AA Rankings for 12/19/21

[O-townClown]

I just wish we could get back to some sense of "playing for your community" again and not let these parents who have the means (or the right lawyer) to shop their kid like a free agent

What problem are you trying to solve? Kids playing HS hockey in Minnesota versus Midget hockey in another state? I can tell you are are COUNTLESS kids that leave Minnesota for hockey reasons that don't appear on the "Staying or Going" lists because they are good - but not great - players. I'm not seeing a problem right now that kids who can't make the HS team where they live go to another school because athletics are also important to them. Also don't see a problem that parents may have hit the breaking point with their children's school district and are ready for a change.

[headsupsticksdown]

Then they are eligible immediately

But a job transfer from Minnetonka to Edina does not fly.....Kids can drive themselves to their old schools....

I'm sure someone a lot smarter than me can think of the 1-2 "special cases"...Ie...A family moving from Thief River Falls to say Lakeville for a parents job....If nothing else we can eliminate those who have the means to sell their place on Lake Minnetonka and downgrade to a 6 bedroom colony home on Interlachen country club ..

Yea yea I know with everyone today working from home, someone will still figure out a way to beat this.. but at least it stops all this metro transfers we've been seeing the past few years..(now how we stop the Hermantown recruiting? )

I'm not here to pick any fights..I just wish we could get back to some sense of "playing for your community" again and not let these parents who have the means (or the right lawyer) to shop their kid like a free agent ....And by having this one year no post season rule, I think you see these numbers go drastically down.

The same reason why community hockey is great also makes it fragile in this world today. I'll give you an example, you have Johnny who's grown up in said community--born and raised. Plays association hockey from mini mites all the way through, with his buddies, etc. Heck, he even plays in the Spring/Summer with the local "AAA" team---not some team 45 minutes away, the team that is based out of his home rink because he loves his community and playing with his buddies. But guess what? At some point he realizes he's still on the mid/lower team. He then figures he'd check out some other teams tryout and guess what? He ends up getting selected for the better team, makes new friends and now has options he never really had his eye open for. In this situation, Johnny, his parents, etc., love his community and have always only wanted to play and represent his community. But if there's a point where he or his parents feel he has better options elsewhere, then so be it. Should they have pie thrown at them?

Is Johnny supposed to just suck it up gutting it out with his local association "hoping" for the best? Because guess what, you can come up through the association from mites to bantam and STILL get pushed out due to someone else. Do you think coaches and associations nowadays are going to take the local kid vs. someone else who gives them a better chance to win? Let me know if you find a coach willing the do the former, I'd gladly have my kid play for him. Oh wait...

So, if Johnny is so good that he can play on a better team, why would he have to worry about being pushed out on the lower level team?

There can be a variety of reasons—politics, perception, etc. The point is, if the kid or parent feels the need to move in the best interest of the player/family, then so be it. People only pee up a storm when someone does it and starts winning, but this happens everywhere to some degree. In my example above, maybe Johnny’s parents or him felt being on the A team in Hopkins was better than being on the B2 team in Tonka? Sounds silly, but these letter designations cause a whole boot load of issues for an ill perceived player/parent…