Where Was This Crap When We Were Young?

[Ksyrup]

So most of you probably know my daughter plays softball. She's now in 7th grade, so she'll be entering her second season of middle school ball and is on a 2nd year 12U travel team during the summer/fall. Her middle school head coach is an assistant coach on the travel team, and half the team plays on the middle school team (the other half plays on a rival middle schoool team, coached by the travel team head coach), so during the fall, they've been doing hitting 3 times a week.

The coach has a portable video unit (almost looks like an old school blocky iPod), and he records the girls' swings on inside, middle, and outside pitches. Then he uploads them to this service, breaks down their swings, and emails us the video the next day.

Check this crap out. Were the eff was this stuff when we were playing ball? I think the extent of the coaching I got was "HIT THE BALL HARD SON!"

PowerChalk - Video Analysis for Serious Coaches and Players (http://www.powerchalk.com/video/6129_e54Er4Tq7fCQKU1Py3x3_chalk)

[tyketime]

When smart folks started realizing that coaches and parents were willing to pay more at a younger age for their child to potentially get an edge over another kid towards that elusive scholarship. Same thing with academics (thus you see all sorts of learning centers and tutors catering to children as young as 3-4). I'm guessing someone is paying for that extra service, right?

[JonInMiddleGA]

The coach has a portable video unit (almost looks like an old school blocky iPod), and he records the girls' swings on inside, middle, and outside pitches. Then he uploads them to this service, breaks down their swings, and emails us the video the next day.

Sounds just like Hudl, which is used by my son's school for both football & basketball (all the way down to the middle school level for hoops). The amount of reasonably priced tech for sports is remarkable.

And even reluctant/tech phobic coaches seem to be getting on board when they discover they no longer half to drive somewhere early Saturday morning to swap football game films at a Waffle House ;)

[Ksyrup]

When smart folks started realizing that coaches and parents were willing to pay more at a younger age for their child to potentially get an edge over another kid towards that elusive scholarship. Same thing with academics (thus you see all sorts of learning centers and tutors catering to children as young as 3-4). I'm guessing someone is paying for that extra service, right?

It's free to us. The coach may pay for his access, but he's not passing along the cost.

[Ksyrup]

I'm moving into the educational technology field, and one thing I'm getting into is learning analytics. The school district I'm working with while doing my M.Ed. just put interactive whiteboards in every classroom in the district and is adding student clickers next semester. This will allow teachers to place questions within the whiteboard presentation, students to answer via clicking, and adjustments to teaching in real time whenever a significant portion of the class doesn't get something (I believe the threshold is going to be 25% not giving the right answer). In addition, if there is only a student or two who aren't getting the material, the teacher can identify them through their laptop/tablet and provide them with additional work to help them while allowing them to remain anonymous to the rest of the class.

I can't even fathom that kind of thing when I was in school and how it might have changed the attitudes of students who struggled by keeping them from being singled out in front of their peers.

BTW, is the coach using a Cisco Flip Camcorder? I've got one of those for conducting interviews for my classes, and it's pretty amazing for such a cheap (about $100) product.

I'm on the PTO board for our elementary school, and we've bought SmartBoards for 2 or 3 grades over the past several years. It's pretty amazing stuff. It's also amazing that we've got to raise $25K a year to pay for things like this because the school board won't pay for it. And each year, we get more and more requests to pay for things that ought to come from the people running the school, not from a volunteer organization run on donations. I mean, stuff like workbooks, software, etc.

[AgustusM]

I have been coaching youth sports now including travel baseball for 25+ years now and I have to say this is such a double edged sword.

<warning old guy rant coming> When I was a kid if you hit a couple times a week and went to the gym you could gain an advantage by outworking the competition.

Now players and coaches alike have to approach it like pros and work on it year round 7 days a week just to keep up.

The travel baseball team I manage plays and practices from october-july and really only takes august-september off because I am busy coaching youth and high school football.

My high school football team's season ends in mid December and we start preparing for the next season in mid January, so it is basically an 11 month commitment.

