Problems with Select Tournament Baseball
Player Health
There is a clear problem with injuries at all levels of baseball right now. Former MLB players, college coaches, scouts, doctors, physical therapists, and trainers are constantly talking about it on social media. When did the injuries start occurring in such large numbers? What is causing them? What steps can be taken to prevent them? We would like to help educate you on this topic and provide a clear solution to the problem. Most studies that you can read regarding baseball injuries list the beginning of the rise in the early 2000's. Unfortunately, the numbers have exploded over the last 20 years and especially in younger players. If we have pinpointed the time frame that this all started, then we should easily be able to detect what changed at that point in baseball. Many educated guesses have been offered, but we believe the most obvious answer is the one that everyone seems to want to ignore. The most obvious answer to what changed is clear. Travel baseball tournaments began to take off in the early 2000's and have grown increasingly over the last 20 years. Common sense would tell you that if the injuries and the tournaments started at the same time and have both grown in numbers over these years, then there is a direct correlation between them. More specifically, we believe that the format of these tournaments and the manipulation of their rules are the specific causes for the rise in injuries. Let's dive into what is really going on here. Youth teams (7 year olds - 14 year olds) in the spring and fall are playing 4-7 games in just two days almost every weekend. High school teams (15 year olds - 17 year olds) are playing the same as the youth in the fall, and in the summer they are playing 4-9 games in just 3-5 days every week. That is absolute insanity for a number of reasons, which we will explain below. These young players are playing entirely too many games in such short periods of time. The exhaustion level alone would be enough to open the body to injury. Even if the player doesn't experience an immediate injury, the lack of proper recovery from all of that will definitely wear down the body. Player health is the main reason that all other levels of baseball (professional, college, and even school teams) use a league format. Why on earth are we asking the youngest players in the game to do something totally different? Unfortunately, there are even more alarming issues with these tournaments. When you really take a close look at pitching and catching, then the cause of injuries becomes even more apparent. Even though these tournament organizations have some pitch count rules in place, many times they are not enforced. Several are even based on outs not actual pitches. Also, the actual problem is ignored in those rules. There are no rules about playing in the field before or after pitching on the mound. There are also no rules limiting the number of games a kid can catch during a tournament. It is completely common to see a high school player pitch a full game on a Thursday throwing 100 pitches, play in the field for all games on Friday and Saturday, and then pitch again on Sunday. We hear from high school catchers all the time that they were behind the plate in every single game of a tournament. There is absolutely no proper rest from throwing. The tournament schedules also create another major problem for injuries. Tournament organizations try to get as many teams entered as possible to make more money. So, they have to really shorten game time limits and time in between games. This completely removes the opportunity for a proper warmup for all players before the game and definitely for pitchers coming into a game. There is always this constant rush to keep things going forward, which completely ignores what is best for player health. Not to mention that all of this is happening while players are on the road. Late night games followed by early morning games limit the amount of quality sleep that is already being affected by being in a strange bed in a hotel. Fast food meals because that is all that they have time to throw down before the next game. We know that proper rest and nutrition are so important for health, but those are tossed out because it doesn't fit into the money-making model. There are the causes in plain sight. Youth and high school bodies are being torn down by travel tournament formats and are completely susceptible to injury. These athletes are never really recovering from all of the minor and major injuries and continue to suffer additional injuries as they get to higher levels of baseball. We are offering a clear solution to this problem. The format of the Texas Select League is specifically designed for player health.
