The Increasing Move to Early Friday Play: the Implications

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On a separate, tournament-specific thread complaining that only one umpire was being used on the games, I was reminded of an increasing concern that Ted and I have about the way early Friday play is becoming considered "routine" for Ohio travel ball.

The decision to require early Friday play could be influenced by several factors. It could be that the tournament is an invitational and the TD has received many applications from extremely talented teams. It could be that the tournament is first-come, first-served and the TD decides to increase the bottom line by letting in additional teams. It could be, as with ASA/USA National qualifiers, that the tournament has very little choice about the number of teams that can attend the tournament.

BUT ONE THING IS CLEAR: early Friday and Thursday play will continue to separate the haves from the havenots for Ohio fastpitch. Families with limited economic resources face very, very hard choices about funding Friday play. That funding includes missed wages.

As the players get older (I'm thinking the older 12U's), I actually think that a good response is to have a few parents cart the majority of the girls to the Friday play, with the rest of the parents being allowed their normal work days. The parents responsible for getting the girls there would rotate from week to week. It's hard for the parents to have to skip games, but some players would definitely benefit from having a few games without the pressure of parental review AND the family stress level would be reduced by lessening the economic cost of travel ball. Of course, after the players have their licenses, they can always get themselves to local and perhaps even more distant tournaments.

I understand that there will always be families that have more economic resources to devote to the game. I'd just like to see TD's take into consideration the impact on middle class families of extending the tournament fields to such a degree that early Friday play is required. If such an increase in the number of teams is based primarily upon the economic return to the tournament, at that point I'd have to question priorities.

And I'd certainly expect that there would be two umps available when the choice has been made to expand the number of teams.

 

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I understand that there will always be families that have more economic resources to devote to the game. I'd just like to see TD's take into consideration the impact on middle class families of extending the tournament fields to such a degree that early Friday play is required. If such an increase in the number of teams is based primarily upon the economic return to the tournament, at that point I'd have to question priorities.

And I'd certainly expect that there would be two umps available when the choice has been made to expand the number of teams.

Who would you like the TD not to let in the tournaments? Its a little more complicated than that what you speak of. If the tournament is advertised as an early start on Friday, and that is not convenient for a team, then they always have options. I see you are a 95'. Wait till next year, when you are leaving on Tuesday or Wednesday for your showcases. The fun has just began. The coach will find out quickly who are the "team" parents and who are not. The logistics can be a nightmare for a coach. It truely takes a team effort.

 

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Excellent, thoughtful post cgs.

Also wonder about the coaches...they don't all have flexible work schedules, either.

 

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Akadema1:

I don't need to be schooled in the process, thank you very much. Have been through it already with daughter and have included missed work for Rising Stars in Florida, Kent State, Compuware, Stingrays, and the Netherlands, among others, as well as college spring trips.

And the process is not that more complicated that what I described. If you have quality teams for a showcase, I indicated that is a legitimate reason to begin with Thursday or Friday play. I'm talking about tournaments that don't get showcase quality applications and simply extend the field to increase the bottom line. And my post couldn't be any clearer.

Finally, lots of tourneys list Friday play but they don't specify whether it is early play. The tradition (and perhaps you don't have the experience in Ohio that would allow you to know about the tradition) has been this means Friday evening play.

You might want to think about the tone that your writing establishes before you post.

 

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PS to Akadema1:

My husband and I ARE the coaches and we worry as much about our middle class families as about any "nightmare" they create for us by having work concerns.

 

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a lot of tournaments dont always "advertise" as early start times way before hand (not all tourneys are "showcases", akadema).

we ran into this at ASA states this weekend, and the rain has made it possible for me to respond to the post. Luckily for my wife and I, we are teachers, so running around in the summer is par for the course. A lot of girls here this weekend are with only one parent, as the stay over on Thursday was required and not everyone gets weekends off.

On a parental note, cgs, i know my wife and i are always talking about our little ones (little statman and the monster, age 2) and sometimes hotel rooms can be pretty small (when they are adoringly asleep like now, it's all worthwhile). And we have gotten into arguments over whether or not to bring them, and wife always tells me that our kids are our concern, not someone else's. I'm more of a, well at least if they are with family, who cares kind of person (it worked for me, so to speak). So when the schedule entails sending your DD with another family for the first day or two (compuware is on the horizon with a grand thursday evening game (and akadema, we've already hear about your feelings towards compuware so keep em to yourself)--and dont tell me that the contract with the hotels has nothing to do with the decision for a thursday night game. What is this, nationals michigan?

anyway, cgs, if your DD is staying with another family, some families don't like to "pawn" off their daughters with other people's family's. and then, what if it's a dad? I would be very uncomfortable if I were in charge of 5 girls, or sending my DD with a bachelor dad for the weekend. and furthermore, what kind of message do we send when we can't even get our own DD to the park?

