JV Team a Dying Tradition ?

I will say this, growing up in Philly area where lacrosse has always been popular, freshman teams were never a thing, for baseball or really any sport. I don't believe I had ever heard of straight freshman teams until I moved to Ohio. I graduated in 95 for reference. Memories a little fuzzy, but I don't remember there ever being anything even remotely close enough to field a freshman team at my high school.

With all that said, my school never had freshman for any sport. A lot of that may have had something to do with it being a mid size school usually graduating around 250, and they also offered pretty much every sport, club, and after school activity you could think of. Sports waaaaay outside the norm. We had hockey, crew, bowling, archery, even equestrian. Yea, horses and ish lol. So kids had tons of options for things to do outside of your standard sports.
What part of Philadelphia? Sounds very Chester County-ish. I worked in Kennett Square for 11 years.
 
I know our school no longer has freshman teams for any sport. 10+ years ago that was your way on to jv and varsity. But numbers are down in my area in general. The school send kids to learn basketball at the YMCA. For kids starting out that’s fine but there’s no reason a 5th or 6th grader should be play rec league and hope to make their actual middle school team.
Do you no longer have truly freshman teams or is your school doing this “JVB” bulls#%t?

lot of that driven by parents too.
 
Do you no longer have truly freshman teams or is your school doing this “JVB” bulls#%t?

lot of that driven by parents too.
I haven’t seen or heard of a freshman team in 10 years. It’s jv and varsity. Our numbers are pretty low as far as kids actually coming out to play.
 
What part of Philadelphia? Sounds very Chester County-ish. I worked in Kennett Square for 11 years.
My uncle owns a small business in Kenneth Square and lives in Chadds Ford. High school sports are afterthought in that area. His kids played lacrosse and hockey, as they were seen as a safer alternative to football. I imagine lacrosse makes fielding a single baseball team a monumental task.
 
My uncle owns a small business in Kenneth Square and lives in Chadds Ford. High school sports are afterthought in that area. His kids played lacrosse and hockey, as they were seen as a safer alternative to football. I imagine lacrosse makes fielding a single baseball team a monumental task.
Which business? If he lives in Chadds Ford, he is obviously doing very very well.
 
My uncle owns a small business in Kenneth Square and lives in Chadds Ford. High school sports are afterthought in that area. His kids played lacrosse and hockey, as they were seen as a safer alternative to football. I imagine lacrosse makes fielding a single baseball team a monumental task.
Saturday morning varsity football games are pretty normal in southeastern PA, just to give you an idea of difference in priorities.
 
Which business? If he lives in Chadds Ford, he is obviously doing very very well.
He owns a printing business close to the post office. He and his wife settled in the area in the early eighties. The Delaware border and Mendenhall Inn(?) are close to his home. I got the impression pro sports and country club sports take top billing. According to him, Penn State football doesn’t garner much interest in his area.
 
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He owns a printing business close to the post office. He and his wife settled in the area in the early eighties. The Delaware border and Mendenhall Inn(?) are close to his home. I got the impression pro sports and country club sports take top billing. According to him, Penn State football doesn’t garner much interest in his area.
That was one thing that has been weird since moving to Ohio (2000). How the entire state is completely infatuated with Ohio State. It is NOT like that in PA for Penn State at all, particularly southeastern PA. Not exactly sure why, but it's something I've been trying to figure out for 20 years. Maybe it's the saturation of colleges and universities, particularly the Big 5 (City 6) in Philly. Makes it hard to say a single school represents the whole state.
 
Do you no longer have truly freshman teams or is your school doing this “JVB” bulls#%t?

lot of that driven by parents too.
What's wrong with JV-B? It gives a school flexibility to develop kids who may be late bloomers, especially pitchers. You can never have enough pitching. And usually the best freshmen are moved up to JV and Varsity, leaving the freshmen teams devoid of pitching. Calling them JVB allows the flexibility to move a sophomore or even junior that isn't quite JVA or Varsity level, but still decent. More opportunity for kids who are capable of throwing strikes is ok in my book.
 
