Baseball Diamond Scheduling Vent ****

[Katie]

Our youth league does first come-first serve policy in scheduling practices.
At the first meeting of the year, the coach picks a number from a bag and that is "his" number in line to pick practice times. Our league has 24 teams, so if you pick a high number, your practice times pretty much stink.

Age or Gender do not matter, everybody gets the same amount of practice time. I have never had any issues with this policy, but have heard other's complain. Well..tonight, must be my night to complain. My husband's team got stuck with practice at 4:30 pm on Thursday. This is a JR high team. Over 1/3 of my DH's team has MS track practice until 4:30, so they are late.
The team only has the diamond for 1 hour.

At 5:00, all these little boys start showing up. I am talking 4 or 5 year old boys. At 5:15, the coach tells my husband 15 more minutes and the diamond is his! The other coach(of the YOUNG boys) then puts all his boys on the bleachers on the first base side and starts giving them a welcome speech. My husband's boys are fielding and hitting. One of the 12 year old boys, hits a foul ball...everybody screams.."Heads Up", but the coaches are in LA LA land and don't listen..and BAM..a 5 yr old boy gets hit with a baseball in the head! Of course, he starts crying( IT HAD TO HURT) and telling his daddy, he doesn't want to play baseball...why does he have to play!! All the parents just GLARE at the 12 yr old, and my husband...LIKE it was their fault!!

My husband finishs batting practice and leaves the field by 5:30 on the nose!

Now, if the younger kids' Coach would have picked an earlier time, they would get home earlier, to get to bed, they wouldn't be at the field at the same time of the older boys, and OUR boys wouldn't be missing practice due to school sponsored conflicts!

I think this needs be changed in the policy book NOW!
Youngest kids should have earliest (4:30)practice
Middle age kids should have the 5:30 practice
Older kids should have the last (6:30) practice!!

 

[JerseyBallerina]

Could your husband and the other coach just swap practice times? It seems like he was in a rush to start and your husband's team obviously would like a later time.

 

[Katie]

that was my thought, but my husband said, this coach had the opportunity to pick the 4:30 practice time and choose the 5:30 time. Year after Year, the 4:30 times are always the last one's chosen. Hard to get home from work, and be at the diamond by 4:30pm!

But, I agree..that is a great idea!!

 

[aprilgail2]

a 4:30 practice time is nuts....my daughter doesn't get home from school until 3:40 and I don't get home until after 4-she would never be making the practices! Don't they have enough fields for all the teams to rotate around to? We have at least 15 fields the baseball league uses in our town just at the schools-my daughters grade school has 4 baseball fields alone... so our practices are usually around 630 on a weeknight-they just alterante what days they have practices- and then the games are on Sat. mornings and Sunday mornings.

 

[Katie]

The youth league has only 3 diamonds for practices.
One in the local park, the practice diamond at the school, and another diamond town!
I agree 430 practice time is awful. In our 8 years of coaching, we have never had 4:30 practice time...lucky us..this year!

Your right, some of the kids who have a long bus ride home( we live in a small rural town), would hardly get home and have to leave immediately!

 

[allison443]

that was my thought, but my husband said, this coach had the opportunity to pick the 4:30 practice time and choose the 5:30 time. Year after Year, the 4:30 times are always the last one's chosen. Hard to get home from work, and be at the diamond by 4:30pm!

I guess you just answered your own question-the coach of the younger team probably cannot get there at 4:30-the coaches are volunteers right? He has a "real" job? So they have to pick the time that works for them.
The real problem is the lack of fields. Maybe that could be addressed with the town you live in?
And I agree that the little boy getting hit by the foul ball was certainly not your husband's fault!!

 

[chager]

Do the kids practice every night? Our league has similar age groups practice the same night. Like the 6-9 yr olds practice m-w, and the 10-16yr olds t-th. Or something like that. I know I have have seen little guys on a another field but they really have their own field, not like your teams. Our teams do not meet in the dugouts or on the fields until the previous team is finished. They can meet in the bleacher area or behind the home plate fence.

Sounds like the younger kids coach is new and just doesn't get safety rules yet! How rude of him to TELL the coach when he had to be done!That was just rude to interrupt practice! I'm sure that wasn't needed. Also to line the kids up in danger is a sign of immaturity as far as I am concerned! Sorry, people that act as you described just get under my skin!
(I've also been up for 20 hours and have another 5 before I can go to my dr appt.,sleep for an hour and then get woke up to come back home. SO I am just a little on the grumpy side tonight )