I applaud all the Classics parents for getting their girls here this weekend, especially those with parents working (or at a 14u national in Elyria).

and don't think that for a second that softball somehow permits us to have great marital lives. with one parent gone every weekend, and no church whatsoever for 3 months out of the year, I'm already feeling my scruples slowly ebbing away like the tide. This sport takes toughness and a commitment that sometimes is tough to handle.

get that, akadema?

 

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I agree with CGS, This will be my 20th year running a tournament and TD,s can do something about early start times on Friday, you limit the number of teams and it is first pay first in. You work your schedule out with games starting at 5 on Fri. and give yourself some room at the end on Sat. and Sun. incase of rain. Everyone on here says it's about the girls but they seldom prove it. As far as showcases, we ( college coaches ) will attend but we will also go whereever a recruit is playing that is why we tell them to send us a schedule.

 

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Stattie:

Especially with recent events within the fastpitch family, I understand the concern about multiple players staying with a dad. Thanks for pointing out the flaw in my "it takes a village" argument.

It's just a tough, tough issue.

 

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CGS.......Three well thought out posts and all within an hour. Before 7 AM to boot. Could/would you write a how-to book on this? Just the whole time management thing.

Really though, very good posts.

 

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Danger1:

Thanks for your commitment to Ohio fastpitch.

 

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Well I am about to fall into this category next weekend. We play Friday at 1:30 & 4:30 and Sat at 8:00am.......

Pros:

• Wont be up late Saturday Night

Cons

• Parents wont get to see their child play
• Both coaches must take vacation days

Reasons

• 8 teams at 14u with 1 field , they dont have a choice but to play all day friday !!!!!

Although this tourney is less than 2 miles from my house,i would be more willing to drive an hour or so to get a "normal" schedule next year. It will be their loss in the long run.

 

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TD does have a choice, you can run 6 teams on one field starting at 5:00 Fri. and have it be a DE tourney

 

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A lot of parents pay a lot of money for their DD to play and most would like the opportunity to at least watch them. My husband and I both work and Fridays every weekend make it tough especially since he needs to be there to keep stats on the turbostat palm and me to get the photos of the girls play. Driving separately is unreasonable with the distances we often have to travel. I really feel that tourneys should be limited to what can be done from Friday evening. Money is most likely the motivating factor for a lot of these TDs and it shouldn't be. What is playing ball anyway without the crowd there to cheer you on or pick you up if you fall?

 

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Earlier & earlier play is a symptom of a larger problem -- fastpitch softball is becoming "big business".

My daugther started playing at 10U and is now 19 and in her last year of travel ball. All of the tournaments were Saturday morning when we started, almost all were no parking fees, and coolers allowed.

Since that time, the number of teams and tournaments have grown dramatically, and along with the growth...dozens of "showcase" camps and events, HUGE tournaments are popping up all over the place, and TD's are getting every possible buck out of your pocket. The trend is towards making money for someone, and it's discouraging.

I remember going to great tournaments like the "Silver Bullet" in Mount Vernon where you showed up Saturday monring with your kids to play, the TD was 100% about the kids playing games, you parked free, and bring all the food you want.

This year I have tournament that has yet to give us a game schedule and it starts in less than a week, but I have a half dozen PDF flyers from them in my email about all kinds of other events they have that cost $100 here and $150 there. We have another tournament that many months after the signup deadline decided out of the kindness of their heart to institute a $10 per car parking fee rather than raise tee shirt and concession prices, never mind that amounts another $300 from our team to attend the event, and the same from the other 100 teams who are going. Another $30,000 income for the tournament, but AT LEAST the tee shirt prices aren't going up!!

 

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I have to agree with Jack. You signup for these tourneys as early as October of the year before and then the expenses just keeping adding up, it's getting out of hand.

This coming weekend we play at 8 am, 3:30, then 6:30. Talk about a long day on Friday!!! Glad I told my parents through an email or there may have been one less person on OFC!!!