What's wrong with JV-B? It gives a school flexibility to develop kids who may be late bloomers, especially pitchers. You can never have enough pitching. And usually the best freshmen are moved up to JV and Varsity, leaving the freshmen teams devoid of pitching. Calling them JVB allows the flexibility to move a sophomore or even junior that isn't quite JVA or Varsity level, but still decent. More opportunity for kids who are capable of throwing strikes is ok in my book.
Because it's a stupid idea that's been done to appease parents who don't want little Timmy on a Freshmen team because didn't you know he was a 12U all star? Might make sense for pitching, but in my experience that's not happening.

Having witnessed this personally, the JVB teams usually are god awful and set the game back. It would be better to have no JVB and a large JV team than some 9-10 player roster who cannot do the basics.
 
How do you feel about a school that gets 50 players out for baseball and makes cuts instead of fielding three teams? Could be Freshman, JV, Varsity or JV A, JV B, and a Varsity. I don't like the idea of cutting anybody who is willing to play because sports help health and keep grades up and most kids out of trouble.
 
How do you feel about a school that gets 50 players out for baseball and makes cuts instead of fielding three teams? Could be Freshman, JV, Varsity or JV A, JV B, and a Varsity. I don't like the idea of cutting anybody who is willing to play because sports help health and keep grades up and most kids out of trouble.
If you have 50 players, you more than likely dont have this issue and if your 50 don't contain enough freshmen, what is your plan when those 10-11th graders get to Varsity? Have a 30 person varsity team? Cuts hurt, but they are part of life. You also assume 50 players have enough talent to all make a team and contribute.
My JH basketball coaches when I was an AD had 40 kids show up for 7th grade one year. Guess what? 25 didnt make it and still has prosperous lives.
 
Because it's a stupid idea that's been done to appease parents who don't want little Timmy on a Freshmen team because didn't you know he was a 12U all star? Might make sense for pitching, but in my experience that's not happening.

Having witnessed this personally, the JVB teams usually are god awful and set the game back. It would be better to have no JVB and a large JV team than some 9-10 player roster who cannot do the basics.
Maybe I'm out of the loop on this, but most schools that have JVB teams don't have freshman teams. And it isn't because of parents who want to say their freshman is playing JV. I think you are reaching here.
 
Maybe I'm out of the loop on this, but most schools that have JVB teams don't have freshman teams. And it isn't because of parents who want to say their freshman is playing JV. I think you are reaching here.
Id be happy to put you in touch with the irate parents who were in my office yearly for five years complaining about this. Small sample but let's just say the other ADs in the conference were having the same conversations. I also spoke to our local AD this morning on an unrelated issue and asked him about their JVB team, and he confirmed this was the case this year in our district and was the same issue going back the last two years. And we have ZERO issues having enough freshmen.

This is a reflection of parenting today, where they don't want their children to be told no and want them to be as high as possible in team standing.

Sure, there are probably cases where not enough freshmen makes sense to have a second JV team. I'd be curious to know other numbers though as to whether or not two larger teams (i.e. JV and V) would make sense. The perfect balance is hard to strike.

It's also something that could be addressed by playing shorter games at freshmen level, like they do in sub-varsity games in basketball where you get two freshmen or two JV quarters then play the varsity game. There are few reasons outside of hesitance to change why sub-varsity should not be less than 7 innings. This has come up to the NFHS rules committee almost every other year and it is defeated because it is against the grain.
 
It's also something that could be addressed by playing shorter games at freshmen level, like they do in sub-varsity games in basketball where you get two freshmen or two JV quarters then play the varsity game. There are few reasons outside of hesitance to change why sub-varsity should not be less than 7 innings. This has come up to the NFHS rules committee almost every other year and it is defeated because it is against the grain.
The difference is that in basketball, they are in the same gym and play back-to-back. Baseball in our area, JV and Varsity usually play the same schedule at opposite locations.
 
I'm also in favor of getting as many kids to play baseball as possible. If a school doesn't have three teams (Varsity/JV/Frosh or Varsity/JVA/JVB) and they are cutting kids, I don't think they have the proper perspective of what academic sports are supposed to be.

IMO, there is no such thing as "bad baseball". I've taken people to high level HS games that have only seen MLB games. They wonder why all the players are "so bad". It is just a matter of perspective.
 
The difference is that in basketball, they are in the same gym and play back-to-back. Baseball in our area, JV and Varsity usually play the same schedule at opposite locations.
So that means that freshmen can’t play 5-6 innings?
 