There is a clear problem with injuries at all levels of baseball right now. Former MLB players, college coaches, scouts, doctors, physical therapists, and trainers are constantly talking about it on social media. When did the injuries start occurring in such large numbers? What is causing them? What steps can be taken to prevent them? We would like to help educate you on this topic and provide a clear solution to the problem. Most studies that you can read regarding baseball injuries list the beginning of the rise in the early 2000's. Unfortunately, the numbers have exploded over the last 20 years and especially in younger players. If we have pinpointed the time frame that this all started, then we should easily be able to detect what changed at that point in baseball. Many educated guesses have been offered, but we believe the most obvious answer is the one that everyone seems to want to ignore. The most obvious answer to what changed is clear. Travel baseball tournaments began to take off in the early 2000's and have grown increasingly over the last 20 years. Common sense would tell you that if the injuries and the tournaments started at the same time and have both grown in numbers over these years, then there is a direct correlation between them. More specifically, we believe that the format of these tournaments and the manipulation of their rules are the specific causes for the rise in injuries. Let's dive into what is really going on here. Youth teams (7 year olds - 14 year olds) in the spring and fall are playing 4-7 games in just two days almost every weekend. High school teams (15 year olds - 17 year olds) are playing the same as the youth in the fall, and in the summer they are playing 4-9 games in just 3-5 days every week. That is absolute insanity for a number of reasons, which we will explain below. These young players are playing entirely too many games in such short periods of time. The exhaustion level alone would be enough to open the body to injury. Even if the player doesn't experience an immediate injury, the lack of proper recovery from all of that will definitely wear down the body. Player health is the main reason that all other levels of baseball (professional, college, and even school teams) use a league format. Why on earth are we asking the youngest players in the game to do something totally different? Unfortunately, there are even more alarming issues with these tournaments. When you really take a close look at pitching and catching, then the cause of injuries becomes even more apparent. Even though these tournament organizations have some pitch count rules in place, many times they are not enforced. Several are even based on outs not actual pitches. Also, the actual problem is ignored in those rules. There are no rules about playing in the field before or after pitching on the mound. There are also no rules limiting the number of games a kid can catch during a tournament. It is completely common to see a high school player pitch a full game on a Thursday throwing 100 pitches, play in the field for all games on Friday and Saturday, and then pitch again on Sunday. We hear from high school catchers all the time that they were behind the plate in every single game of a tournament. There is absolutely no proper rest from throwing. The tournament schedules also create another major problem for injuries. Tournament organizations try to get as many teams entered as possible to make more money. So, they have to really shorten game time limits and time in between games. This completely removes the opportunity for a proper warmup for all players before the game and definitely for pitchers coming into a game. There is always this constant rush to keep things going forward, which completely ignores what is best for player health. Not to mention that all of this is happening while players are on the road. Late night games followed by early morning games limit the amount of quality sleep that is already being affected by being in a strange bed in a hotel. Fast food meals because that is all that they have time to throw down before the next game. We know that proper rest and nutrition are so important for health, but those are tossed out because it doesn't fit into the money-making model. There are the causes in plain sight. Youth and high school bodies are being torn down by travel tournament formats and are completely susceptible to injury. These athletes are never really recovering from all of the minor and major injuries and continue to suffer additional injuries as they get to higher levels of baseball. We are offering a clear solution to this problem. The format of the Texas Select League is specifically designed for player health.