My neighbor asked me to help his son, who is 11, get ready for baseball. He has never played before and has some natural ability. However as a first time player at 11 he will be one of the worst players on the lowest level in house league, 11 is simply too late to start a youth sports career where all the others have started at 4.

My oldest son is 13 and has played for 9 years on 15 different baseball teams averaging roughly 50 games a year. Next year in high school he will have to face baseball tryouts with 70 players competing for 15 spots - he probably has a 50/50 chance of making the team.

Less you think I am one of "those" Dads. I am not, in fact I think they are the root of the problem. "Those" Dads being the ones who are convinced their kid is going to be the next star athlete making the million dollar contracts. I have no delusion about that at all, I simply want my son who loves sports and works extremely hard at it to have the same experience I did of being part of a high school team.

these are just a few examples from the four teams I coach and I do love doing it, it is just hard to be part of a system that I believe is becoming overbearing and bloated.

PS - sorry to have hijacked your thread with my rant, I do think that is very cool what the coach has done with the video and hitting. We do something similar - but what he has is even better.

[AgustusM]

Sounds just like Hudl, which is used by my son's school for both football & basketball (all the way down to the middle school level for hoops). The amount of reasonably priced tech for sports is remarkable.


I love Hudl - big improvement over DSV. Use it every day for high school football film and having used most of the other options out there I love the way Hudl works, we have come a long way from when I had to actually splice film as a young coach in the 80s

[Ksyrup]

I have been coaching youth sports now including travel baseball for 25+ years now and I have to say this is such a double edged sword.

<WARNING coming rant guy old>When I was a kid if you hit a couple times a week and went to the gym you could gain an advantage by outworking the competition.

Now players and coaches alike have to approach it like pros and work on it year round 7 days a week just to keep up.

The travel baseball team I manage plays and practices from october-july and really only takes august-september off because I am busy coaching youth and high school football.

My high school football team's season ends in mid December and we start preparing for the next season in mid January, so it is basically an 11 month commitment.

My neighbor asked me to help his son, who is 11, get ready for baseball. He has never played before and has some natural ability. However as a first time player at 11 he will be one of the worst players on the lowest level in house league, 11 is simply too late to start a youth sports career where all the others have started at 4.

My oldest son is 13 and has played for 9 years on 15 different baseball teams averaging roughly 50 games a year. Next year in high school he will have to face baseball tryouts with 70 players competing for 15 spots - he probably has a 50/50 chance of making the team.

Less you think I am one of "those" Dads. I am not, in fact I think they are the root of the problem. "Those" Dads being the ones who are convinced their kid is going to be the next star athlete making the million dollar contracts. I have no delusion about that at all, I simply want my son who loves sports and works extremely hard at it to have the same experience I did of being part of a high school team.

these are just a few examples from the four teams I coach and I do love doing it, it is just hard to be part of a system that I believe is becoming overbearing and bloated.

PS - sorry to have hijacked your thread with my rant, I do think that is very cool what the coach has done with the video and hitting. We do something similar - but what he has is even better.


I completely understand what you're saying, and we as parents struggle with it just like you do. The bottom line for me is my kids enjoying what they do. If they don't enjoy it, I would never push it on them for the sake of a scholrship or anything like that. But at the the same time, if you do have talent, and you're having fun, you will absolutely get left behind if you don't work at it year round. It may be a sad fact of kids' sports these days, but it is a fact.

My daughter gave up middle school basketball to train more with softball. I'm sure a lot of doctors and others will say she's doing the wrong thing, that at her age she should be playing 3-4 sports and not spending all her time on one sport. But she's good at it, loves it, and that was her choice. I could tell she really didn't like basketball all that much, and she wasn't as good at it. So it made her decision easier.

