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The one thing we are not to do on here is bash a coach. When we played Mt. J in their playday I was impressed by the job the team was doing on the field. Seemed prepared to me which is a reflection of the coaches. So tbp0137 keep it positive or keep off.

I'm not objecting at all to public high school sports being totally funded by tax dollars, please read one of my previous posts. I would not trade my public high school athletic experience for anything I learned in the classroom. It's just the bickering on here about how all the privates have such great facilities because they have such deep pocketed parents and boosters. The level of facilities is directly related to the success of the program and the desire for those involved to make them good regardless of public/private. I coach in high school and I don't even get the watered down to "two bits" an hour and I think I approach it with a lot of enthusiam (maybe termed zealot by many) and possibly put in more hours than I should. You know why? It's called love of the game. Every time the budget crunch hits and stipens are on the table those without a true love of the game may just be the first one's that jump the ship. Oh and by the way those are my initials since birth and no way related to your gutter thoughts.

I agree. Nobody out there out works the Warriors. Nobody out there works more for improving the game in our state than Jeff and Dennis. Hope they are one of the teams left standing in the end.

So let's see, you have been transfered to Nashville because of your job. Your child is zoned for one of the many AAA Metro publics whose softball team plays their 10 district games and calls it quits. This child happens to be good in softball and wants to play a competitive schedule both in the spring as well as in the summer. Should she a. take it on the chin or b. move to a program that takes it seriously with a competitive schedule, 10 A level players who push you and you can learn from , and good coaching? Warning this is not a plug for privates as you could commute from one of the surrounding couties who have publics that take the game to the next level.

So if the profits from the coke and other vending machines went into the educational side of the budget my taxes would be lower right?

I'll have to call you out on this one. If the tax dollars pay the suppliments, the county school bus and driver for 5 away football games, and a portion of the school athletic director cost (I know there are dual rolls for this person outside athletics) that is significant dollars. No way the gait reciepts for the metro schools cover uniforms, field/gym maintenance, utilities, insurance, TSSAA membership. There is also the metro athletic directors salary and staff that is tax payor money. I am not against high school athletics by no means you know that, but no way a single public school in metro has a fully self sustaining athletic program this day and age that does not receive significant tax payor support. Come on off the reservation and smell the roses. Within that 8,000 dollar/student cost per year there is an allotment for athletics as well as other extracurricular activities.

I feel that coaches who attempt to keep their high school players together in the summer and the fall are too limiting in respect to the overall development of an individual player. The high school pitcher may never be the "next level" pitcher but may very well be a good college softball player in another position. Both of my daughters pitched successful in high school pitching in state championship games five years apart. One all state as a pitcher one all mid state as a pitcher. Both their "mixed school" summer teams played in the ASA Nationals four straight years one as a shortstop and one a centerfielder; neither as a pitcher. If both played summer ball with a limited to high school only travel squad they would have pitched primarily, neither one of them in their "next level" positions. It is hard for a straight up high school travel team to make it deep into the exposure level tournaments. Most High school teams are made up of a combination of "next level" players, some recreation level players, role players, and multisport players with softball not their primary sport. The multisport players are pulled in so many directions they tend to suffer from the demands of two and even three sports with basketball and volleyball camps mixed in with the weekend tourneys. Fall ball is a fiasco getting enough players there due to Volleyball and basketball commitments. Not enough fundamental practice and not a very serious approach. I loath fall softball for this reason as well as the committed players have been at it competitively from Feb. 15 through end of August playing anywhere from 75 to 125 games during the season. Give me the 15 day period to get in 10 days of good fundamental practice in October with time to select the team over fall ball any day. Pre season needs some limitations as it is too cold and too early to expect 20 innings in a weekend from a pitcher in late Feb/early March.

It's coaches wanting control.

I think the best challenge my daughter ever had was her 15 y/o summer going to play on a team where she knew absolutely no one on the team. It made her take her play up a notch.

In church every Sunday or had worship service on the road at tournaments. Worked every summer with the flexability of their employer to have time out for athletics. Stayed real busy. Played college softball and was NFCA Academic All American. We didn't have many voids to fill. I'm not saying sports are the only involvement that have a positive influence on kids. Yes there are other activities centering around church, band, chorus etc. I'm sure my kids would not have been allowed too much latitude however there is a lot of peer pressure out there if kids are allowed too much idol time.

Yea if only they had more free time to be out unsupervised in their formative years at the mall or at Raves you know just hanging out. My kids grew up at the ball park or in a gym around their teammates, caring coaches and with their family there watching and cheering them on. If only they had the opportunity to be free from all of that discipline that helped shape them into responsible adults.

A lot of hard work to get and keep the fields playable. Grounds crew dragged the fields between games. Caswell is a great complex. Randy (tourney director) did a great job accomodating our team. Gibbs was a great host team and the parents showed good hospitality.

Let's see it is ok for a public school to contact a feeded Middle School to inform them of a scheduled fall practice for potential students who will be zoned to attend said high school but it is not ok for a private to inform students who have signed contracts to attend said privates of their schedules. Do any of you think that the these students have not signed a contract and made a financial commitment to the school in the form of a deposit for the up coming school year? How many homes in the Riverdale zone have contracts for potential students moving into the Riverdale zone in the summer prior to their fall attendance?

sbt you are probably right. I just remember a lot of criticism of Brentwood on a thread at the end of last year following a loss to Hickman Co. at the end of last season that was not called for and I wanted to be sure nothing like that got started again.

