Rec ball and Travel team too??

[default]

I think I'm getting some of my questions answered. My dd's rec team disbanded after last year. She went to tryouts in August and was selected by a 12U travel team. She is just going into her third year of playing ball, and late last summer really committed to learning how to pitch. Her travel ball coach wants the girls to play community ball, believing the more they play the better they'll get. So we were planning on signing up for a rec league with the idea she'll be able get game experience pitching at that level before she can earn innings for her travel ball team. Is this a reasonable plan?

 

[default]

Her travel ball coach wants the girls to play community ball, believing the more they play the better they'll get.

Does this mean that the travel ball team won't be practicing very much? I think at 12U, you need to be practicing together and a games, games, games attitude is not going to develop players to their full ability. You can improve, but you can't learn to change habits in a game, you are just reacting to plays using what you have already learned (sometimes incorrectly). Just out of curiousity, are any of the other pitcher's parents involved with coaching the team?

 

[default]

Philbob ... absolutely sounds reasonaable, especially with the travel team coach's encouragement that you already have. With that being said, I'm assuming she's doing pitching lessons with someone as well if she really wants to be a pitcher down the road ... i.e., rec ball is a great place to get in some innings once you know what to do, but you need to learn what to do first from someone who knows what they're doing.

 

[default]

Thanks for the responses. As for Coach JWB, my dd took weekly lessons from a former college pitcher from August until the end of October, just to ensure she develops proper mechanics. This past week was the first time she started pitching full distance since then. She had a couple of experience high school coaches watching her at that session and she did pretty well. Her pitching instructor wanted her to get the mechanics down properly before she started to work on a change of pace. Getting that one down, for example, before starting on another pitch. She's never pitched in a game before.

DTRJ - the travel team she's going to be playing for is a well-established organization that's been around for about 10 years. Since this is our first foray into travel ball I'm sort of waiting to the the workout schedule from her coach. The proviso is, of course, that her travel ball team, has priority. As far as the rec team, it's the OGSO, and I know the local organization aims to group the girls by ages, so chances are she'd either be with a team of 12-year-olds, or possibly 13- and 14-year-olds. Judging from my dd's first two years in the OGSO they'll pitch anybody if they can throw strikes.

 

[default]

I can only think about all that my dd would have missed had her 10U travel team told her she had to choose between travel and rec. I know she would have chosen to play rec with her friends; and would have quit softball entirely after a year or two because rec ball here was so bad. She would have never discovered how fun the game can be when the pitchers can pitch, hitters can hit, and fielders can catch and throw. Fortunately, for her (and me), she was allowed to play both; she played both travel and rec just that one year; travel softball became a huge part of her life; and softball is now paying for college.

 

[default]

Philbob, I agree with coachjwb. If your dd is working to be a pitcher, then game innings will help her grow, which in turn makes all her workouts matter. Real innings will help a lot. It will teach her how to withstand stress, patience, grace under pressure, etc. For example, giving up a 2-strike double is quite an education! Not every rec ball game will be rewarding, as when she is not challenged by the opponents. But at least there will be hitters in the box when she is pitching against even weaker teams, which is different than most practices. Good luck to her.