Arlington travel tryouts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:6th grade girls are having a 4th night of tryouts?!?

Yes. That was quite humorous to see that in the email. They should have just cut down to the small group of kids that are going to make the team or on the margins and give everyone else the notice they aren't on the team. But, ATB has always been disorganized - should have seen how the check in was for 3 teams. Talk about complete chaos. So this isn't surprising.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This isn't that surprising. In the winter of 2020-21, when the decision not to play basketball was made it caused a huge rift in the organization. Lots of the more organized directors left (along with coaches) and the organization has been a walking disaster since. The replacements have been very much driven by the old school political correctness which has transformed into "equity."

Two other tidbits:
1) The 7th and 8th grade teams are basically set. There was no announcements of open gyms for those grades unlike the 5th and 6th grade. Take that for what you will.

2) At least on the boy's side, unless your kid is really tall, he better play Arlington Storm baseball because both Storm and ATB are heavily intertwined with each other. Lots of hand shake deals to get kids on ATB from Storm baseball for boys that have no earthly right to be on the ATB team. And this is coming from a parent that has had 2 sons play or are playing in ATB right now. I would have done almost anything to get them out of this environment but Arlington kids are ineligible from playing on other Fairfax team.

As for coaching with the assumption everything stays the same. The 5th grade A coach is very good. Can really develop talent. 5B coaches are okay. The 6A coach is terrible. He's probably worse than his dad who got fired as HC from Georgetown. The 7A coach is okay nothing to write home about. Seems to always get inside his own head. I'm assuming the 7B coach will move up to 8B because that's the only way his kid (and a couple of his friends) will make the team. He is the epitome of a Dad coach. 8A coach is decent and can build for HS.

This is 100 percent correct. The 7B team coach and presumably now the 8B coach picks his kid and their friends. There are much stronger kids who try out but aren’t in the club. Those left for AAU teams or other fycbl teams. Most kids from 7b last year played rec too - and they get schooled by all the kids they beat out for the travel team. It’s pathetic.

[Anonymous]

If they live in Arlington, they can't play for othre FCYBL teams.

[Anonymous]

What is up with the travel baseball/travel basketball connection? I guess it's the dad bro network? I noticed several boys wearing shirts for the the local travel baseball team at my son's tryouts. They are big/tall but certainly not all good at basketball. But I noticed the coaches high fiving the boys and shaking hands with the dads. I guess those kids are getting in regardless.

[Anonymous]

I wasn’t there but heard same thing from friends parent. Said her kid who is ok was playing against a kid that was not very good a coach came up to the kid said hello and moved him to the top court. Mentioned the kid had baseball gear on which he thought was weird for bball tryouts. Is there a rival travel club for baseball that if they get the kids parents mad they will switch them to? Otherwise don’t see any reason to take a noticeably inferior player. It’s ok to be great at baseball and not so great at basketball. As the previous poster said the whole thing is strange. Maybe the kid was just given an opportunity to play against the best kids because he knew the coach and didn’t make it if that was the case im fine with it. But based on previous posts that doesn’t sound like the case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is up with the travel baseball/travel basketball connection? I guess it's the dad bro network? I noticed several boys wearing shirts for the the local travel baseball team at my son's tryouts. They are big/tall but certainly not all good at basketball. But I noticed the coaches high fiving the boys and shaking hands with the dads. I guess those kids are getting in regardless.

Many of the parents (mostly Dads) are involved in Arlington Storm and ATB so there is a lot of cross over and hand shake deals on this stuff. I'm sure the 5th grade team will be comprised of many of these same relationships. It is what it is. As someone stated above - by 7th grade most parents with kids that can play (they play on AAU teams like NOVA94, Ballers, etc.) know the deal and don't even bother showing up.

But, want to talk about disfunction. Have a friend that has kids trying out for 8th, 7th and 5th (4th grader trying to play up) teams on both sides. 8th grader has played for ATB and a decent player. 7th grader made it 5th but not 6th. Anyway, they get one email last night - no name or anything like that - saying thanks for trying out. Of course, with no name they have no idea if the 8th grader made it so have spent the morning trying to track this down as who the email applies to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn't that surprising. In the winter of 2020-21, when the decision not to play basketball was made it caused a huge rift in the organization. Lots of the more organized directors left (along with coaches) and the organization has been a walking disaster since. The replacements have been very much driven by the old school political correctness which has transformed into "equity."

Two other tidbits:
1) The 7th and 8th grade teams are basically set. There was no announcements of open gyms for those grades unlike the 5th and 6th grade. Take that for what you will.

2) At least on the boy's side, unless your kid is really tall, he better play Arlington Storm baseball because both Storm and ATB are heavily intertwined with each other. Lots of hand shake deals to get kids on ATB from Storm baseball for boys that have no earthly right to be on the ATB team. And this is coming from a parent that has had 2 sons play or are playing in ATB right now. I would have done almost anything to get them out of this environment but Arlington kids are ineligible from playing on other Fairfax team.

