Agree. Anyone who wants to pitch should get private lessons and make sure your instructor teaches IR.

Anonymous wrote:Sounds like the kiddo is looking for an excuse. "But you didn't get me private lessons."

If the kiddo is indeed that motivated. Get her some literature, take her out and practice with her. I don't know much about softball, but for most sports there are plenty of improvement materials available. Not to ding on lessons, just one or two isn't going to do much, and many of the low hanging fruit advice are in the books and YouTube videos.

Quick google and there is one on Amazon: "Diamond Girl: A Guide to Beginner and Advanced Softball Pitching"

Different softball parent here, not OP. Softball pitching is not something you can do this for, unless possibly a parent is willing to take the online Pauly Girl University classes and implement that method, but that's a major lift on the parent.

There are 2 major different schools of thought on the entire pitching motion (one is flat wrong, FWIW) and within those schools infinite variations - how far sideways do you turn? When do you close your hips? Where do you set up for each drill? What drills are worth it? Is wrist snap at the end of the pitch real? You can find highly experienced pitchers and coaches arguing about this stuff infinitely online and it shouldn't be on a kid to navigate the answers to that. If you just do books or YouTube videos it isn't going to work, and when you start wrong it takes months to break it down and fix it - my own pitcher learned this the hard way, but thankfully in the off-season.

Pitching lessons aren't something that requires a contract (at least not that I've seen). It's pretty easy - set them up for every other week and if the kid isn't making a way to do the drills 2-3 times a week in between just stop. That's your indicator of motivation.

Sounds like the kiddo is looking for an excuse. "But you didn't get me private lessons."

If the kiddo is indeed that motivated. Get her some literature, take her out and practice with her. I don't know much about softball, but for most sports there are plenty of improvement materials available. Not to ding on lessons, just one or two isn't going to do much, and many of the low hanging fruit advice are in the books and YouTube videos.

Quick google and there is one on Amazon: "Diamond Girl: A Guide to Beginner and Advanced Softball Pitching"

OP- another thing that ways in favor of your effort. . . There may be value in your kid having one-on-one time with an adult who’s not a parent during the awkward early teen years. Mine lifted with a personal trainer starting at 14, cost me more than it was probably worth in terms of muscle gain, but I could tell it helped my kids’ confidence. Do we kept it up and it was cheaper than therapy!

Softball parent here… I’d let her have the lessons. I saw a lot of mediocre athletes do pretty well with low level club and high school ball. It is a sport where if you put in the effort and get coached and like it you can do ok. It’s nice that she enjoys it. I know the driving is a drag but seems like she likes it and that is great! I’d put in the time to give her the chance to be on a team. So much good comes from that… it doesn’t have to end with playing in college… there is value in the present and the friendships, the learning, etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

What? No. Rec level teams are shiiiiit past 12u. Half the team are unathletic kids with clueless parents who couldn’t catch a ball if you dropped it in their lap. You are now forced into C level travel if you want teammates who know the rules of the game and can throw/catch AT ALL.

What part of the area do you live in, because this isn't our experience.

That is the whole DMV. I lived in MoCo/FredCo and that was our experiences. We have good friends that live in Ashburn and its the same.

It is 100% the experience. After 12, rec is for girls that want to try the sport for the first time.

We're in Fairfax County and this is not our experience. Yes we have those girls, but we also have girls who got sick of travel, multi-sport athletes who love softball but can't commit to a travel schedule because they play a fall high school sport, and even girls who are playing both travel and rec. Is it the same as 14, 16, or 18U B? Absolutely not. Is it a laughing stock? Also not.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

What? No. Rec level teams are shiiiiit past 12u. Half the team are unathletic kids with clueless parents who couldn’t catch a ball if you dropped it in their lap. You are now forced into C level travel if you want teammates who know the rules of the game and can throw/catch AT ALL.

What part of the area do you live in, because this isn't our experience.

That is the whole DMV. I lived in MoCo/FredCo and that was our experiences. We have good friends that live in Ashburn and its the same.

It is 100% the experience. After 12, rec is for girls that want to try the sport for the first time.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

What? No. Rec level teams are shiiiiit past 12u. Half the team are unathletic kids with clueless parents who couldn’t catch a ball if you dropped it in their lap. You are now forced into C level travel if you want teammates who know the rules of the game and can throw/catch AT ALL.

What part of the area do you live in, because this isn't our experience.

