Showcase or Travel Baseball

thanks

there is nothing better than running into one of these guys years later and they still remember what you taught them. Seeing them as a young man with their pants pulled up and wearing a hat the right way is well worth the time and effort.

 

Amen brother. When all is said and done, it is the lasting impression you made on those kids that is gratifying.

 

These coaches are unusual, in a good way. not everyone does this. That's not a slam at anyone. Just not every coach is that committed to the job and to his kids. Not every coach can be.

 

Yes, you are correct, but I believe you are starting to see more and more get involved. Not every coach has the relationships to just pick up a phone to make a call, but more families are demanding for their coach to become more involved than the lack of effort by some in the past.

I predict in the near future, if a coach is not willing to help a bonafide college talent, then he won't last too long as the coach. Maybe there is, but I can't think of one coach in Charlotte that won't help their players. Some may be better than others, but they all help in some way.

 

My 8 cents.

Im not sure about a lot of things. Not sure of what seems to be surfacing regarding travel vs rec. Or travel teams vs showcase teams. However it does seem like there has been a lot of "one-upsmenship" going on. Par for our culture.

Eliteness. Able to say one is in a certain group. One is to reap the spoils of a name or a groups name.

For instance if your baseball resume did not say "showcase" on it many might think that you are not part of that group. Its kind of sad in a way. Exclusiveness. Many want to be exclusive. To exclude others. To distance from the main stream.

What will be next? Showcase allstars? Travel all stars? Did showcase ball turn into travel ball allstars?

Things like invitational tournaments are exclusive arenas. But some will ask how do you get invited. There is talent out there that do not get invited because someone didn't see them play. Or they had a bad day/night when someone did see them play. Or for a myriad of other reasons. Or maybe their coach didn't get their name out there. (Thank goodness for TBR.)

And true, some will not get invited because they have a piss poor attitude!
(I wouldn't invite them to beakfast much less to play a game!)

What will happen now that showcase is getting watered down?

What is the next exclusive venue? It will, in time, get watered down to.

Why would it seem to some that it is a suprise that showcase ball is getting watered down?

 

End the MADDNESS

Let's elect Impact the king of recruitment in NC. All players must go before it and it infinite wisdom and be place in those who play or not play catagories. All college coaches must take those elected regardless of what they need. NC players before out of state and transfers. Carolina will get exclusive rights to Dirtbag players. All others will be spread across the college system. All others will be force to work or go to the school of their choice. As for cost. No more free enterprise. All players must pay $29.95 and $9.95 for those players who can prove that they have not switch school during their HS career. All money needs to be sent to PD Ventures. I will give Impact their cut after proper paperwork and procedures have been followed. This will end the back & forth.

 

Can someone hide his submit button

 

The coaches that do have those relationships really do a good job for their kids though. At one point a few years back we had 16 kids playing beyond the HS level. One of the toughest things that these coaches have to deal with though is parent expectations. Just because a kid is all conference does not mean he is a D1 player. These established coaches need to be trusted in their honest evaluation of the players, and the parents need to realize that the coach wants to get them into a situation where the player will have a chance to continue playing, have fun, and have a reasonable chance of success. The players and parents attitudes go a long way in determining just how hard a HS coach is going to work for the kid though.

Now back on topic. One of the problems I see is the way tournaments are labeled. It seems about 50% of the tournaments that HS aged kids can enter anymore are labeled "Showcase Tournaments". We play together as a HS team and have entered some of these and have been somewhat successful. Now if these had been what I would consider true elite events we would probably get waxed and that has occured when facing some of the true elite teams. But we do approach these games the same as any other game. We can't get involved in a home run derby and can't change pitchers every 3 innings but sometimes you can compete by just simply playing the game.

 

Bad idea.....then he would PM all of us every day....

 

Hey Mudcat- I saw Casey Allison for the 1st time. I was impressed. The kid can hit with the best of 'em... And his character is unmatched.