theGame]

I will host my tryouts just like any other year in the past. Nothing changes for me. I will start posting my tryouts, age group, & Org. info Saturday of Stingrays. Till then nothing to worry about for me.