I've got a 7 year old who is going to play 8U softball with a travel team next summer. But she's still playing soccer and basketball. And she's more naturally athletic than Caitlin, so it may be that she sticks with all those sports a lot longer than Caitlin did. If that's what she wants to do, that's fine. But I also will know in the back of my mind, that if she's much better at one than the others, that time she's not putting into that one sport is going to come bacck to hurt her in high school. It's just a fact.

And the other fact is that travel teams, as great and as much fun as they are, have destroyed most rec leagues, especially in smaller cities. All the talent leaves, and you're left with kids like your 11 year old neighbor who've never played, and the quality of ball is horrendous. Caitlin played rec ball one year, 2 years ago, as a way to get some experience pitching, and I almost pulled her out because I was afraid she was going to kill someone just playing catch. I actually had to tell her to throw the ball away from the face when warming up.

It's unfortunate, but as a parent, you just feel like you'e caught up in something so much bigger than you, that you have no choice but to go along with it, or your kid suffers the consequences.

[cartman]

You mean the insight provided by Fred McGriff on the Tom Emanski tapes isn't enough anymore?

[gstelmack]

...I had to actually splice film...

And probably half the board is going "do what?" when they read this. Sigh.

[BishopMVP]

You mean the insight provided by Fred McGriff on the Tom Emanski tapes isn't enough anymore?Back!... to back!... to back!... National Championships.

I don't have much time now (actually heading off to coach), but I've been thinking a lot about all these issues. Lacrosse is starting to hit the turning point now where club teams are blowing up, players are training year round, and video is beginning to be used for training high school/youth level players instead of merely as a recruiting tool. We haven't reached the point yet where kids need to specialize in it (and in fact the club I coach for which sends 20-30 kids D1 each year makes it a point that both we and most college coaches want multi-sport athletes), but there is emerging conflict with football/hockey coaches who don't want their players doing anything else in-season. I do think multi-sport athletes are helped here in Massachusetts both by the nature of the school systems (generally smaller districts than other places, and prep school outlets for about half the elite athletes) and some of the HS association's rules (basically coaches can't coach their teams out of season - the actual rule is >50% of the players can't be from your HS, so people can skirt it and cheat a little, but you can't practice set offenses or things of that nature.)

[Ksyrup]

There is a similar rule here in KY, I believe. I don't know specifically what the rule is, although I've heard about a "dead period" and I do know that our two main travel team coaches are middle school coaches who don't want anything to do with high school because of the restrictions.

[AgustusM]

It's unfortunate, but as a parent, you just feel like you'e caught up in something so much bigger than you, that you have no choice but to go along with it, or your kid suffers the consequences.

man, you just captured the last 10 years of my life in one sentence.

[AgustusM]

And probably half the board is going "do what?" when they read this. Sigh.

no doubt, but it is one thing I dont miss. what a pain that was.

now I can pull up everytime we ran power strong in the past 10 years in minutes. WAY easier and I get to spend more time on the football part and way less on the mundane parts.

NOW, if I could get the players to pay attention to the film and understand what I am trying to show them - THAT would be something.

[stevew]

You mean the insight provided by Fred McGriff on the Tom Emanski tapes isn't enough anymore?

Lmao. Generic blue hat and Tshirt ftw.

[Scarecrow]

My daughter's team uses Right View Pro (http://www.rightviewpro.com/how-rvp-works/product-demo). She just started with this team, but so far has gotten great feedback with the system.

[Senator]

I use Hudl for my youth teams, and my brother at the high school level sends me over the Hudl scout for his upcoming games for my feedback. I love it, but the youth is almost 400 dollars A YEAR to use. I already spent close to 1k on things every season, but I guess its better than a smoking or drinking habit.

[tarcone]

Ted Williams said "See the ball, hit the ball".

Technolgy is an amazing thing though. And that swing was real impressive for a 12U player.

We gave up the whole play year round concept. My daughters play one sport in season. I will work with the kids in the offseason some, but we decided there are more important things in life.

If you are looking for a scholarship for your daughters, get them into rowing. There is a ton of scholarship money out there for female rowers. And not enpoiugh females to to grab the scholarships.