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

What? No. Rec level teams are shiiiiit past 12u. Half the team are unathletic kids with clueless parents who couldn’t catch a ball if you dropped it in their lap. You are now forced into C level travel if you want teammates who know the rules of the game and can throw/catch AT ALL.

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

They’re the ones that need it. And if level C allows them to play more games then it serves a purpose. Money grabs are at every level.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

Y'all need to stop denigrating C level teams. Yes, some may be glorified rec teams. Most are not. There are unlikely to be new players on a travel team; most of the girls will have played for years. They'll make most catches, they'll know how to bunt and where they're supposed to be on the field based on game play. Some, like DDs team last year, are playing C because they lack any good pitchers and it's really hard to win at B without at least one good pitcher. Some are outstanding teams (I have no idea how some of the teams at the East Coast C Championships could be classified as C teams.) It is absolutely worth taking private lessons if you want to improve at that level.

I don't buy it. What B-level non-pitcher is going to stay on a C team with no solid pitchers? Those girls should all go find B teams if their hitting and fielding is at the B level.

Also for those who keep saying C teams are so great, I have seen C teams have a crazy strong record -- like 40 and 2 for the Spring with several of those wins being blowouts and then they move up to B and get absolutely crushed. If your kid is playing C, you don't realize how much higher the level of play can be in B.

In fact I do.. kid has played both. Usually they play the off-years (11U, for instance) as C and top years as B, and they do fine. But these 40-2 C teams...you're suggesting those girls stay in rec?

DD had rec practice last night. Two girls are new to softball, one has literally never played before. Which is great, that's the purpose of rec. In their end-of-practice scrimmage the first batter hit a ground ball to 2nd-- 2nd baseman overthrows first by a mile and the base runner gets to third. First baseman way overthrows 3rd...allowing the runner to go home. That doesn't happen on C level teams (someone will say they saw something like that one time at one tournament, but it really doesn't happen.) BIG errors happen a lot in rec. For those who have rec teams that are basically travel teams, that's awesome. But most aren't like that, and we've been in this world for a long time.

Either way -- a kid on a C team who wants and can afford private lessons should absolutely do them.

Totally agree.

And to PP, tell me the C team that went 40-2 in the spring and then got crushed at the B level? Lets look up that record in GC.

Bc even if they did go 40-2 in GG, they didnt have that record in USSSA. BC, USSSA actually does a good job of bumping those teams mid season up to B.

And I also have experience with athletes at both the B level and the C level. And there's actually a VERY thin line (almost non-existant) between the top 10% of C teams, and the bottom 50% of B teams. Virtually non-existant.

Anonymous wrote:There is value in working hard to improve, whether the athlete is "good" compared to others or not. I would support this if it isn't a burden financially. Your daughter has a growth mindset and rightly believes that hard work will improve her skills. Let her discover the payoff!

This is where we came down with a boy and a different sport. Every year, he's the kid who barely gets asked back to a high-level kid. But he's also the kid who works out at 6 a.m. six days a week, either at a skills lesson, at the gym with a group training session or running on our treadmill. How can we not support that if we have the means? I don't care if this all ends in high school because he's developed a work ethic that he'll have for the rest of his life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

Y'all need to stop denigrating C level teams. Yes, some may be glorified rec teams. Most are not. There are unlikely to be new players on a travel team; most of the girls will have played for years. They'll make most catches, they'll know how to bunt and where they're supposed to be on the field based on game play. Some, like DDs team last year, are playing C because they lack any good pitchers and it's really hard to win at B without at least one good pitcher. Some are outstanding teams (I have no idea how some of the teams at the East Coast C Championships could be classified as C teams.) It is absolutely worth taking private lessons if you want to improve at that level.

I don't buy it. What B-level non-pitcher is going to stay on a C team with no solid pitchers? Those girls should all go find B teams if their hitting and fielding is at the B level.

Also for those who keep saying C teams are so great, I have seen C teams have a crazy strong record -- like 40 and 2 for the Spring with several of those wins being blowouts and then they move up to B and get absolutely crushed. If your kid is playing C, you don't realize how much higher the level of play can be in B.

In fact I do.. kid has played both. Usually they play the off-years (11U, for instance) as C and top years as B, and they do fine. But these 40-2 C teams...you're suggesting those girls stay in rec?

