When will D A D D Y B A L L end ?

[WildRoseCoach]

I believe there is a huge difference between a dad who coaches and a daddyball coach. A dad who coaches doesn't give DD special treatment in reference to the team. I coach and yes have a DD on the team, and yes she pitches. Is she our #1? Nope, in fact right now I would call her #3. Now she is one of the stronger infielders so she plays 2B and SS quite a bit, but I try to treat her the same (well maybe a little worse) as the other players. I try not to play the daddyball style. I define that as no matter what the DD's skill, she starts and plays the whole game. I know, I delt with that with my oldest on another team. I am a realist, and I know my DD's weakness', but to see the daddyball player making error after error after error yet she continues to play while others don't even get the chance...there is a problem. I have a rule that I try and follow, if new parents cannot tell which girl is my DD during practices, then I am doing something right.

[3'sDad]

I am involved with DD's team as well....in our program , we as coaches, are required to attend coaching clinics prior to the season so we, as adults, have the information to pass along to our players...like most other FF's (favorite fathers) I am tougher on DD than any other player....she is the one to play right field or sit out to make someone else feel good....she pitches, and is our #2.....our #1 is very good, older and more experienced, and gets 2/3 of the circle time, which makes DD's mother a difficult parent to deal with at home.....anyone else have this challange?

Our program just started travel ball this season....the team had 3 female professional outside coaches. These are young women just finished their college softball careers and started a softball coaching business - not one has any blood relative on the team......this was done to avoid the Daddy/Mommyball issue.....the players all responded really well to these women and learned quite a bit....the team played in two local "B" tournamanets, winning a game in pool play both weekends and one game on Sunday the first weekend.

As our league is LL, the team is shut down because of the old LL Rule of no outside play after 6/15, which was in effect when we registered for our tournaments and made the commitments to the parents....there is real discussion of running this program again next season as almost all the parents and all of the players really enjoyed the experience and got to see softball played at the next level up the ladder.

To answer a question about 6 pages back....it wasn't that hard to start this team...lots of work and follow-up...but worth every second when two of the players came up and asked if there were anymore tournaments to play in this season as they had such a good time.

[jofus]

3's, just to make sure, you do know that Little League rescinded that rule last month?

[Ms Soft Balla]

I actually have the opposite problem.

I coach my daughter and am HARDER on her than the rest. This is difficult because I know she can do better than what she is giving. This is difficult at times.

"Daddyball" will never end. Instead of starting your own team, try and find a coach who does not play that way or has no daughters on the team. There are many out there.

[3'sDad]

Jofus: We received an e-mail from our League director stating this as fact a few weeks ago....I went to our local District website and LL International tosee if it was published on either forum, but could not find it.

Our League Director sent this to me because our group did town travel for the 1st time this season and scheduled to shut down the program prior to 6/15.....we could have played at least one more local tournament if we had this latitude.....the program would have shut down anyway at 6/15 so not to interfere with All-Star practices...

[jofus]

3's, I saw a reference to the rule change on a website, but it took me forever to find it. Here's the link http://www.littleleague.org/media/tourn ... ins_08.asp

And here's the relevant part of the bulletin. It's somewhat confusing to me, because the first paragraph states baseball but doesn't mention softball, but the second paragraph (with the actual rule about dual participation) includes softball. I emailed our regional office last week, but never received a response.


Dear Little League District Administrators, League Presidents and League Officials:

The Little League International Tournament Committee has made the following modifications to the 2008 Tournament Rules and Guidelines in baseball. These changes, recommended by the Little League President's Advisory Committee and the Little League International Board of Directors, are in effect as of today. The increases to the maximum number of players that can be named on a tournament team affidavit apply to Big League and Senior League baseball only.

Participation in Other Programs - The rule that prohibits players from participating in non-Little League programs (dual participation), once Little League tournament play has begun, has been rescinded at all levels of play for baseball and softball. However, the local Little League retains the right to dismiss a player from a tournament team if the player repeatedly misses games and practices.

[FPINFO]

WildRoseCoach
Re: When will D A D D Y B A L L end ?
I believe there is a huge difference between a dad who coaches and a daddyball coach. A dad who coaches doesn't give DD special treatment in reference to the team. I coach and yes have a DD on the team, and yes she pitches. Is she our #1? Nope, in fact right now I would call her #3. Now she is one of the stronger infielders so she plays 2B and SS quite a bit, but I try to treat her the same (well maybe a little worse) as the other players. I try not to play the daddyball style. I define that as no matter what the DD's skill, she starts and plays the whole game. I know, I delt with that with my oldest on another team. I am a realist, and I know my DD's weakness', but to see the daddyball player making error after error after error yet she continues to play while others don't even get the chance...there is a problem. I have a rule that I try and follow, if new parents cannot tell which girl is my DD during practices, then I am doing something right.

