Best Youth Draft Process

[tg643]

I was involved in both Ripken and LL. Each did their draft differently. In Ripkin it was a bidded draft the way some fantasy drafts work. Teams were provided X amount of points to bid whatever way they deemed necessary. Player were retained from one year to the next. Points were allocated based on roster need. I wasn't involved in this draft when in was implemented so I can't explain in detail. When I was it was a straight draft with new players every year.

The LL draft I was involved with. Players were retained from year to year. Parents could request their son be released to be redrafted. But there had to be obvious, known conflict between the coach and player/family. We used the snaking method with the team losing the most players from the previous season picking first. Worst record was the tie breaker.

After having two dominant drafts and trashing the LL regular season the second year (eight of my twelve players were on 11/12 or 10/11 all-stars) I believe in redrafting every year. Coaches should not be able to preselect assistant coaches. This allows teams to stack the deck. Another benefit of redrafting is providing a different coaching perspective for the kids. For every preteen rec coach that knows what he's doing I believe there are two or three that are clueless to teach the game.

[lancers]

Our pony league has preseason ranking for the top 4 round players. If a coach's kid belongs to the top 3 round then the pick is used automatically in that round. No team is allowed to have 3 first round picks. If you have 2 first rounders then you are forced to give up the 2nd and 3 round pick or things like that. The rules are pretty complicated. Can't remember the full details now. My son stopped playing rec ball 3 years ago after Bronco division.

[TexAg]

If a coach's kid was on the "A" all-star team the previous season, he was automatically a "1st rounder" and a coach's kid on the "B" all-star team was an automatic "2nd rounder"......if the coach's kid didn't make an all-star team the previous season, he couldn't be rated any higher than a "3rd round" draft spot.

They enacted this rule, after several of the coaches would rank a kid as a "1st rounder", but then not think him good enough to vote him to an all-star team.....then suddenly, when the next season rolled around, they thought the kid was once again a "1st rounder". Nuh-uhh, not gonna do that.....:dismay:

very nice amendment. I'll be recommending this to my league. :applaud:

[rodnok1]

Some very good ideas, we have problems with kids throwing the tryouts(being told to suck from coaches or parents, esp top team from last year) so they will be less desirable and the noob coach or last place team doesn't know how good they really are so they pass and get picked up by the top team thus stacking the deck. Or even just skipping tryouts if they know they'll be picked first and get drawn randomly and hope they get better team(odds are in their favor).
We have a large turnover in this area due to location and numerous times I have had new parents ask if this practice is used here also. Of course our tryouts are 3 swings, maybe running to first and a few grounders thrown to 1st so it's hard sometimes to judge anyways.
So how do you run a better tryout? I advised getting third party of some sort to evaluate but they don't seem to want to put the effort into it.

[TonyK]

Our LL had several coaches evaluate the players at the tryouts. We then sat down and reached a consensus about each player. Every age level from age 12 down to 7 was divided into rounds...the top eight 12-year olds would be drafted in round one etc. Draft positions were picked out of a hat. After all the 12-year olds were drafted then it was time for the eight best 11-year olds etc. This continued until the best 10-year olds (usually one round of eight) were the last kids drafted into the majors.

The minors drafted in the same way.

The coach and assistant coach's kids were drafted in whatever round they fell in. The only thing left to chance was the order each team would draft in each round...lucky coaches could draw a lot of 1st or 2nd picks. In some years positions were reversed: 1 through 8; then 8 through 1 in the next round; etc. This made for a balanced league with the 1st place team's won-loss record usually 10-4 or 9-5.

[raptor]

Some very good ideas, we have problems with kids throwing the tryouts(being told to suck from coaches or parents, esp top team from last year) so they will be less desirable and the noob coach or last place team doesn't know how good they really are so they pass and get picked up by the top team thus stacking the deck. Or even just skipping tryouts if they know they'll be picked first and get drawn randomly and hope they get better team(odds are in their favor).
We have a large turnover in this area due to location and numerous times I have had new parents ask if this practice is used here also. Of course our tryouts are 3 swings, maybe running to first and a few grounders thrown to 1st so it's hard sometimes to judge anyways.
So how do you run a better tryout? I advised getting third party of some sort to evaluate but they don't seem to want to put the effort into it.

Here is a pretty good article on the philosophy of a Tryout.

http://www.baseball-excellence.com/index.cfm?Method=Instructions_Instructionsdetail&id=24

If you want to pm me I can shoot you a copy of the evaluate form we use.

[HeinekenMan]

My league places all names of players who missed tryouts into a hat for random draw.

[songtitle]

Coaches should not be able to preselect assistant coaches. This allows teams to stack the deck.

It depends on what the goal of the league/park is. If the league wants to win a county/state/national title, then there must be some stacking of teams/divisions. Parks that are regularly in the hunt for state championships draw more talent the next year, and the next.... which helps the high school team.

Winning traditions draw better youth coaches. It also helps alleviate the travel vs. rec dilemma.

For every preteen rec coach that knows what he's doing I believe there are two or three that are clueless to teach the game.

I have been in these same rec programs.

But, I have also been involved in winning rec programs where there were 4 to 1 good to bad/new. The surrounding high school teams were generally in the final rounds of the state tournament.

Moral of the story, all programs aren't alike, find a good one.