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My daughter is a behemouth for her age (13), not super agile, but fast hands. She can catch anything thrown her way, and does OK behind the plate. Can crush the ball, so she bats 3 or 4 most of the year. Last year's coach is pushing like this a travel team when it is just rec league. His tiny daughter is about eighth talented on the team, but plays in two travel leagues along with rec. The one girl out for the first time is super shy, her mom drops her off and never stays to watch, so she bats deal last all year, and rarely plays anything but a couple innings in RF. Last game of the year, we have the league regular season wrapped up, playing the last place team. My daughter on her own goes to the coach and tells him that she will switch spots with Morgan so she gets a chance to bat up in the lineup and start the game. I could not have been prouder of a walk-off GS. Dickhead says NO, we need to keep our continuity. My wife about killed him. They left rec this year, as did most of the "good"players. We are down to two rec teams with .75 good pitchers total. Having more fun, though. Fuck 'em.

Props to your daughter for getting it right. Win with class and when it does not matter let the others play. I would be proud to be her father right now.

Hey K_E,
Your daughter sounds like a class act. I,on the other hand,was not a class act when my son was small. He wasn't looking good with his swing and his baseball coach thought he could bat him 2nd to last or last every game. I straightened his ass out on that and got in his face. My son had like 12 AB's and had drawn walks about 7 times in 12 AB's. So his "form" looked like shit,my argument was don't pigeonhole a young boy into batting last all the time. (I think the kids were 8-9) That was one of the few times I ever said anything to a coach. I tried to bite my tongue. It's not easy.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

Some time in the late 90s a friend of mine was coaching his grandson at Hiawatha Park. A lot of guys had heard about the quality of the league at Norridge which was an actual Little League, so a bunch of kids from Hiawatha were going to play over there too. Norridge was a pretty tight and snooty little group but somehow my buddy finagled his way into coaching a team over there.

They had some secret rating system for slotting the players that would play on their dads' teams. My friend's grandson was a pretty good hitter but kind of slow. They slotted him in something like the seventh round so that meant that my friend lost his seventh round pick. He was really happy they had slotted the kid so low.

The two best pitchers from Hiawatha at the time were Ryan Klein and Billy Rasch. Klein was a tall kid with a good fastball and pinpoint control most of the time. Rasch was a guy who was just developing and had begun throwing really hard. On a good day, he could probably dial it up to about 70 mph which was pretty fast for 11/12s. He had some control issues but that doesn't matter so much when over half the kids are bailing on every pitch.

They had a closed draft with head coaches only. My friend figured he would take Rasch with the first pick and then a kid named George Hickey with the second because George Sr. was going to be his assistant coach. Hickey was a nice little player but he was a small kid and I think he was only eleven. I figured nobody at Norridge knew him or was going to spend a second-rounder on him. I had seen this kid named Bruce play at Norridge and he was a talented little bastard. I told my buddy to take Bruce in the second round and wait to take Hickey with his third pick.

After the draft I met my friend at some Greek coffee shop on Harlem and he had a disgusted look on his face. Some guy had taken Hickey in the second round. "I lost my assistant coach, you asshole. And now George Sr. is mad at me. I expect to see you on Monday. Practice starts at 3:00."

Shit got worse when Bruce turned out to be a prima donna and a real pain in the balls. We were the worst team in the league. I'm not sure if we even won a game. We were the A's and the best team in the league was the Indians. They had a bomber guy named Dean Cadematori who was a killer at Notre Dame H.S. and went on to play at S.I.U. Our most glorious moment was talking those guys to ten or eleven innings before losing. They couldn't hit Rasch and we rode him the maximum of six innings. It was the last game of the day on a Friday and by the time it was over there were a couple hundred people watching the game. After we lost they gave both teams a standing ovation. I think I still have the scorebook from that game. If I can find it, maybe I'll post a picture of it.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Thats awesome, man

Jorr, spin us more tales. You never cease to amaze me. When you heading out to Arlington Park?

