[quote=Anonymous]It's 2 years old but hardly an outlier. He tries to charge parents an extra 6 months of academy fees if they leave. if a kid leavws, he kicks out their siblings. He has been fired from hs job and threatened his hs team that they had to play madlax or else. Swell guy.
Ouch!
VLC Crabs tack on seasonal "member fees" in addition to seasonal dues and tournament fees. Crabs owner attended zero VLC practices and no VLC team games not coincident with Baltimore Crabs being at same event, and then urges VLC players who want his advocacy to attend his $700 three day prospect camp in order to see the kids on a club he owns. I can understand if you avoid Madlax because of academy fees, but alike tack on fees are abound with Crabs, especially if you want the organization to advocate for your son to college coaches. Leave VLC and that's fine with them, but that also means the family is out. Family profile is removed from the website to register for anything including tryout fees. And then, of course, VLC coaches are told not to give references for any kid who leaves and there have been "negative recruiting" things repeated to college coaches about former VLC players. Let's not confuse a negative opinion of Madlax with a grass is greener argument for their competitor club. I have arrived at a belief that Madlax and VLC have mostly great kids who are friends and respectful competitors with each other on clubs and at rival schools. Too bad a lot of them have horrible, vitriolic gossip parents. I can still remember a VLC and Madlax U-15 game which had to be stopped by the refs who heard parents screaming "hurt them" to kids on the field. That about says it all. This game belongs to the kids. The owners and parents at both clubs need to figure out some civility and class between themselves for either club to thrive going ahead IMHO.
