PG is close to dead and buried in Austin. All of the good fields are now run by Five Tool.

Pretty sure that Cedar Park thing is a pipe dream.

Definitely don't agree with that. 5 Tool has Zorn and that's it. They turfed the infields but I find that facility to be garbage. But 5 Tool has definitely increased market share this spring, I think mostly bc Canes teams pretty much exclusively play there. The location in Zorn has also increased their participation from San Antonio area teams.

PG participation has been down but I think that's mostly bc most programs haven't started yet and Canes playing 5 Tool. There is 160 teams in PG this weekend. Over 300 already signed up for the April NIT. PG owns Henley, Westinghouse and Black Star, all fully turfed fields. They seem to be doing better at upkeep but tournaments and gate fees are more expensive.

I think what lies in the middle will be the interesting thing going forward. 5 Tool is using Taylor this weekend, PG has tourneys at Northeast Metro. Fields are crappy at both, so perhaps the next investment separates them. I know they are building more fields at Henley and obviously the Cedar Park thing would be a game changer if it ever happens. Does 5 Tool continue to rake in gate fees with no field maintenance like they did at PG? Will be interesting to see how it plays out, but 5 Tool has definitely made inroads, can they stay there or be like they always were when they ran PG. I think PG is doing better now, so the competition is good. Should also make more manageable tournaments where there aren't 35 teams in a bracket. At the end of the day its all a racket and making the baseball experience more expensive, so there probably isn't a winner here other than lining some pockets of the organizers.

Yea I guess you are right. I didn't realize that many were still playing PG.

Goignt o disagree on Zorn. We like Zorn a lot.

V Tool runs a better tournament and it is not even close. They also have Crossroads in Temple this weekend which is a great facility.

That being said the biggest problem in Austin is, to your point, poor facilities. Most are really garbage. We rarely even go to Austin anymore. We play in Houston, CS, and Franklin. We are one of the last independent teams still standing and proud of it.

We remained independent the whole way through select ball. Congratulations on not caving in.

Zorn just seems all run down to me. We played there before all the infields were turfed and the fields were trash. The turf we played on was sloped and very inconsistent. Maybe it needed more break in time. But the outfields were still garbage, cringe on every ground ball that its going to hop 10 feet in the air. A nice facility for the parents is great, but I'll opt for nice turf fields every time. Take Taylor for instance, like the facility, plenty of parking but the fields are terrible. I do really like Temple, nice facility AND they take care of the fields, but its 2 hours for us.

I may be wrong, but I think PG will win out here. If they follow through with what they've said on field improvements. Have to remember, all the things people complained about Austin Select baseball all these years, are now just the same guys running 5 Tool. If 5 Tool stays status quo, PG will win back the masses.

Absolutely hate PG tournaments, glad we aren't playing them anymore.

Have a 14u majors player and have been playing in "Austin" and "San Antonio" area since 8u. Honestly I don't know the difference from Taylor, Georgetown, Round Rock, Pflugerville, etc. To me they all run together. We played in Lake Travis this past weekend. Not great facilities. Houston facilities have us beat but it doesn't bother me. It is what it is and we play who shows up. I assume most of the *****ing is from the younger level parents.

What bat or what size bat do you coaches/dads like to use for hitting balls to your players?

Jbob04 said:

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What bat or what size bat do you coaches/dads like to use for hitting balls to your players?

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LS custom fungo in 36"... https://custom.slugger.com/custom/fungo/wood/maple/s345/customize#color

Whatever size my kid swings.

Farmer1906 said:

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Whatever size my kid swings.

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Yeah that's what I've been doing for the past 8 years or so. Been thinking about going the fungo route.

Do any of you Austin area guys have 9u teams? We'll be playing some 5 Tool, PG, and Small Town tourneys in the area this Spring (after playing all STS last fall). Looking forward to seeing how we stack up in some of the bigger tournaments.

Yep. We are on Texas Hustle out of Taylor area. We are playing Five Tool this weekend in San Marcos. There is a Five Tool in Taylor this weekend but with the threat of rain we moved down south to be on Turf. Who are you playing with?

Nice. I see y'all are registered for the same 5 Tool March Madness tourney on 3/22-23. Do you know how they do the split between Taylor and Burnet?

And, not that I'm in any way anonymous on here, but since it's me a couple other dads that coach the team, I'd rather not nail down specifically who we are in public... but if you want to chat, shoot me an email at aggieeng06 at gmail.

Good luck 9u guys. We are 13u and in Temple this weekend. We got the best fields which is nice.

Enjoy 9u.

Cold today. Could have been worse. But it was cold.

My boys want 2-0 and only allowed 1 run. But we had an easy draw and it's going to heat up quick tomorrow.

Hope everyone is having a good weekend

My guess is that 9u will be in Taylor. That tournament was supposed to be a NEM/Taylor deal. PG weaseled their way back into NEM for some weekends. We will play some PG this season but maybe only 1. Five Tool is much easier to work with, not nearly as shady, and are gaining enough traction to have some serious competition in their tournaments.