Development
Travel tournaments have had additional effects on the game that are also easily recognizable. Player development, baseball education, and mental health are also being directly impacted. The inevitable burn out from playing so much, the intensity level and focus demanded over such long periods of time, and the incredible internal and external pressures being put on these young players is detrimental to their development. Player development encompasses many different things. Yes, players are getting much more individual instruction for individual skills through lessons. However, they are not getting taught some of the more important qualities that the game can produce. Getting a hitting, pitching, catching, or fielding lesson does not necessarily teach a player how to be a good teammate, how to deal with adversity, how to deal with success, how to have integrity, and how to be respectful. These are qualities that all coaches at higher levels are looking for in their players and are learned primarily while playing games. Travel tournaments have created a severely cut-throat, win at all cost environment. Rosters are kept at an absolute minimum level, because there is no time to develop players. Roster turnover is at an all-time high. If a player is not performing well, the team will just look for another player to replace them. Baseball is a game of failure. However, the expectation is that these players must not fail. How many stories of foul language, arguments, fights, and total disrespect have you heard about at youth baseball tournaments? What are we teaching these young athletes? The incredible pressures on everyone to get that instant gratification of a plastic ring each weekend have ruined some of the best parts of the game. According to many, there is a complete lack of baseball knowledge in the game now at all levels. The reason for that is simple. Players are not learning on their own how to play the game. Due to the pressures to win a tournament every weekend, coaches feel the need to direct everything on the field. They call pitches, move players around, call out what to do before every single pitch, direct the baserunners, and instruct every hitter after every pitch in every at bat. Parents like to help with all of that from the stands as well due to the pressure of not wanting their player to fail. These young athletes cannot do a single thing on the field without being told first. The environment has created a situation in which the players are discouraged from learning anything on their own. How many times have you heard a coach tell players that they need to go home and watch professional or college games on tv? There is no doubt that players can learn from watching the game. However, after having two practices, playing in 6 games, and missing hanging out with their friends, what kid really wants to go home and watch more baseball. Players are getting completely burned out from all of the games. If you want to create more interest and desire in the game, then you have to limit some of the time actually playing. Practices, lessons, and games become much more meaningful to the player when they don't get to do it quite as often. Mental health is a very real concern now for young players in baseball. Young athletes are not equipped to deal with such high intensity levels and acute focus for such long periods of time. How many times do you hear a coach or parents say the word focus during a long Sunday at the ballpark? The expectations are unrealistic and unfair for young athletes. The best players in the game at the professional level fail all the time during a game. However, these young players are expected to never fail on the field. They are competitive, want to please the adults in their lives, and don't want to let themselves or anyone else down. The internal pressure creates extreme emotions that are very difficult for them to deal with. Instead of addressing the problems creating this or seeking professional help to deal with it, most of the time players are just told to suck it up and deal with it on their own. It is way past time for the environment to change and lessen some of these issues for young players. Texas Select League was created to change the environment and put players' needs first.
Travel tournaments have had additional effects on the game that are also easily recognizable. Player development, baseball education, and mental health are also being directly impacted. The inevitable burn out from playing so much, the intensity level and focus demanded over such long periods of time, and the incredible internal and external pressures being put on these young players is detrimental to their development. Player development encompasses many different things. Yes, players are getting much more individual instruction for individual skills through lessons. However, they are not getting taught some of the more important qualities that the game can produce. Getting a hitting, pitching, catching, or fielding lesson does not necessarily teach a player how to be a good teammate, how to deal with adversity, how to deal with success, how to have integrity, and how to be respectful. These are qualities that all coaches at higher levels are looking for in their players and are learned primarily while playing games. Travel tournaments have created a severely cut-throat, win at all cost environment. Rosters are kept at an absolute minimum level, because there is no time to develop players. Roster turnover is at an all-time high. If a player is not performing well, the team will just look for another player to replace them. Baseball is a game of failure. However, the expectation is that these players must not fail. How many stories of foul language, arguments, fights, and total disrespect have you heard about at youth baseball tournaments? What are we teaching these young athletes? The incredible pressures on everyone to get that instant gratification of a plastic ring each weekend have ruined some of the best parts of the game. According to many, there is a complete lack of baseball knowledge in the game now at all levels. The reason for that is simple. Players are not learning on their own how to play the game. Due to the pressures to win a tournament every weekend, coaches feel the need to direct everything on the field. They call pitches, move players around, call out what to do before every single pitch, direct the baserunners, and instruct every hitter after every pitch in every at bat. Parents like to help with all of that from the stands as well due to the pressure of not wanting their player to fail. These young athletes cannot do a single thing on the field without being told first. The environment has created a situation in which the players are discouraged from learning anything on their own. How many times have you heard a coach tell players that they need to go home and watch professional or college games on tv? There is no doubt that players can learn from watching the game. However, after having two practices, playing in 6 games, and missing hanging out with their friends, what kid really wants to go home and watch more baseball. Players are getting completely burned out from all of the games. If you want to create more interest and desire in the game, then you have to limit some of the time actually playing. Practices, lessons, and games become much more meaningful to the player when they don't get to do it quite as often. Mental health is a very real concern now for young players in baseball. Young athletes are not equipped to deal with such high intensity levels and acute focus for such long periods of time. How many times do you hear a coach or parents say the word focus during a long Sunday at the ballpark? The expectations are unrealistic and unfair for young athletes. The best players in the game at the professional level fail all the time during a game. However, these young players are expected to never fail on the field. They are competitive, want to please the adults in their lives, and don't want to let themselves or anyone else down. The internal pressure creates extreme emotions that are very difficult for them to deal with. Instead of addressing the problems creating this or seeking professional help to deal with it, most of the time players are just told to suck it up and deal with it on their own. It is way past time for the environment to change and lessen some of these issues for young players. Texas Select League was created to change the environment and put players' needs first.