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Hawaii (fuck) You

I'm not sure when I'm going to get out to AP. I'd definitely be up for meeting out there some time.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Cool Story, JORR


No really, cool story


But Ive always wondered why there's a draft in little league. Couldnt you just randomize it? Especially a league with returning players where only the 10 yr olds (out of the 10-12 group) are coming in

I'm sure some of the guys here with kids have seen something like this, but in the limited experience I have in watching my friends coach, there's usually a clique of guys who push the shit out of their kids and all get to be friends because they are the same type of douchebag. Sometimes they like to try to stack up a team with all the best kids playing together. It can be ridiculous. I'm sure if your daughter really likes to play and you keep going forward, you'll see all types of stupid shit that will make you shake your head.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Yeah, my dad coached but wasnt IN with the clique. He was pretty taken back by the intensity of the first draft. Guys making trades and shit. Get a life.


I guess ya kinda need a draft to make sure every team has a couple decent players, its just a silly idea to me.

You know these lunatics are making draft boards in their war rooms in the weeks and months leading up to D-DAY

Just went through the draft process out in the Dundee area (Tri-Cities) back in March. It is actually really fair. All of the kids go through a set of skills and are graded 1-5. If a coach's kid gets a top rating, then he loses his first draft pick. Same for his assistant coaches. It leaves the teams with weaker coach's kids to be able to grab the top talent in the draft. I find that there is good balance in the league. To be quite honest, most teams only have 3-4 decent players while the rest are kids with bad swings and marginal fielding skills.

My problem is with the coaches who send their kids up to the plate and tell them not to swing until they get two strikes. The games become a walk fest because many pitchers can't throw 3 called strikes in a 7 pitch at bat. And you burn up your best pitchers because balls are never put in play,

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Hawaii (fuck) You

When the kids are young you dont know all the players. In the draft I always took the kids with the biggest uniform sizes.

Coaching tips for the real young:

Keep them moving. Get them to line up. I used to put kids at short and second and hit grounders, make them change lines, move move,move. Make them run second to home, first to third so they were used to that.

In the field always throw the ball to second. No exceptions. Teach the cutoff to second throw. Stop the bleeding.

When kids look like they are afraid of the ball, have a practice with tennis balls. Kids love that.

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Gloop, is that your first productive post? Those are actually good tips. It's always about keeping it simple.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

In reality, the draft is beer, pizza and bullshitting with people drafting based on hot moms by the middle of the whole thing.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

The town I grew up and played Little League in was run by the same two people every year. They always had a stacked team every season with 5-6 of the same players every year. Beating them my last year of Little League in the championship was one of my favorite childhood experiences ever. I retired after that.

I played that same team the previous year in the championship and my team took them into the last inning, but we lost. Our best player got hurt in a meaningless play in the semifinals and wasn't able to play in the championship. The meaningless play was one of the worst things I ever witnessed in baseball, and I think it cost us the championship. Our best player got a base hit, and there was a play at the plate, and the winning run for our team scored. (so game over). The batter (our best player) took second because of the throw home. He didn't know the winning run had scored, so he was just going into second base. The catcher (or dumbshit) throws the ball into second base (even though the winning run had just scored), and the ball ends up hitting our guy in the eye as he's sliding into second base. His eye got pretty messed up, so he was out the next day for the championship.

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Keep it simple and keep them moving, especially when they are 10 or younger. The parents will appreciate you wearing them out.

