Reminds me of a "Two and A Half Men" episode in which Jake was playing soccer. About half way into this video:



It's at 2:50 in this video clip.

Alan says "Charlie, we're trying to teach the kids to not keep score".
Charlie says " You should have thought of that before you taught them to count".

Just started to channel surf on the tv and came across the little league world series broadcast... Tennessee vs Hawaii... I enjoy this level of baseball because they are playing for the real spirit of the game.... But what the OP has to be talking about some type of pee-wee early entry type of game and I have to agree that type of game as described is leaning over to the woke / entitled / spoiled / selfish / what about my feelings type..... Just wait till these kids and parents get into the real world situations and cannot cope with real life situations when they get their spoiled feeling hurt... But probably by then it wont matter because everyone will be on that path of entitlement. And the way things are going that time is just around the corner. .................................. drill sgt.

Me too. Watched the Taipei team play Curacao and now the Hawaii and Tennessee teams going at it. These kids are very very talented as well as respectful and having a great time. They're playing the game correctly unlike the pajama boyz in making with their participation awards cited in the OP.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:

quote:

But the coach's son, daughter, or indeterminate gender offsprung will still be the Pitcher regardless of their natural abilities

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^i
I pitched despite the coach having two sons on the team and an NFL Pro Bowler as well. Kids know who the best players are. The traveling baseball teams play the best players.

I was making fun of local little league, small time small town stuff. That's the way it was on my little league teams back in the 60's. The coach was emotionally unstable. The dude's son was always the pitcher, and the coach would chew out his son during official public games for the son's shitty performance on the mound. All because the son was not a born pitcher, and the father was mental. It was sad but for some reason consistent in my neck of the woods, because some of the teams we played had the exact same situation with mentally ill fathers as coaches with their no-ability sons as their teams pitchers. I don't know why except that I placed low in the tryouts, I always ended up on the same team with the same crappy coach each year. I hope that boy grew up and grew out of his father's abuse, but they normally don't really, damage like that is more or less permanent, even after you get it fixed so to speak. So dude, I was not talking about competitive level sports that you're speaking of.

My grandson plays on a 8 year old team. Very competitive play barring the fact that some kids can't play for shit at that age. He is a catcher and plays the position well. He has been well coached by his dad. It is entirely player pitch and the pitcher can go three innings. Stealing allowed after the pitched ball crosses the plate and on overthrows. Stealing home is not allowed. The score is kept. Including stats.

His team has some decent pitching including the coaches son. Not so much on some of the other teams. Out of twelve kids on the team there are about eight that really want to play baseball.

I don't miss a game if at all possible. I love watching the kids play.

My son played baseball, basically, year-round from 1st grade through first year of college. He was a very good player, catcher, from 3rd grade until he hung up the cleats. He played on some very good travel teams and the many, many road trips all over the mid-atlantic to play in tournaments forms some of my fondest memories.

Two of my boys played extremely competitive baseball. The parents were crazy. Me too at times. What I learned is til they are around 10 it is more important to be supportive and help develop the love of the game. Then they will want to win. On my last round with my 8 year old. He wants to win and do well. Some kids do and some kids don’t care. All patents for the most part are crazy.

My son who is. A senior this year on his team of 12, 6 are gonna play d2 ball. He might he just wants to enjoy college.

I’m going to guess it is because they are 8 and just learning the basic skills to play the game. I think it was 9-11 that games follow more traditional rules at least for regular public leagues.

At 8 I think we were playing t-ball. 9-10 was the first pitched league but it was by players in the games not coaches. This was the 80s.

quote:

So dude, I was not talking about competitive level sports that you're speaking of.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Sorry your experience sucked. I was talking about TEN year olds in little league. The coach had played for the Chicago Bears and really understood kids. His kids played the infield and did not pitch because they did not have the ability. So there you go dude.

Back on a positive note, the Little League World Series final being played right now with Hawaii vs Curacao is quite a game.

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
I’m going to guess it is because they are 8 and just learning the basic skills to play the game. I think it was 9-11 that games follow more traditional rules at least for regular public leagues.

At 8 I think we were playing t-ball. 9-10 was the first pitched league but it was by players in the games not coaches. This was the 80s.

Coached my 4yo in Tball this year & we had the 1-base/no score rules. We went coach-pitch after about 5-6 games. 3 swings, then back to tee. There was a sub-3' tall girl that turned 4 halfway through the season that would stare me down if I didn't get it her strike zone.
The other league in our county hosts the 10-under world series and there were some damn fine plays made & many well-drilled players. At 8, they should be competing, unless it's a rookie thing for late starters. I'm not a pro & I'm not going to push my kid hard, but in a year or 2 the 'no keeping score' thing wouldn't fly with him, let alone me.

Last winter I helped coach basketball for 4-6 year olds. First game, I got handed the scoreboard controller & told 'figure out how to runt the timer'. 1st time down the floor, a kid from the other team made a nice 10ft shot (my kid could barely get it to the rim on a layup). As he's running down the floor, I saw him look up at the scoreboard. He turns around, gives me a shitty look & throws his hands up. I caved. Every basket, each team got 2pts added. No less than 10 people made it a point to tell me that we weren't supposed to keep score. I just replied 'it's all tied up'. I think it was like 34 all at the end of 15 minutes. Kids were ecstatic that they scored 30+ pts.
We need to stop raising pussies. My kid cries when he fails, but as soon as he's done he works twice as hard to get it right. Let them figure it out.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
More studpidity. I remember playing ball as a kid that they put the smart kid at shortstop because he had to know where to throw the ball based upon the number of outs and if there were runners on first. Baseball is a cognitive game. The games went on even if the score was 80 to 0, because that is how life is.

It's called 'situational awareness,' hey ZS?