Recruiting
Starting with the 2025-2026 season the DI roster size will be dropping from 40 players to 34 players. We can absolutely guarantee this move will dramatically affect high school recruiting. It is a good thing that there are going to be no limits on scholarships, but the roster size change will cause some big ripples in recruiting. There are currently 301 NCAA DI baseball programs. That means over 1800 roster spots will be going away. This change along with the evolution of the transfer portal, NIL, and additional changes coming down the road are making this the hardest time in baseball history for high school recruiting. We are going to educate you on some of the hard facts of recruiting that we have discovered over the last year.There was very little high school recruiting until very late in the summer.College coaches did not attend regional high school select baseball tournaments.College coaches did attend a large amount of summer collegiate games.Bounce back D1 Players were being given a large amount of roster spots in JUCO.There are more college camps being offered now than ever before.The tone of camp emails has changed dramatically.
These facts were personally observed and confirmed by college coaches directly. The recruiting process has been changing slowly over the last decade, but this year it changed dramatically. Plain and simple, college coaches are no longer recruiting high school players at travel tournaments. The transfer portal and NIL have directly impacted how recruiting is being done. Colleges do not have the time or resources to recruit at tournaments. The third paid coach and changes to their program budgets have limited their resources. The summer was spent shopping the transfer portal, watching summer collegiate games, and negotiating NIL deals. There were several news stories this summer about this very thing. In an effort to protect their current players from being plucked by another school, coaches were encouraging their players not to play this summer. While trying to protect their own players, they were all out looking for players to pluck from other programs. It took all of their time to manage this process and get to the deadline with a solid roster. NIL is awesome and terrible at the same time. Players deserve it for sure. However, it has opened up a whole new set of problems for college baseball. It has created a "buy a player" market. What does all of this mean for high school recruiting? In our opinion it actually makes it much more clear for everyone to see. Since college coaches cannot attend high school tournaments, their camps become the primary way for them to recruit high school players. This is very apparent by the increase in the number of camps being offered this summer and fall. Also, you probably have noticed that the tone of their emails regarding camps has changed drastically. In the past, the emails would just state that the best way to guarantee to be seen by their school was to attend their camp. However, now they are flat out stating that they do not recruit at tournaments. They are stating the exact percentage of their roster that were discovered at their camps. They all still want and need high school recruits, but they do not have the time to go search for them. Coaches will listen to trusted word of mouth, but they still want to see the player at camp. There is one main reason that seeing a high school player perform at their camp makes such a difference for them. They can easily compare that kid to the players they already have and what they see in performance every day. The are looking for players that fit in by size, strength, and performance. What that means for the high school player is that they had better show up in shape, healthy, and display peak performance. This fact creates even more issues for athletes playing in travel tournaments. Tournament schedules don't stop for college camps. The player has to choose to show up to their games or attend the camp. Also, instead of spending consistent time in the weight room, eating right, and getting much needed rest, players are out on the road all summer wearing themselves out, weakening their health, eating fast food, and not getting any rest in hotel beds with crazy sleep schedules. If you want advice on how to get recruited out of high school, here it is. Have a solid and consistent plan to increase speed, strength, velocity, knowledge, playing ability, and make a camp strategy that fits your level. When you get to the camp, look like a college player and perform like a college player. Texas Select League has solutions to help promote that type of development and to provide the opportunities for high school players to get recruited.