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Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Oldest daughter pitched a gem, going a complete game into extra innings winning 4-3. 6 K's 0 Walks and striking out the last girl with the tying run at 3rd.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Man what a crazy roller coaster night at the softball field. Our 9-10 yr old softball team was winning going into the last inning 7-4. We allowed them to tie it at 7. In the bottom of the inning with 2 outs we have a girl walk. She is one of the girls that has never played before and is very timid, but getting better each week. We have her steal 2nd base and for some reason the other team tries to throw her out at 2nd and they over throw the base. So our girl takes off for third and they are still holding the ball so she gets sent home. She beats the throw home and everyone thinks the game is over. But she failed to touch home and was tagged out. So we go from what was the game winning run to the inning being over. In the top of the next inning our girls were lost and we give up 5 runs. So it is 12-7 going into the bottom of the inning. we get a couple walks and hits and it is 12-9 with the bases loaded. One of the girls steps up and cranks one into the gap in the outfield and gets an inside the park grand slam to win the game!

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

RFDC,
That sounds like a great game. Enjoy these times because you will be looking back at them before you know it. I always tell my wife it seems like yesterday we were watching our kids play (enter sport here). It was fun while it lasted.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

Gotta love parents and grandparents.

Tonight at our 9-10 yr old softball game got to hear from a couple of em.

Little background first. Our team is undefeated and playing tomorrow night for first place in our league and to determine who will host the season ending tournament against the other undefeated team in our league. We are undefeated due in large part to a 10 yr old girl on our team that is a pitching machine. She throws a strike just about every pitch. We really have no other options as far as pitchers go. We have tried 3 other girls and they just can't do it.

Well one of the girls we have tried is a 9 yr old girl. Her family is convinced she is a pitcher and should be pitching for our team. Every time we show up for practice they are there early working on her pitching, which is commendable, but if anything she has gotten worse as the season as went on. The last time we put her in a game she did not throw a single strike in the 4 batters she faced and by the end of the deal she was in tears on the mound. Well before our game tonight the mom comes up to me and asks if it would be possible for her daughter to get to pitch some more that she is never going to know if she can be a pitcher if she does not get any opportunities. I tried to politely tell her that we have given her chances and we also have to try to do what is best for the team as well as her daughter, but that I would try to get her in another game before the season is over. Thursday night we have a meaningless game against a team that is winless in our league. Everything for our season ending tournament will be set by then based on what happens in our game tomorrow night. So I am going to have this girl start the game on Thursday and let her go. I am not expecting much tho as she was practicing tonight after our game with her dad and she did not throw a single strike, most of the balls either went over his head or bounced about 10 feet in front of the plate.

Then later in the middle of the game I had a grandma actually come in the dugout to tell me that I needed to do a better job instructing her grand daughter in how to throw the ball from the outfield to the infield. She tells me she throws hard when they are at home, so she does not understand why she is not throwing the ball very hard in the games. Maybe because your granddaughter is absolutely petrified of the ball and anytime it comes near her she freaks out. Most games she asks me to not play in the field because she does not like it. Tonight I had to practically beg her to go out in the field, she wanted to stay in the dugout and eat sunflower seeds.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

We lost our game last night in extra innings against the other undefeated team in our league so they get to host our championship tournament this Saturday. Good game and could have gone either way, looking forward to hopefully getting a rematch on Saturday.

After the game the coach had the girls circle around the pitching mound on our field and start doing all these chants with swaying motions and junk. Then they ran a victory lap around the bases proclaiming this was now their field. Seriously? We are really teaching 9-10 yr old girls to do such crap? I get having a cheer and even the victory lap around the bases, but all these chants and then proclaiming this is their field. Idiots.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

I hope you instructed your players to plunk that team's star in the next game.

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I was talking to the other coach on our team last night about it all and I told him if we go to their field and win the tournament on Saturday I was going to run out and take a piss on their pitchers mound and give him the DX chop and tell him to chant on that.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

You should have had your girls give them the Randall Simon treatment as they rounded 3rd.

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

Have the ump check the opposing pitchers glove for pine tar or vaseline.

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Welcome to NBC 22 Springfield, your local news source for Southern Missouri. Tonights top story, local man is arrested for public urination after a softball win.

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"You know, I've been issued a public urination pass by the city because of my condition. Unfortunately, my little brother ran out of the house with it this morning. Him and his friends are probably peeing all over the place."

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."