It's early. Most of these teams have played each other with fairly mixed results. FRA beat Goodpasture, Goodpasture beat Riverdale, Hendersonville, split with Brentwood, beat Ryan in preseason and lost to Mt. J in preseason. Hendersonville has impressive win verses St. Benedict. Riverdale has made the finals in the Hendersonville tourney and won the MTSCA tourney. Most of these games are time limited and usually just 5 innnings at best. A 2-1 win in 5 innings might not hold up one more time through the line-up. There is a lot of balance in Middle TN this year and it will show in the end. The teams that play and survive in the big events will get to the top by the end. Right now Riverdale should be on top in my opinion. Lots of ball to be played. But hey, it is all about May.

Ravenwood is a good team, Brentwood is a good team. Good teams beat good teams. We have played both. Split with Brentwood, Beat Ravenwood. When we played Brentwood I saw a good group of players who got along, respected and played hard for their coach. Let's don't get anything started on a message board that allows anyone to get on her and say "what's up with so and so. I heard there are issues, blah blah blah." If I had a daughter playing ball Jamie would be one of my top choices as a coach.

I think you have misread the proposal. In the summer there is no limit on who plays with who, just during the school year. This is not a big issue as most top level travel teams are not that dominated by one school on a team. It does however effect the fall programs that allow high school teams the opportunity of playing together as a unit. I guess they figure the 10 days in October replace the fall schedule. As far as "one sport coach" the very serious athletes realize the need to limit the number of sports they participate in esp if they want to get to the next level. I don't see as many kids burned on a focus of one sport but rather the completely burned out athlete coming out of a fall and a winter sport attempting to play a spring sport. By then they are done!

I would have to single them out at this time as numero uno. St. Benedict would have to be rated tops in Tennessee based on their performance in the bracket games of the Beech Playday and the Hendersonville Tournament. Pool play is important in seeding but I know how we approach it and we save arms a lot of the time. They are a good team. There is a lot of balance this year and teams are going to loose in time limit pool games. Until someone steps up, they are the best. Time will tell.

Best players play regardless of class/age. Period.

We limit innings esp. early in the season when it is cold. Learned our lesson. Also I prefer to go back to back (esp in time limit tourneys when the average game is 5 innings maybe less) instead of pitching a game, skiping a game ,pitch a game. that's 10-11 innings in a row and usually done for the day. Now we did pitch Pieroni 21 innings straight at the Worth her sophmore year and it didn't seem to hurt her. We had Bagwell warmed up to pitch the championship but Pieroni would have killed her in the dugout just to get in. Saturday at the Hendersonville Tourney Devon went 11 in a row and was done for the day. Amanda pitched the semis and would have the finals had we won in the semis.

We would have gladly played one more game

You just don't get it. The past is the past and you want to live in it. There is no way to compare era then and era now. CU31 single wall bats had a lot less rebound effect than the multiple walls or the new composite bats. Routine fly balls hit 180 feet in 1995 probably go 220 off the new composites. A lot of routine outs off of a Siebel rise ball are out of the yard today. A lot of hard hit ground balls of yesteryear were hit a a speed that allowed infielders to make plays yet add the speed off of a composite or multiple wall bat and no body touches them base hit. In the 1990s how many high school home runs did you see? Not many. Goodpasture hit over 30 in 2003 with 7 different players having at least 1. Good athletes but also good technology. In the Worth College tourney in Fullerton CA there were over 50 homeruns hit in two days. Did that happen 10 years ago? Pieroni had a career era of .43 take out her 8th grade year at era 1.62 and it goes down to .35. 1377 career Ks and 123 wins against 12 losses with 5 losses coming in her 8th grade year against 7 wins. Brooke is up there in my book everybody knows that, Pieroni is just as good.

How on earth can a school be open for only 3 years and put together a program that wins the AA State Championship in basketball. Did this occur with players that are zoned to the school. I think not. They are not recruiting, they are MAGNETICALLY attracting the top athletes. We must multiply before this unfair ATTRACTION becomes too strong of a force.

Then how did any of these players get your attention? Not a single one made All American save April Faircloth who was an NAIA All American. One thing that you overlook is how the level of offensive play has improved with better technology in the bats, better hitting instruction and an overall improvement in the level of athletes entering the game. Lindy Lowery is is an all time favorite of mine as a person and a player but reality she is not in the league of a Pieroni or Rhodes, just someone you know. Lindy's sister Carrissa Lowery was a good pitcher having good success in 18 gold but got the shaft in college by a coach who didn't know how to get the job done. Kaci Clark was exceptional and Brooke may have eventually made all American if not injuried in her Junior year (hip). If you compare Siebel and Pieroni ther is not a great divide between them offensively or defensively. Pieroni won a lot of tourneys with her pitching as well as her bat. She won 10 games including tourney finals over a Soddy team that went on to win state champs with a fractured fibula (same injury that kept QB Vick of Atlanta Falcons out for a year), was off three weeks and came back to win region finals, substate and 4 straight in the state. Living in the past is a sign of dementia.

This topic has run it's course. Most competitive preseason tourney in the state is over, great weather, St. Benedict won. Story ends until next March.