DD had rec practice last night. Two girls are new to softball, one has literally never played before. Which is great, that's the purpose of rec. In their end-of-practice scrimmage the first batter hit a ground ball to 2nd-- 2nd baseman overthrows first by a mile and the base runner gets to third. First baseman way overthrows 3rd...allowing the runner to go home. That doesn't happen on C level teams (someone will say they saw something like that one time at one tournament, but it really doesn't happen.) BIG errors happen a lot in rec. For those who have rec teams that are basically travel teams, that's awesome. But most aren't like that, and we've been in this world for a long time.

Either way -- a kid on a C team who wants and can afford private lessons should absolutely do them.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

Y'all need to stop denigrating C level teams. Yes, some may be glorified rec teams. Most are not. There are unlikely to be new players on a travel team; most of the girls will have played for years. They'll make most catches, they'll know how to bunt and where they're supposed to be on the field based on game play. Some, like DDs team last year, are playing C because they lack any good pitchers and it's really hard to win at B without at least one good pitcher. Some are outstanding teams (I have no idea how some of the teams at the East Coast C Championships could be classified as C teams.) It is absolutely worth taking private lessons if you want to improve at that level.

I think they all got bumped up to B by their local directors for 24-25.

I say that bc I'm a parent of one of the players on that team. They were C bc they were essentially a brand new team; 10 of the 12 years had only played rec before the year. But they wanted to improve. They put in the work all fall & winter and it paid off with a great finish to the season, and then they were (rightly) bumped up to B for their second year of 12U.

Which is 100% the point of C level softball. The person denigrating C level is an idiot. That story would have never happened if those girls had stayed in Rec or been forced to play B before they were ready.

I know a different C level team that is exactly what you described (or are you on the 13U Firebirds?). Great story, I agree. And the purpose of C.

But there are other C level teams that are not even or just barely rec all-star teams with coaches who may or may not actually be able to get them to that level. I know those teams too and I know that they typically end up just chasing girls out of the sport because it's not fun to be beat by teams like yours with solid players who were catching up to B level play over the course of a year when they aren't improving.

I'm not the poster ragging on C level play, but I get why they would be. It's not your success story and those like you. It's the other teams.

No, no the Firebirds but I do know that team, and they are also a good example.

You're not wrong. And FWIW, those games (where a glorified rec team faces a team catching up to B) suck for both team. Sure, it stinks to be mercied. And it stinks when run differential is a tie breaker so the score gets run up a bit.

But it also stinks that, at C level, you only get 2 pool play games and one of them is against a team that shouldn't be there. You don't actually have to compete. You don't improve. When you get 2 ABs and its just 8 balls outside of the zone. That stinks for the other girls too.

So I totally agree that there are teams that should go back to Rec. But I do object to the PP that said something like "if you're playing C, just go back to rec". By age 12, you're not going to catch up to the B teams by playing rec. There's still a place for C level softball. Even if its diluted by teams that shouldn't be there

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point for C level kids to be on a travel team. It's just a money grab. C level kids should be playing rec. I personally would not waste money on private lessons for a C level 13 year old.

Y'all need to stop denigrating C level teams. Yes, some may be glorified rec teams. Most are not. There are unlikely to be new players on a travel team; most of the girls will have played for years. They'll make most catches, they'll know how to bunt and where they're supposed to be on the field based on game play. Some, like DDs team last year, are playing C because they lack any good pitchers and it's really hard to win at B without at least one good pitcher. Some are outstanding teams (I have no idea how some of the teams at the East Coast C Championships could be classified as C teams.) It is absolutely worth taking private lessons if you want to improve at that level.

I think they all got bumped up to B by their local directors for 24-25.

I say that bc I'm a parent of one of the players on that team. They were C bc they were essentially a brand new team; 10 of the 12 years had only played rec before the year. But they wanted to improve. They put in the work all fall & winter and it paid off with a great finish to the season, and then they were (rightly) bumped up to B for their second year of 12U.

Which is 100% the point of C level softball. The person denigrating C level is an idiot. That story would have never happened if those girls had stayed in Rec or been forced to play B before they were ready.

I know a different C level team that is exactly what you described (or are you on the 13U Firebirds?). Great story, I agree. And the purpose of C.

But there are other C level teams that are not even or just barely rec all-star teams with coaches who may or may not actually be able to get them to that level. I know those teams too and I know that they typically end up just chasing girls out of the sport because it's not fun to be beat by teams like yours with solid players who were catching up to B level play over the course of a year when they aren't improving.

I'm not the poster ragging on C level play, but I get why they would be. It's not your success story and those like you. It's the other teams.