We could go very in depth and talk about the next two pieces of information that I am about to present to you all day. However, I merely wanted to show these statistics to the parents of our young readers, for the next time their children say their more interested in baseball than school.
The probability of playing college baseball, for a high school senior, is extremely slim. And, even if your high school senior has the ability to play college baseball, and wants to go to school where he has a scholarship and a chance to play, as opposed to a school that he can go to with a better academic reputation but not play baseball, show him these statistics and this graph. The statistics and graphs were found on HSBaseballweb.com:
While the odds to play college and professional baseball are extremely slim, many players may still be motivated to dismiss this information and say “I’m going to be that small percent to play pro/college ball.” However, lets look at another factor that many people are unaware of when it comes to professional or competitive baseball: birthdate. I recently heard about this phenomenon in Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers: the seceret to success.
The reason for the slanted amount of professional baseball players born in August are because of the July 31st age-cutoff imposed by youth baseball organizations. As a result, the oldest players are the ones that happen to be born in August. A player born on August 1st has twelve full months of development more than a player born on July 31st, in the same league. As a result, the player born on August 1st will, on average, be bigger, stronger, and more coordinated than the player born on July 31st. The player that is born on August 1st will look better against his peers and make traveling all star teams where he will play against better talent, play in more games over the coarse of the summer, get more practice, and get better coaching. Tell your kids that if they are born in July, and not on August 7th like Mike Trout, that it might be a good idea to put school first.
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