 

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It is all GREED, GREED, GREED. I did make a mistake myself and sign us up for a tournament that not only do you have to pay to get in but no coolers as well. I as a coach will tell you that next year I am definately going to be double checking all tournaments of interest. I will go out of state 4 or 5 times before I play in some of these greed tournaments around here again. The Hawks/Lasers friendlies was awesome, this might be the thing to do all year long and then go to nationals. If all teams did this then the greedy TD's would be know more and the cost of these tourneys might get back on an even playing field.

 

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92% percent of all Ohio tournaments are ran by organizations themselves. Orgs even have their own rules on gate fees and NO coolers. Not all.. but some.

So, don't blame the "individual" TD's for something be done by orgs as well.

 

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Thinking back 5 - 10 years ago when we were on the tournament circuit, the Fridays games were not too common, maybe 2 or 3 times a season. And, they were usually early afternoon, NOT morning games. The tournaments we attended that did have early Friday play were always the larger must-attend invitational showcase tournaments. Typically though, the TDs did their best at giving the teams local to the venue the early Friday pool game times, so the distant traveling teams could play later on Friday. GAPSS and Stingrays were local for us, so we usually had the early afternoon Friday games at those.

I can still remember the coach pulling his hair out trying to schedule his time off work to be with the team. Our team also pooled drivers for those Friday events. Bottom line is that if you want to be seen by college coaches, it's a HUGE sacrifice of time and money - most of travel ball is. Fortunately it was extremely rare to have parking fees or cooler Nazis at any tournaments back then. But hey, being the rebel I am, I would figure out clever "work-arounds" for those obstacles.

Something I will NEVER forget is when a family was forced to quit my DDs team due to financial hardships. That is an absolute travesty, and this particular kid had the skills to play college ball! That's why I get so peeved at the obvious "profiteers" in this sport, and encourage folks to not support the individuals that are running tournaments for profit's sake, NOT advancement of the kids and the sport. Tournaments can be run as a non-profit break-even basis with dedicated volunteers and a lot of elbow grease to keep costs down. No one said it was easy, but the ones who do it are the real heroes of the sport of women's fastpitch.

 

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That's why I get so peeved at the obvious "profiteers" in this sport, and encourage folks to not support the individuals that are running tournaments for profit's sake, NOT advancement of the kids and the sport. Tournaments can be run as a non-profit break-even basis with dedicated volunteers and a lot of elbow grease to keep costs down. No one said it was easy, but the ones who do it are the real heroes of the sport of women's fastpitch.

Remember, 92% percent of ALL tournaments in Ohio are ran by fastpitch orgs as a FUNDRAISER. Not for non-profit/break even basis. No org and anyone for that matter... is going to do the headache of a tournament, coaches and parents for no profit.

I'm probally the lowest profit making TD in Ohio as a matter of fact. I give out unforms, jackets, hoodies, etc... instead of dust collectors ( trophies).

My event in Clinton with the Ohio Lady Patriots is definately not about profit when for $375.00, you get two umpires and at least five games and the DD's go to Akron Racers game and eat on the TD !!!!! I like it personally.. but it isn't a fundraiser for me and the Ohio Lady Patriots are NOT running it as a fundraiser for them. They are running it with my help as a "fun" event for the girls and will probally do well in 2011 and 2012 with the same event and having two more age divisions. NEVER will the tournament have over 8 teams in each age group. NEVER. Don't want it - don't need it.

I'm staying in a tent on the grounds so I can "afford" to go do this tournament for the Lady Patriots just because I liked the idea of taking the girls to the game. I suggested it to the Lady Patriots and it took two seconds for them to tell me "go for it".... "We are 100 % percent behind you". I told them I'd give up my $300 fee for being a TD and motel rooms for two nights if they would agree to let me give away free game tickets to the girls.

Let me know Sammy when you find an girls fastpitch organization to work and run a tournament and not make a dime for it. I want to sponsor and send a team to it !!!!

 

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We are dealing with this for a tournament next weekend. We have 4 games on friday! I guess it would not be a problem if that info was communicated up front. We might have chose not to play in that tournament. TD said it was a field availability issue. But it is a 6 gg, we are playing all 4 pool games on friday, bracket play starts sat. So there will be some teams that lose their first two on sat and not even play on sunday?? I don't have a problem with Fri evening games, but it is becoming a finacial burden when play starts friday mornings. Remeber td's Quality b/4 Quantity.