totally, no question in my eyes
Every kid who plays baseball should ump younger ages, it's got so many positives
that said, the parents are the real issue. My son's fall team was ranked high in the state in and in PG nationally and natually does the gambit of out of state tournaments. If I told you how many kids are reclassed and playing the birthdate game you'd be blown away. We were at a tournament and my son (new 14s but he's playing 15s going forward) comes up to the plate. Kid on the mound is reclassed and about to turn 16 (their team had 5 such players and from discussion didn't have a single kid at 14) and he's throwing an avg of 84 topping out on the gun at 87. Kids are struggling which is to be expected as they usually only see 77-81. Kids dad is behind the gun with me as I'm watching the at bat and he proceeds to start talking about how no one is hitting his kid or making any decent contact. He then tells me his age, stats, what college he wants to play for etc etc. My son fouls off some pitches, get's 8 throws out of the kid before hitting a solid line drive right to the center fielder. Guy doesn't know it's my son and then says, 'see, this game will be over by 5th to which I respond, 'that's one way to look at it or you can see that kid, who just turned 14, drive your son who is almost 2yrs older to center after eating him for 8 pitches. Either your son needs to learn how to pitch and not just throw or my kid is just that good earlier than I anticipated'
he looked at me and tried to backtrack and I walked away
that is a common occurrence at many of the higher level and invite only tournaments.
parents are delusional, have lofty expectations and truly believe all of their kids are the next Derek Jeter
my favorite is the kid at 5 star who bunts against us to move a runner with no outs and parents go nuts with 'he's a ferarri and you have him playing like a chevette' yup, heard that too