Senior State Games - West team

Has the roster been posted and if so Who made the West??

 

A few of my thoughts on this one... Things to think about.

ss-05: Thanks for your thoughts...

I have read the posts on this forum and I just want to get across a few points on this issue. If you don't agree with me, that's fine. The State Games are important to me. Here are the things that I have observed over the past several years of my involvement:

#1: All Coaches do not nominate their players. This can be for several reasons. Either they dont want their players to miss Legion Games, which I had a coach tell me that one time, or as Mudcat stated they dont feel the process is as fair as it should be. The fact of the matter is that any coach who doesnt nominate a player, has missed a chance for that player to be seen by someone. What abou the experience of the tryout. For a kid that has never been to a showcase or a pro style workout, this is valuable for the experience. So for a coach not to nominate a player, well I have a hard time with that.

#2: The integrity of the coaches. It is difficult to pick out 20 players for 2 7-inning games (that's all for the Seniors this year, not a 3 game, 9-inning series as in the past). We all miss players, heck I would be lying if I said I never missed a player when making the decisions I have had to make on 3 occasions. I have missed players, some I didn't know and they had a bad day at tryouts. I have always told players at ant state games tryout that I have been a part of, if they feel like they have not had their best workout, to come to the next one. If someone feels like I have been unfair in any of the selections that I have been a part of, then I would invite them into private conversation, not public bashing. I know of a coach who was offered money to keep a player, turned it down and cut the player, because other players had better tryouts. This was a substantial amount of money. We are humans ya know...

#3: Maybe the state games format should be changed, I dont know how, but maybe it needs tweaking. Apparently, they have lost interest in the Senior Games, I hear it is because the scouts arent interested, I dont know. That doesnt matter to me, the draft has already occurred when these take place anyway. Maybe the Senior games should be for unsigned Seniors, so college coaches could have one more look. It might help a kid find a place to play.

#4: The state games committee this year limited region teams to only 2 Sophomores and NO Freshmen. So this helps more juniors get opportunities to be seen. Is this really good? What if there are 3-4 sophomores that are better than 15 of the 20 players, and you have to pick only 2 of them?

Please don't question the integrity of the coaches involved, we do this for nothing, pay for stuff out of our pockets, just like many of us do with our own players at school, an ddont ask for anything in return.

 

Now that was a great post

 

I think there is definately a problem with the Senior State games.

I know that the coach at Providence wanted to send players who have not signed with a college so they can get some final looks. I do have a senior and he was told that since he was already signed that he would not be nominated to go - which was fine with him because there were other players that had not signed and needed to go.

I know there are several players (I can think of about six or seven and there may be more) that were nominated this year that were on the Region 6 team last year with my son and who have also signed as well. That's fine as it is up to the coach and the player as to who goes. It is such a great experience and so much fun that it's hard to turn down the opportunity if it is presented to you. I'm sure my son would have loved to go again.

I think what would be a great thing for senior state games is --

Take the defending champions of the Junior games (in this case it would be Region 6) and play a game against the winner of this years East/West Senior game winner. Of course all the players on the defending team would not be nominated to tryout for the next years Senior team. That might eliminate several players that were nominated to tryout and would open several spots for those boys that could be nominated.

Just a thought - Any ideas?

 

In the absence of any formal guidelines, recommendations from HS coaches to the Senior State Games are difficult. It has been suggested that the game be reserved for unsigned seniors, which is an excellent idea, but it does leave a couple of questions open:

1. How strict is this guideline? A school may not have a viable candidate that isn't already signed.
2. Recommendations from the HS coaches go out before the beginning of the spring signing period.
3. If a HS coach only recommends unsigned seniors, what happens to his recommendations if the players he sends to the tryouts sign in the spring?
4. If it is left as a recommendation, then the unsigned seniors may be competing at tryouts with players who committed the prior fall. I don't think the typical unsigned graduating senior player will be able to compete with a player like Chad Flack or Josh Horton.
5. Do you make out a 30-man roster for each (East/West), striking out names when players commit? Do you have any pitching that isn't signed?

The way it is now, signed senior players may choose NOT to compete, giving the potential of a roster spot to someone that isn't signed, but there are a lot more than 20 signed players in the east/west and this thought isn't universal.

The Senior State Games isn't about showcasing (or it never has been in the past). It's about a FINAL celebration of some wonderful high school players and their careers. There are other venue's for showcasing unsigned seniors. Let's leave something that purely about baseball itself. Let's have some competition at it's very best.

 

Senior State Games-West

This is our first time posting on your board, and until now, we have appreciated the fact that you do not allow athletes to be "slammed". For some reason, Chris Taylor has been the recipient of a lot of criticism that is not earned. To our knowledge the Senior State Games are open to all nominated seniors, signed and unsigned, and the team is picked by coaches who do their best to not be POLITICAL. The coaches do however want to pick a competative team. Some days kids do better than others at the tryouts, and it is important that players attend all of the tryouts so that they can have the best opportunity to be seen and selected. People who choose to comment on one player having a better tryout than others, should keep their opinions to themselves if they are not the ones responsible for selecting the team.

As for mamaslam, I believe you are just angry because your son did not make the team, and instead of supporting him you have chosen to bash another player. This is inexcusable. No one is ever elevated to a higher level by putting someone else down. And as for your 3 catchers who you feel are all better than those who were selected, we wish them luck in the signing process, and in their continued baseball careers.

Let's support all of our athletes. These young men work hard day in and day out and do not deserve to be assaulted by angry parents on a message board.

 

WOW!

Some quality "points" made here in the last few posts.. Time to put it to bed! I think? Over my 15 year coaching career the State Games experience was amongst the best I ever had within HS sports and I think I can honestly say the same for all the hundreds of young men who tried out and either didi or did not make the team! :applause: :xyzthumbs :applause: :xyzthumbs :applause: :xyzthumbs :applause: :xyzthumbs

 

I went back through to read this thread looking for when a player was slammed. Is this what you were referring to? I agree, we try hard not to allow a particular player to be singled out in a negative way, but I didn't think this crossed the line...perhaps I'm wrong...but I do recall myself and statefan both saying Chris is a wonderful player and had an excellent tryout. Apparently, the coaches agreed with us.

Good luck to all the participants and I hope the next post in this thread is about listing the names selected

 

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Sportsfamily your comments regarding mamaslam are totally incorrect. I have known this family and their son for years and you will not find a finer family. All of her points were about the process and were never directed at a particular player. Her son is an excellent catcher and respects the game and thrives on competition. She would not say this but her son has been signed to play DI, was all conference player of the year this year and selected as an all state player.

Personally, my son did not even want to go to the tryout because he knew the catchers had already been picked. We made him go out of respect for his coach that nominated him. He will also be playing DI and was also on Impacts 2004 follow list.

There are a lot of things about the process I don't understand and things look different when you are on the inside.....fact remains, that politics are woven through every part of our lives. Someone gets the job we are going after not because they are better or better qualified but because they knew someone, etc.

I know that mamaslam's son and mine have not lost any sleep over State Games and that the team/coach has not lost any sleep over their choices and that the team will be very, very, very good. The most important thing is that all of these young men we all talk about are very intelligent, classy young men that just happen to play baseball....in four years they will all have a degree and will be very successful in anything they do.

 

Rosters anyone?

Does anyone have the East/West rosters.