Baseball: Which is the best option?
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Anonymous
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Kids are in their first season of Babe Ruth baseball. Age 10. Minors. Only done a summer camp before. Love baseball. They have done swimming, tennis, rock climbing, basketball but it their love for baseball is the greatest. I have read all about how competitive it is to get on high school basketball teams. What about baseball? If I want to set them up for success - not in being recruited - but just to be able to play on their high school baseball team, which is the best option?
a. continue with Babe Ruth in fall and spring and have them play a lot in the summer with camps/clinics/private lessons b. travel baseball asap c. travel baseball when they get to middle school, but continue with Babe Ruth until then Thanks! |
Anonymous
| Tell us your high school and we can give you a much better answer. My kids go to Madison in Vienna. I'd say your kids would have slim to no chance here no matter what you do now unless they are just super athletes. Baseball is a sport many kids start at 4 or 5 years old. |
Anonymous
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My kids did BCC rec league baseball and loved it - https://www.bccbaseball.com/rec
One of them did it until age 12, the other just decided to stop after age 16. It was a lot of fun and "only" a couple hundred bucks per season. My kids liked the pace - one practice and one game per week. I didn't have the budget/time and my kids didn't have the drive to get on the travel sports treadmill. I can only advise that you know what you're getting into |
Anonymous
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The bad news is, your kids are starting a little late.
The good news is that the advanced motor skills for catching, throwing don't kick in until around 8 years old. So presumably, your kids don't have any bad habits ingrained yet. I would look for quality instruction and lots of repetition. Defense first because that'll help your kid stick on the field (cannot be a defensive liability), hitting second, and pitching third (pitching can be developed later b/c they don't start until 8/9 years old). I'd look for some individual or small group private instruction (no more than 4 kids). At big camps, there are just too many kids to slow things down. Get some basic defensive and hitting fundamentals down cold. I'd do Rec ball and tryout for travel teams even if they don't make it. If you can find a travel team that is practice heavy preseason and during the season, it'll be much better than a team that just plays tournaments every weekend. Once they've caught up, take the winter off and play another sport. There's a ton of failure in baseball and part of being a good player is just hanging around long enough to develop. The fruit that ripens first is also the first to rot. |
Anonymous
| Our local Babe Ruth has travel integrated into the league. Does yours? That makes it a little easier to decide because you aren't leaving the organization. |
Anonymous
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At this age, practice >> games. Do wiffle ball, hit off a tee, play catch, join whatever team has a quality coach and some kids your child likes spending time with.
HS team competitiveness depends on the school, but you have time to let them develop and have fun. Strong athletes will catch up to the dad ball kids pretty quickly once puberty pans out. A kid who falls in love with baseball at 10 can absolutely catch up. |
Anonymous
Get a grip! The top public high schools for baseball and even WCAC schools in DMV have rosters loaded with players who do not play high level travel baseball or who focus on other sports. The coaches who develop those players in 9th and 10th grades build the best programs. Any travel baseball beyond the NVTBL-type before 13 or in most cases even 15 is a total waste of time and money that should be dedicated to baseball skill development. |
Anonymous
My kid is on his high school baseball team and started bb late. He always did little league but it was not his main sport until age 13. My advice: join a travel team asap because it will prepare them to play high school ball. Babe Ruth won't. |
Anonymous
None of the starters on WCAC teams did not play travel when 13-14. Almost none of the players on the good WCAC teams (ie anyone other than The Heights) play another sport. This really goes for all sports, not just baseball. You are very wrong on player development. Having a kid going through SJC, there is little player development. The coaches are really just managing…most development is done with personal paid coaching/trainers. |
Anonymous
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I think it really depends on the school. In FCPS, there are some schools that are crazy competitive and some that can barely field a single varsity team.
My son played little league in a competitive, well-run little league til he aged out and then tried out and made a very competitive 13U travel program in our area. We were glad we waited til 13 to start travel. There were already 13 year olds who had thrown out their arms pitching in both little league and travel when they were 11-12. He has mainly sat the bench as a freshman on the J-V team (there are, like, 40 kids on the JV team), but all signs point to him playing as a sophomore, fingers crossed. He just really loves it. |
Anonymous
| My son started baseball in 6th grade, is not an amazing athlete, and just made his large public HS JV team. Never played travel. |
Anonymous
+1. From a skills perspective the kids who play in the top WCAC programs are close to being finished products when they arrive in 9th grade. Many are already on college coach radar. So there is little technical player development once you arrive. There just isn’t time for that in a 50 player program. Now, you better believe the coach is going to develop them in the weight room, get them used to facing pitching velocity, and advanced offensive/defensive concepts. But no one is learning how to bunt or throw a curve ball at this level. |
Anonymous
| OP, what high school are you zoned for? People can tell you how competitive the program is. |
Anonymous
Ours does too, but at 10, all of the travel players are already playing majors 60 and they are required to play rec. So, at 10, your kid will be falling further and further behind by playing minors and only getting 2 games a week and 1 practice. The travel players get that plus another travel practice and a double header on Sundays. We are in Arlignton, and we know a bunch of kids who played on the A travel team who did not make their high school teams. It was pretty shocking to me. I think op gave good advice above. If your kid wants to play in hs at one of these big schools, they are going to need a lot more reps. A lot more. Tell them to get out there everyday and hit off a tee and throw with them. Start at 10 feet, back up and work up to 60’. That’s the base path length. It will help tremendously if they are good athletes and can catch and throw somewhat accurately. Our 10U team definitely has some kids on to who probably don’t deserve to be. With that being said, if your kid practices all summer, there’s a decent chance he could get one of the 2-3 openings for an 11u team that will start training in the winter. T |
Anonymous
100%. Some of the kids started travel at 8 because their dads want them too. It’s a lot of you don’t love it. So, by 10 or 11 a few will drop out. |