As for coaching with the assumption everything stays the same. The 5th grade A coach is very good. Can really develop talent. 5B coaches are okay. The 6A coach is terrible. He's probably worse than his dad who got fired as HC from Georgetown. The 7A coach is okay nothing to write home about. Seems to always get inside his own head. I'm assuming the 7B coach will move up to 8B because that's the only way his kid (and a couple of his friends) will make the team. He is the epitome of a Dad coach. 8A coach is decent and can build for HS.

This is 100 percent correct. The 7B team coach and presumably now the 8B coach picks his kid and their friends. There are much stronger kids who try out but aren’t in the club. Those left for AAU teams or other fycbl teams. Most kids from 7b last year played rec too - and they get schooled by all the kids they beat out for the travel team. It’s pathetic.

Yes, the 7B coach is moving up to 8B coach. How else would his kid and his friends make the team?

[Anonymous]

I posted in a previous thread (last year?) that DH was outside looking into the Kenmore gym several years ago during tryouts, standing next to a group of dads chatting. The dad clique was discussing who would "make the team" this year. Our DS made the B team/div 2 even though he had played AAU for several years and was arguably more skilled than at least half of the div 1 team. Many of the div 1 team that year also played for Storm baseball with no AAU experience. Others were high-level travel lacrosse players.

This daddy ball favoritism also impacts playing time of course. DH wants to keep DS on an ATB team of any level if only for practice time in a gym and reps. It's hard to find decent and affordable group training at intermediate/advanced level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I posted in a previous thread (last year?) that DH was outside looking into the Kenmore gym several years ago during tryouts, standing next to a group of dads chatting. The dad clique was discussing who would "make the team" this year. Our DS made the B team/div 2 even though he had played AAU for several years and was arguably more skilled than at least half of the div 1 team. Many of the div 1 team that year also played for Storm baseball with no AAU experience. Others were high-level travel lacrosse players.

This daddy ball favoritism also impacts playing time of course. DH wants to keep DS on an ATB team of any level if only for practice time in a gym and reps. It's hard to find decent and affordable group training at intermediate/advanced level.

So did he make a team this year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
quote=Anonymous]
So did he make a team this year?

Yes, we got a congrats email this evening. A few Friends of DS got rejection emails around the same time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is up with the travel baseball/travel basketball connection? I guess it's the dad bro network? I noticed several boys wearing shirts for the the local travel baseball team at my son's tryouts. They are big/tall but certainly not all good at basketball. But I noticed the coaches high fiving the boys and shaking hands with the dads. I guess those kids are getting in regardless.

Yes A team. Politics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I posted in a previous thread (last year?) that DH was outside looking into the Kenmore gym several years ago during tryouts, standing next to a group of dads chatting. The dad clique was discussing who would "make the team" this year. Our DS made the B team/div 2 even though he had played AAU for several years and was arguably more skilled than at least half of the div 1 team. Many of the div 1 team that year also played for Storm baseball with no AAU experience. Others were high-level travel lacrosse players.

This daddy ball favoritism also impacts playing time of course. DH wants to keep DS on an ATB team of any level if only for practice time in a gym and reps. It's hard to find decent and affordable group training at intermediate/advanced level.

I assume you are taking about the kids who are in 8th now. Lots of storm kids made 5th grade A team this year too.

[Anonymous]

Son was very happy with his tryout performance this week, said he scored most often during the scrimmages. No doubt because he’s been a starter on known AAU teams for a few years and trains. We watched him thru the windows towards the end of each session, dominant scoring and solid defense. He made the B team but disappointed he did not make the A team. But, we reasoned with politics at play, he might have ended up on the A team bench so the coach favorites would be given more playing time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is up with the travel baseball/travel basketball connection? I guess it's the dad bro network? I noticed several boys wearing shirts for the the local travel baseball team at my son's tryouts. They are big/tall but certainly not all good at basketball. But I noticed the coaches high fiving the boys and shaking hands with the dads. I guess those kids are getting in regardless.

Yes A team. Politics.

So is it safe to assume most storm players made the “A” team on the boys side?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Son was very happy with his tryout performance this week, said he scored most often during the scrimmages. No doubt because he’s been a starter on known AAU teams for a few years and trains. We watched him thru the windows towards the end of each session, dominant scoring and solid defense. He made the B team but disappointed he did not make the A team. But, we reasoned with politics at play, he might have ended up on the A team bench so the coach favorites would be given more playing time.

We are in same boat. Son said he kept being moved to the better court (we peaked in and saw). And also felt really good about tryouts and plays/starts AAU. Disappointed if politics were at play.