Starting with the 2025-2026 season the DI roster size will be dropping from 40 players to 34 players. We can absolutely guarantee this move will dramatically affect high school recruiting. It is a good thing that there are going to be no limits on scholarships, but the roster size change will cause some big ripples in recruiting. There are currently 301 NCAA DI baseball programs. That means over 1800 roster spots will be going away. This change along with the evolution of the transfer portal, NIL, and additional changes coming down the road are making this the hardest time in baseball history for high school recruiting. We are going to educate you on some of the hard facts of recruiting that we have discovered over the last year.There was very little high school recruiting until very late in the summer.College coaches did not attend regional high school select baseball tournaments.College coaches did attend a large amount of summer collegiate games.Bounce back D1 Players were being given a large amount of roster spots in JUCO.There are more college camps being offered now than ever before.The tone of camp emails has changed dramatically.
These facts were personally observed and confirmed by college coaches directly. The recruiting process has been changing slowly over the last decade, but this year it changed dramatically. Plain and simple, college coaches are no longer recruiting high school players at travel tournaments. The transfer portal and NIL have directly impacted how recruiting is being done. Colleges do not have the time or resources to recruit at tournaments. The third paid coach and changes to their program budgets have limited their resources. The summer was spent shopping the transfer portal, watching summer collegiate games, and negotiating NIL deals. There were several news stories this summer about this very thing. In an effort to protect their current players from being plucked by another school, coaches were encouraging their players not to play this summer. While trying to protect their own players, they were all out looking for players to pluck from other programs. It took all of their time to manage this process and get to the deadline with a solid roster. NIL is awesome and terrible at the same time. Players deserve it for sure. However, it has opened up a whole new set of problems for college baseball. It has created a "buy a player" market. What does all of this mean for high school recruiting? In our opinion it actually makes it much more clear for everyone to see. Since college coaches cannot attend high school tournaments, their camps become the primary way for them to recruit high school players. This is very apparent by the increase in the number of camps being offered this summer and fall. Also, you probably have noticed that the tone of their emails regarding camps has changed drastically. In the past, the emails would just state that the best way to guarantee to be seen by their school was to attend their camp. However, now they are flat out stating that they do not recruit at tournaments. They are stating the exact percentage of their roster that were discovered at their camps. They all still want and need high school recruits, but they do not have the time to go search for them. Coaches will listen to trusted word of mouth, but they still want to see the player at camp. There is one main reason that seeing a high school player perform at their camp makes such a difference for them. They can easily compare that kid to the players they already have and what they see in performance every day. The are looking for players that fit in by size, strength, and performance. What that means for the high school player is that they had better show up in shape, healthy, and display peak performance. This fact creates even more issues for athletes playing in travel tournaments. Tournament schedules don't stop for college camps. The player has to choose to show up to their games or attend the camp. Also, instead of spending consistent time in the weight room, eating right, and getting much needed rest, players are out on the road all summer wearing themselves out, weakening their health, eating fast food, and not getting any rest in hotel beds with crazy sleep schedules. If you want advice on how to get recruited out of high school, here it is. Have a solid and consistent plan to increase speed, strength, velocity, knowledge, playing ability, and make a camp strategy that fits your level. When you get to the camp, look like a college player and perform like a college player. Texas Select League has solutions to help promote that type of development and to provide the opportunities for high school players to get recruited.