Originally Posted by Anonymous
There are a few other towns that sound like the above.

I have a question how common is it to have "tryouts" masqueraded as 'evaluations" by those in the good ole boy network. or better yet, what grade is it okay to have TRYOUTS. Surely cant be 2nd or 3rd grade could it. This is PAL for goodness sake. You have a few more years before you find your best middie attack. and heaven knows you can have 5 years before you found your defender or goalie.



I don't think evaluations/tryouts are a bad thing at any level, as long as there is opportunity to advance to a more competitive team as a player's skills and ability grows. If you have 15 kids that can catch and throw effectively and 15 who's skills are still developing, separating them will allow a coach to work on skill specific drills. You will allow more advanced kids the ability to tackle more advanced strategies and concepts while strengthening the core skills of the others. The advanced team will play in a higher division and be challenged while the developing team will be placed in a lower division with similar teams and still be competitive. I've seen it work well as young as 2nd or 3rd grade, absolutely. Inevitably, the teams will balance themselves out over time. Some players will just work harder than others and kids will drop from the top team and be replaced by players who have worked to improve their game.