Saturday at Zorn was miserable. Watching 9 year olds learn to pitch on slick turf mounds was not enjoyable. Yesterday was beautiful baseball weather. Went 4-0 on the weekend with (3) 1 run games in a row to win it.

Nice.

9u is not really fun to watch but man it was fun to coach.

We went 4-0 this weekend too. By 13 they know how to handle the mounds.

One thing V tool is going to have to figure out is how to divide these teams up. We faced a low AA team, a low AAA team, a high AAA team, and a winning majors team. That shouldn't happen. Two of those teams could never beat us or the other majors team. But the way V tool has us signing up it is really hard to tell whats going on. They divided us into two five team pots where we all played the other teams in our pot. And that's great. But each side had massive differences in abilities and nobody wants that.

I agree with this as well. I think as they get rolling this spring the teams themselves should start to learn how to sign up. If you register as Open, thats essentially majors. I only know because I asked. There is also the issue that even a PG tournament could turn into an Open tournament if there isn't enough teams in any skill level registered. I think as we go on, more teams will be playing and the lower level divisions will fill and hopefully keep the Opens to your AAA/Majors teams.

I do like Perfect Game for that reason but everything else is terrible in my opinion. Especially in Central Texas.

We did sign up as open. I think what happened in ours is some of the lower end teams didn't realize open meant majors/AAA. They had some mistakes on the website around 54/80 and open and D2/D3. Was confusing.

I have a bad feeling it Will happen again this coming weekend but maybe they will figure it out. If it does that's ok. Our schedule gets really tough after spring break. Franklin will be tough. Houston will be tough. Omaha is always tough.

We had a personal one this weekend. A group has tried to put together an area all-star team to beat me for the last 5 or so years. The latest version is fully funded with a paid professional coach. We finally got a chance to play them this weekend. Tight game that was pretty intense the whole time. My kid hit a 2 run bomb in the top of 5th to give us a 5-3 win.

I wanted to walk out of the park with both middle fingers in the air, but I took the high road. The looks on their faces after my group of leftovers beat them was all the satisfaction I needed.

PhatMack19 said:

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We had a personal one this weekend. A group has tried to put together an area all-star team to beat me for the last 5 or so years. The latest version is fully funded with a paid professional coach. We finally got a chance to play them this weekend. Tight game that was pretty intense the whole time. My kid hit a 2 run bomb in the top of 5th to give us a 5-3 win.

I wanted to walk out of the park with both middle fingers in the air, but I took the high road. The looks on their faces after my group of leftovers beat them was all the satisfaction I needed.

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Leftovers? I thought y'all had been a solid majors team with a really strong org for a few years now, no??

You do realize the guys running 5 Tool are the same guys that ran PG before? All the things people complain about in Austin was under the supervision of the now 5 Tool guys.

hustle2015 said:

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I agree with this as well. I think as they get rolling this spring the teams themselves should start to learn how to sign up. If you register as Open, thats essentially majors. I only know because I asked. There is also the issue that even a PG tournament could turn into an Open tournament if there isn't enough teams in any skill level registered. I think as we go on, more teams will be playing and the lower level divisions will fill and hopefully keep the Opens to your AAA/Majors teams.

I do like Perfect Game for that reason but everything else is terrible in my opinion. Especially in Central Texas.

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Even if you sign up in a lower AA or AAA division don't be surprised to see the organizations drop a few major players on the roster for Sunday. That happened time and time again over the time when we had a team. Canes and whatever LBC is now were the worst. I'd of been livid if my kid got benched by dropping higher level kids down just to win a ring. But Austin Select baseball didn't seem to care at all as those organizations were filling their tournaments.

docb said:

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hustle2015 said:

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I agree with this as well. I think as they get rolling this spring the teams themselves should start to learn how to sign up. If you register as Open, thats essentially majors. I only know because I asked. There is also the issue that even a PG tournament could turn into an Open tournament if there isn't enough teams in any skill level registered. I think as we go on, more teams will be playing and the lower level divisions will fill and hopefully keep the Opens to your AAA/Majors teams.

I do like Perfect Game for that reason but everything else is terrible in my opinion. Especially in Central Texas.

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Even if you sign up in a lower AA or AAA division don't be surprised to see the organizations drop a few major players on the roster for Sunday. That happened time and time again over the time when we had a team. Canes and whatever LBC is now were the worst. I'd of been livid if my kid got benched by dropping higher level kids down just to win a ring. But Austin Select baseball didn't seem to care at all as those organizations were filling their tournaments.

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This is annoying.

Any time we need a pickup players, we try to get a good one. But they bat near the end of the lineup and play OF 95% of the time.

docb said:

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hustle2015 said:

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I agree with this as well. I think as they get rolling this spring the teams themselves should start to learn how to sign up. If you register as Open, thats essentially majors. I only know because I asked. There is also the issue that even a PG tournament could turn into an Open tournament if there isn't enough teams in any skill level registered. I think as we go on, more teams will be playing and the lower level divisions will fill and hopefully keep the Opens to your AAA/Majors teams.

I do like Perfect Game for that reason but everything else is terrible in my opinion. Especially in Central Texas.