I'm also in favor of getting as many kids to play baseball as possible. If a school doesn't have three teams (Varsity/JV/Frosh or Varsity/JVA/JVB) and they are cutting kids, I don't think they have the proper perspective of what academic sports are supposed to be.

IMO, there is no such thing as "bad baseball". I've taken people to high level HS games that have only seen MLB games. They wonder why all the players are "so bad". It is just a matter of perspective.
This is assuming they have enough kids for 3 teams. It is possible to get the awkward number where its too many for 2 teams but not enough for 3 well staffed teams. Which I guess at that point you can just have an extra large JV team but then it becomes hard to get everyone decent playing time.
 
This is assuming they have enough kids for 3 teams. It is possible to get the awkward number where its too many for 2 teams but not enough for 3 well staffed teams. Which I guess at that point you can just have an extra large JV team but then it becomes hard to get everyone decent playing time.
Agreed. I watched a top team that carried 36 players. They had 10 Freshmen with two playing up on Varsity. They played everyone on JV and played about 10 Freshmen games with just the Freshmen and the two least played Sophs. It was considered a JVB team and still won most of their games against regular JVs.

Coaches that have alot of talent can make it work with creative scheduling.
 
Back in my HS days, I had 3 teams. Varsity, Junior Varsity, and Freshman. We had enough to fill up every team. Kids used to play baseball all the time. It is sad to see that nowadays teams can barely fill up a Varsity team.
 
Most baseball in NE Ohio is JV/Varsity playing same schedule at opposite sites, especially in league play (there's at least one league that was JV/VAR at the same site, different fields, which created its own headaches).

In terms of a freshman only team, if you don't have 12 freshmen that aren't playing up on JV or VAR, it's hard to be effective at it without being real creative. That's probably why you see lots of JV-B.
 
Definitely enjoy seeing the developmental aspect of schools with JV and the success shows in the programs with the strong tradition.

It's a hard sport to "sell" to a kid anymore as there aren't the big crowds, pep bands and overall environment that builds the fun and suspense. And I think the love of the game is dwindling with the rise of NBA and NFL. You don't see the random pickup games at the local diamond or someone's backyard anymore.
I’m in my mid 40s and I’ve never seen pickup games at the local diamond. Baseball to most kids is irrelevant unfortunately. The fact that so many MLB teams around the country never have a chance to even compete. MLB has set up a system where most teams are simply minor league teams for the Yankees. That kills interest in most parts of the country
 
If you have 50 players, you more than likely dont have this issue and if your 50 don't contain enough freshmen, what is your plan when those 10-11th graders get to Varsity? Have a 30 person varsity team? Cuts hurt, but they are part of life. You also assume 50 players have enough talent to all make a team and contribute.
My JH basketball coaches when I was an AD had 40 kids show up for 7th grade one year. Guess what? 25 didnt make it and still has prosperous lives.
If I got 50-60 kids program wide coming out for baseball, ain’t nobody gettin cut. That’s extra fees and fundraising walking right out the door. So yeah, make a JV-B schedule if you have to. That extra 200-500 adds up.
 
It just depends on what school district you are talking about, as far as freshman numbers and teams. The Big OCC schools in Central Ohio who have good history with baseball are booming with freshman numbers and most have 3 teams Varsity, JVA, and JVB (Mostly 9th graders).
 
I’m in my mid 40s and I’ve never seen pickup games at the local diamond. Baseball to most kids is irrelevant unfortunately. The fact that so many MLB teams around the country never have a chance to even compete. MLB has set up a system where most teams are simply minor league teams for the Yankees. That kills interest in most parts of the country
Shoot, you don't see pick up games of any kind anywhere. Kids are not outside running around the neighborhood like they used to.
 
I’m in my mid 40s and I’ve never seen pickup games at the local diamond. Baseball to most kids is irrelevant unfortunately. The fact that so many MLB teams around the country never have a chance to even compete. MLB has set up a system where most teams are simply minor league teams for the Yankees. That kills interest in most parts of the country
I'm in my early 50s and not sure we ever played a pickup game on a baseball diamond. We always played in a backyard. Started with a baseball but changed to a tennis ball when we got older...too many broken windows. When we played with a tennis ball, we threw some wicked curveballs. Everyone in our neighborhood could hit.

My kids have played in a couple pickup games on the local diamond and people were amazed. Someone even made a post about a bunch of kids playing the game on social media because they were so surprised.
 
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