Quick question on "the facts". Honestly I am not trying to be difficult here but we have a lot of 15yo vs 12yo which seems pretty disingenuous to me. The cutoff date for age based is 9/1/2005. This means on average by the beginning of March the average age of 2024 kids is 13, not 12. Of course if your team has more summer 2006 birthdays the average will be 12+, but in that case even an "on age" team could be 6-9 months older if it had more fall birthdays. Most of the MD "holdbacks" I have encountered have summer 2005 birthdays, the reasons for this have been talked about a fair amount (private vs. public focus, etc.). So let's assume every kid on a team was born in June 2005 (which is a stretch as I know for a "fact" that the teams talked about here have "on age" players because it wasn't that long ago MD was age based as well) then by March, on average, the difference would be 9 months as opposed to the "cited facts" of 1 to 2 years. Of course talking in averages does not take into account individuals which can vary but since none of the LI or MD clubs post birth dates or birth certificates no one here really knows exact age or birthday. We can make some assumptions pre/post 9/1.
To your questions about how good MD teams are and why they are not "as good as they should be" since they are 1/2 years older is perhaps because they are actually closer in age than you make it out to be. I am not saying a 9 month age difference (which I think is a high end estimate) is not an advantage but it is a whole lot different than saying a 1 to 2 year difference and it is an age gap that can occur even in age based systems.
Let me know if I am doing the math wrong here.
I am a MD parent of an on age 2024 who believes that age based is the way to go in youth (pre high school) sports.
The first issue is if you stack a team full of summer birthdays or even earlier and have them play a diverse team of different ages. This is the first issue with the HoCo elite divisions. The better teams are completely stacked with this type of roster. There's a reason why they are "better" and it's not due to coaching.
If you are a 2024 parent who pays attention and your club is competitive, here's a better breakdown. There are approximately 21 players on a team, some more and some less but this is about right. At least a third of those kids will be older than the 9/1 guideline; about 10 will be born between September and December; and there might be 4-5 kids born after January. In the elite division, the numbers will skew even older.
The problem lies in those 7 and more like 14 for the elite division teams where their ages vary from a couple of months before up to 18 months before. Yes - 18 months before the 9/1 guideline.
Here's how it happens. You take a delayed entry child who is born in March (and I believe this is too old to play in class divisions) and then that kid re-classes. Now you have a 15 year old playing 7th grade lacrosse. I don't know about 7th grade HoCo but I know most 8th grade teams in the elite division have at least 1 and 1 team has 3. Yes - 3 young men who are 16 years old playing in an 8th grade division.
The age difference in teams for a class based league is way out of balance.
On Long Island, birthdays after 9/1 and before 12/31 are considered holdbacks, since they could/should be playing in the grade above, although that is a call that each parent must make at time of Kindergarten. Not sure if MD considers them holdbacks, but by definition, they are. The parents chooses (they have the option) to "hold them back".
Based on that and your comments above, the average MD "competitive" team is 70% holdbacks ("4 to 5 on age players"), and teams in "elite divisions, the numbers will skew even older."
So the MD teams that the LI teams play, have 2 - 3 on age players, who in all likelihood never see the field, against LI teams. Therefore, MD teams (that play LI teams) are 100% holdback teams. Said another way, they are 2023-age teams, playing down against 2024 LI on-age teams.
Thank you for confirming... that's exactly what I have known all along. There are no 2024-age players playing in the 2024 grade, in MD lacrosse. That's crazy-town. It makes absolutely no sense. It's amazing what profit and greed can do to a kids game. I wish you MD non-holdback parents, the best. You and your kids don't deserve this, and this is not what's best for the sport. Good luck.
That final statement is just not true as my son plays in the HOCO elite division and has a post 9/1 birthday (12 on 9/1) as do many of his teammates. Once again a lot of these kids were playing together during the age based years so they did not all magically become hold backs when they changed to grade. My point here is unless you have seen the birth certificate no one here really knows actual ages.
Not being difficult again but I really don't understand calling kids who meet the age requirement "holdbacks" as well. I don't understand how you slot your kids into school on LI but there are plenty of on age kids with fall birthdays who have never been "held back" so saying by definition if you have an on age kid but a fall birthday you are a hold back is odd at best.
Also, assuming any kid who was playing on age in 2023 and is now playing 2024 is a double hold back is not correct. As I said in a previous post the vast majority of kids I know with pre 9/1 birthdays were born in Jul-Aug of 2005 which means they may have been playing up in a grade based world and are now playing on grade or they were "held back". Either way making the leap to the double hold back once again is an assumption that I have not seen in reality.
Couple final things, I admittedly know nothing about the ages of 2023s or 2025s. I also fully agree it should be age based as that is what is best for the kids and the sport.
