Poaching other teams

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The lack of integrity in travel softball has reached epidemic proportions. There is poaching, slandering and all kinds of other mis-deeds going on this year and I cannot understand why.

 

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I think a lot of it has to do with that which we all preach about the most. What is best for the girls who play the game. Not everyone involved in fastpitch softball is doing it for the right reasons. I do not want to be one of those people. As I read these posts concerning poaching, bringing this issue out in the open does not really help the girls, it just makes me feel better (and that is a selfish reason).

I would like to put this thread to bed.

 

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I think a lot of it has to do with that which we all preach about the most. What is best for the girls who play the game. Not everyone involved in fastpitch softball is doing it for the right reasons. I do not want to be one of those people. As I read these posts concerning poaching, bringing this issue out in the open does not really help the girls, it just makes me feel better (and that is a selfish reason).

I would like to put this thread to bed.

And that is why I am proud to say that my daughter plays for your organization! And Mrs. Klump as well...

 

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I had the same thing happen. Had a girl show up - good little pitcher. I ended up offering a spot and didn't hear anything. Looked up her old team and found out her dad is still the coach and momma was on the board to boot. They were both at the try-out scouting no doubt. I'll be curious to see if any of the girls that were at that try-out wind up playing for them.

 

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Ouch ... Did you offer her a spot? You should have walked out mid-tryout, taken her aside - got the dad and made an offer to play for your team right there... their reaction would have been priceless...

 

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One of things you have to watch is a coach turning words around to fit what he is after.

 

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It is possible that the team he is coaching on is potentially disbanding or there are problems in the organization. It is far easier to judge on what little we know than to consider the other possibilities. I've noticed that quite a bit on this forum. Quick to judge and even quicker to condemn. Sounds like the admin aide aisle at work.

 

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It is possible that the team he is coaching on is potentially disbanding or there are problems in the organization. It is far easier to judge on what little we know than to consider the other possibilities. I've noticed that quite a bit on this forum. Quick to judge and even quicker to condemn. Sounds like the admin aide aisle at work.

I thought of that. I wanted to pursue this girl so I sent an email to their org saying I have a daughter interested in their team and I asked who will be coaching. Sure enough it was him and that is how I determined he was the current coach. It was a nice piece of reverse espionage. Not trying to condemn, just sharing my experience. I can't say I'm 100% sure he was trying to recruit. I didn't even mention the team. What upset me the most was I spent 15 min. talking to them when I could have been talking to serious prospects and parents.

 

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It is possible that the team he is coaching on is potentially disbanding or there are problems in the organization. It is far easier to judge on what little we know than to consider the other possibilities. I've noticed that quite a bit on this forum. Quick to judge and even quicker to condemn. Sounds like the admin aide aisle at work.

Very possible, but from experience most will be honest up front and disclose such information. Especially when most coaches know one another or have seen each other around.

 

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I actually went to a couple other organizations tryouts myself. It was not to try to poach as I was friends with the coaches and knew them well. My reason was simply to see how they ran the tryout and see if there were things I could do to improve my own next year. I also had a 2 coaches who we had played against last season bring their DD's to my try out. I asked them why they were there and both had very logical reasons. I even offered one a spot and would still like to have the other one. All coaches are not poachers or pigs some have legitimate reasons.

 

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I would call Dr phil

 

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Understood on the legit reasons, but this specific case was pure poaching. I too like to go to try-outs with all my DD's, but only to see what my DD needs to work on, how she compares to others her age, can she mesh well with other girls, or any practice tips for them. I would never approach other players at a try-out to persuade them to play on my team instead of the one holding the try-out. Pure poaching and just not cool but like 4carrs said, water under the bridge...let it lie...we are over it...we have vented and now we're good.

 

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Just wait.... there are some out there calling people who have already committed to a different program trying to talk them into backing out of the committment and join them so they will have enough for a team....

 

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I`ve recently heard about a team, ( not mentioning any names ), sending people out to recruit from other try-outs, even going as far as to act as assistant coaches and stuff. Theres been some pretty dirty things going on out there this year. I wouldn`t want to be associated with teams like this.

 

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More often then not players and their parents make the right choice about where they want to play based on things that actually matter. Most can see through the so called poachers and whatever other terms people have for them on here. Personally I think that it reveals much about a persons charactor when they behave like what has been discribed here. Again people tend to see right thru that, and end up factoring it into their decisions.

 

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Wow.....

 

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Man o man people if you only knew!

 

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Great post Climberfan! LOL

 

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More often then not players and their parents make the right choice about where they want to play based on things that actually matter. Most can see through the so called poachers and whatever other terms people have for them on here. Personally I think that it reveals much about a persons charactor when they behave like what has been discribed here. Again people tend to see right thru that, and end up factoring it into their decisions.

I totally agree.

Personally, I could care less if a player leaves our team no matter who it is. It doesn't bruise my ego in the least. Many coaches take it too personally. I don't have the time nor the energy to let it bother me. I've only had it happen to me once. It was a kid on my baseball team about 7 years ago. The father came up to me before the season started and said they were leaving due to what they thought was a better situation. I smiled, said good luck, shook his hand, said the other team was lucky that they were getting a good player, and excused myself so I could start practice. It was our starting SS. The father just stood there waiting for me to beg, plead, get mad....anyway he was expecting more from me. It's almost as if he wanted me to be crushed or pi$$ed about the news.

Even though the kid was probably the best player we had, our season survived without him, and when it was time to play the team he went to, they asked us to re-schedule once, which we did, then they had to forfeit the re-scheduled game due to lack of players. A total of six kids showed up for the game and the kid that left our team for that team was not there. We happened to have extra kids and told that coach even though he had to forfeit we could throw some of our kids out there so his kids that showed up could at least play and the umpire was willing to stay and umpire the "scrimmage". The other coach didn't want any part of it and left. Since we were already there we decided that we would practice and offered the kids from the other team the opportunity to practice as well but the parents were so mad they said thanks but did not take us up on the offer.

 

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I agree with you Ohio Wave, it does show a lot about a persons character both the good sides, ( victims of these poaching fools ), such as Lenski`s example, in which I commend you Lenski, on your handling of the situation you listed above, and the bad sides such as the people that send these individuals out to other organizations to pull this kind of back stabbing. It does make it harder for smaller organizations which is a real shame though.