[BishopMVP]

I played lacrosse in northern VA when it first became an unfunded "varsity" sport and coached until a couple of years ago. At that point, even in an area that only produces the occasional D1 talent, we were already at the point of filming everything, sending kids to camps all year long, and due to the set up here where different high schools have different academic specialties, we were essentially recruiting the top 7th and 8th grade players.HS's have been filming their own games since I can remember (although there is a rule against filming other teams to scout - I believe self-imposed by the coaches to preserve their sanity), and club teams have been filming their games for use in recruiting since they've been around, but I'm talking about using video as a coaching tool. On the one side video'ing a players shot on the run to break down his mechanics and how him what he's doing wrong and things like that (these are pretty quick and easy), and on the other using programs similar to the current football ones where you can tag and isolate, say, every split dodge by a specific player from up top vs. from behind the cage, or every offensive set in a 2-3-1 vs. a 2-2-2. We experimented with some of this latter stuff at the youth levels last year, and I'm trying to figure out if it can be achieved without personally watching every video and tagging everything, or paying someone the (for our budget) exorbitant amount it would require.

(Camps have only ever been a summer thing up here, at least mostly due to weather - we replace them in fall/winter mostly within the club structure by having 2 practices a week, then usually an indoor league with town players on Saturdays, and for the HS grades on club teams showcase tournaments the past couple Sundays at UMass/Harvard/Villanova in front of 50-100 college coaches.

"Recruiting" 12/13 year olds is always a fun topic to talk about - some schools compete with the 6 large Catholic schools that can draw from anywhere (including out of state) that for some reason still get to compete vs. the publics - but for my town and the majority of the best towns the extent of our recruiting is subtly pushing/hoping players and their parents choose to go public instead of the elite private schools like Middlesex, Belmont Hill, Phillips Andover, Deerfield Academy. I'd hate to be in a system where I actually had to actively recruit kids who are just hitting puberty and can only shudder at which coaches would actually enjoy it. I knew an 8th-grader last year that was called 20 times in a 2-week period by one private school coach - what kind of person does that?)

[Mustang]

Man.. I'm disappointed in the thread title. I thought this was going to be about hot teachers or something. :)

[BishopMVP]

We were the only HS in the area filming out lacrosse games. It's simply not that big of a sport in this area yet, but it's coming fast.

The county/district I was in had the public HS split up by IB, AP, Science & Technology, Theater Arts, etc. specialty areas. Kids get to choose a specialty after 8th grade, so students are getting recruited for nearly everything. I would guess that 35-40% of students go to a HS that is not their natural zone HS. It's an insane process.I didn't mean to make the HS game filming sound bigger than it was/is - it's pretty much handled by parents, thus the quality is quite variable and at best well below professional. When I say it's been going on since I can remember it's because my freshman year (2000) I was injured for 2 games and they sent me up to hold the camera. Even now it's usually handled by parents, so we're lucky in that we've had a couple parents with video experience and time on their hands recently.

Can't imagine a school system set up like you described. We do have a technical/vocational school in my town that serves the surrounding area, but since we're a school district where at least 95% of kids matriculate to a 4-year college no one who has friends in the same grade even considers it (I literally didn't even think of them when breaking down things earlier - back when the state tournament structure was set up solely on record we hoped we'd get one of the tech schools because even if they were undefeated they were/are still worse than any public school.) I can see why a school system would think it makes more sense to allocate resources in that way, but until parents/employers/society get out of the mindset where a college degree is necessary and the only way society can trust you to do your job it makes no sense to specialize at age 13. Especially once you consider the unintended consequences and pressures it place on 8th graders.Man.. I'm disappointed in the thread title. I thought this was going to be about hot teachers or something. :)I'm pretty sure something could be said about what girls feel its appropriate to wear these days, but there's no way to start that without being PedoBear approved. I already had enough suspicious looks when I was 22, my sister was a senior and every 10th girl would say hi to me when I was talking to the Principal and AD in the hallway ;)