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Even if you sign up in a lower AA or AAA division don't be surprised to see the organizations drop a few major players on the roster for Sunday. That happened time and time again over the time when we had a team. Canes and whatever LBC is now were the worst. I'd of been livid if my kid got benched by dropping higher level kids down just to win a ring. But Austin Select baseball didn't seem to care at all as those organizations were filling their tournaments.

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I haven't paid close attention in a while but when my oldest was younger and before PG took over Houston there were tons of teams playing AAA or major under USSSA that would drop down to play AAA or usually AA in Nations. This was several years ago before Five Tool bought out Nations and PG ran USSSA out of Houston. And I don't think Nations ever really had much in the way of AAA or higher back then, everybody at that level played USSSA.

Farmer1906 said:

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docb said:

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hustle2015 said:

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I agree with this as well. I think as they get rolling this spring the teams themselves should start to learn how to sign up. If you register as Open, thats essentially majors. I only know because I asked. There is also the issue that even a PG tournament could turn into an Open tournament if there isn't enough teams in any skill level registered. I think as we go on, more teams will be playing and the lower level divisions will fill and hopefully keep the Opens to your AAA/Majors teams.

I do like Perfect Game for that reason but everything else is terrible in my opinion. Especially in Central Texas.

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Even if you sign up in a lower AA or AAA division don't be surprised to see the organizations drop a few major players on the roster for Sunday. That happened time and time again over the time when we had a team. Canes and whatever LBC is now were the worst. I'd of been livid if my kid got benched by dropping higher level kids down just to win a ring. But Austin Select baseball didn't seem to care at all as those organizations were filling their tournaments.

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This is annoying.

Any time we need a pickup players, we try to get a good one. But they bat near the end of the lineup and play OF 95% of the time.

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I guess I really don't know why they even have divisions if no one really follows it. I mean why should a team be able to bring say 4 majors players into a AAA tournament on Sunday. It's not my problem anymore as we have moved through all the select baseball but I never thought that was fair.

Not exactly. The guys that ran Austin PG into the ground just got forced out by PG National. PG guys from Houston have come over to run things in the interim. They jacked up the entry fees, gate fees, and their umpires are still awful.

When I say forced out, I mean there were some nefarious actions going on. Conflict of interest at best, alleged embezzlement at worse. I have no details other than things I've heard.

I have been an admin for a local select team for 3 years. Dealing with PG was a nightmare. Working with Drew at Five Tool has been easy. I know Drew used to be at PG but my one interaction with him back then was positive as well.

I agree with you. It actually hurts the team picking up the players as well. That team is a AA or AAA at best. They pick up a stud pitcher or 2. Now they get bumped a level AA to AAA or AAA to Majors. Except now, when they enter a Majors tournament because they have to, they are facing the kids they picked up and getting smoked. There is really no way around it, people will go to the extreme to win these things.

Agreed. Drew is better and the fact that it is a couple of former employees doesn't make it the same. No way.

TarponChaser said:

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PhatMack19 said:

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We had a personal one this weekend. A group has tried to put together an area all-star team to beat me for the last 5 or so years. The latest version is fully funded with a paid professional coach. We finally got a chance to play them this weekend. Tight game that was pretty intense the whole time. My kid hit a 2 run bomb in the top of 5th to give us a 5-3 win.

I wanted to walk out of the park with both middle fingers in the air, but I took the high road. The looks on their faces after my group of leftovers beat them was all the satisfaction I needed.

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Leftovers? I thought y'all had been a solid majors team with a really strong org for a few years now, no??

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We are. Leftovers may have been too strong of a word. I don't have the "best" players. I have the best team. I've had the same core group of kids for 5-6 years. It goes a long way to keep a group together. I don't even really coach them in games anymore. They know what to do and what I expect from them.

Quote:

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It goes a long way to keep a group together.

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Hell yes it does.

We beat a team yesterday that doesn't lose often. The coach basically picks and chooses out of the top of his organization. He told our first base coach that we play at a different speed. Our boys have all been together since way back and his come and go every year.

Any good stories from the big NIT this weekend? How did we do?


I'm watching some games this morning while at work to pass time.

PhatMack19 said:

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Any good stories from the big NIT this weekend? How did we do?


I'm watching some games this morning while at work to pass time.

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Just perusing the Houston Select Baseball groups on Facebook there doesn't seem anything too crazy so far. Mostly gripes about bad calls by umpires.

The one crazy story is that there's a smaller and newer organization here in the Houston area called "Unleashed." They've evidently built some pretty solid teams in the last 18-24 months and have a really nice facility of their own. It appears it was started by a couple coaches who had coached teams at Premier and kids who left Premier to play for these coaches at Unleashed. Well the ownership at Premier has banned the Unleashed coaches from the premises and supposedly even gotten with law enforcement such that the coaches could be charged with trespassing if they try to come on the site. The Premier ownership has also allegedly completely banned Unleashed teams from playing there and when an Unleashed team got slotted there in bracket play during the NIT they were not allowed on site and forced to forfeit the game.