THIS RESPONSE WAS GREAT. OF COURSE THE FATHER OF THE TEAM IS GOING TO PLACE HIS DAUGHTER IN A POSITION THAT BENIFITS HIS DAUGHTER. IF THE PLAYER IS A GREAT PLAYER (LIKE THE ONE ON OUR TEAM) THEN SHE SHOULD BE PLAYING. I ASKED WHEN DADDY BALL WAS GOING TO END I NEVER SAID THAT THE DAUGHTER ON OUR TEAM WAS A BAD PLAYER (HUGE DIFFERANCE). HOWEVER, THE DAUGHTER ON OUR TEAM MAKES MISTAKES JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE AND NEVER SITS (THAT IS TYPICAL DADDY BALL). IF YOU PLAY YOUR KID ALL THE TIME REMEMBER THIS ---YOUR DADUGHTER WILL GROW UP AND AT THE NEXT LEVEL YOU WILL NOT BE COACHING HER AND HOW WILL SHE REACT WHEN SHE DOESNT GET HER WAY?
BY NOT BEING FAIR YOUR TEACHING THE OTHER GIRLS ON THE TEAM MUCH MORE THAN YOU THINK. HOW TO BE SUPPORTIVE AS A TEAM DISPITE THE SITUATION NOT BEING FAIR (STRONGER TEAM PLAYER), AS WELL AS GIVING THE OTHER GIRLS THE ABILITY TO WORK HARDER THAN YOUR OWN DAUGHTER AND EVENTUALLY IT PAYING OFF WHEN IT COUNTS (LET ME GUESS ALL YOU AMAZING DADDY BALL COACHES WILL WANT TO TAKE CREDIT FOR THAT AS WELL). DAUGHTERS OF THE COACH CAN RARELY HOLD BACK THE TEARS WHEN SOMETHING DOESNT GO THERE WAY AND AT THE NEXT LEVEL TEARS TELL THE HEAD COACH (WILL NOT BE THE DADDY) TONS.

THE PROBLEM WITH DADDY BALL IS THAT THE DAUGHTER DOESNT HAVE TO T R Y! TO DO BETTER BECAUSE REGARDLESS SHE IS GOING TO START AND ALWAYS PLAY AND IT MAY NOT BE RIGHT BUT THAT IS DADDY BALL. THE RESPONSES OF "YOUR KID IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH, START YOUR OWN TEAM, PANTIES IN A BUNCH" IS JUST STUPID AND SCARRY THAT COACHES ACTUALLY RESPOND LIKE THIS UNTIL ....THIS RESPONSE.

WILDROSECOACH-SEEMS YOU ARE COACHING FOR ALL THE RIGHT REASONS AND VALUE THAT TEAM. I WISH YOU CONTINUED SUCESS AS WELL AS YOUR DAUGHTER. THANKS FOR NOT BEING A "T Y P I C A L" (LIVING THROUGH YOUR KIDS) DADDYBALL COACH.

[artomatic]

***crickets***

[3'sDad]

Jofus: Thanks for finding this.....our league took the position the new rule applied to both baseball and softball, which I'm sure they confirmed with our District office.

The change will benefit some local teams in our area who may now bw able to use additional players....this isn't the case with our orgainization. As I stated earlier, we did limited town travel this year for the 1st time and both tournaments were open events, not ASA, PONY USSA , etc. where most of the teams were either other local town travel teams or local travel groups who chose to play close to home for a few weekends.

[jofus]

HOWEVER, THE DAUGHTER ON OUR TEAM MAKES MISTAKES JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE AND NEVER SITS (THAT IS TYPICAL DADDY BALL).

THE RESPONSES OF "YOUR KID IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH, START YOUR OWN TEAM, PANTIES IN A BUNCH" IS JUST STUPID AND SCARRY THAT COACHES ACTUALLY RESPOND LIKE THIS UNTIL ....THIS RESPONSE.

If you feel that a girl (we still don't even know what age you are talking about, btw) should sit down just because she made a mistake, then I'm not sure you should be coaching either (IMHO).

As for scarry, I don't think it's happened yet, but this thread may end up scarring someone, at least psychologically