Little League age changes - Again!

Heinie Wagner

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Nov 14, 2001
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Simsbury, CT
Little League Baseball® to Begin Utilization of August 31 Age Determination Date for the 2018 Season; Children Born Between May 1 and August 31, 2005 to be Grandfathered as 12-Year-Olds For 2018 Season
http://www.littleleague.org/media/llnewsarchive/2015/September-December/llb-age-determination-date.htm

I missed this when it came out in November - just noticed it when our LL sent out a registration notice for this spring. This is a big deal. There must have been TONS of complaints about the changes last season. This gives my November b-day 8 year old who was baseball 8 last year, another year at baseball 8 - an extra year in LL - which I'm only considering an extra year because last year's change took a year away from him. I think this is a good move by LL, the change last year wasn't very well thought out.
 

riboflav

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My 3-year old is a March kid so I hated the April 30 cutoff but loved the Dec. 31 demarcation. This change is ok, not as good for him but ok.
 

Doug Beerabelli

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My June 2005 son gets another year of LL eligibility. Not sure he will use it, but at least he's got the option. He's playing 11u travel on 50/70 fields for spring of 2016, so an adjustment to 46/60 would have to be made.

Per our LL president, lots of feedback on rule change, and this wasn't the first tweak of the initial big change. Maybe they will change it again.
 

Cumberland Blues

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We have 2 or 3 kids who played on our 9-10 all-star team who were bumped from LL8 to LL9 under last year's rule change who will be LL9 again this year with this change - they could potentially play for our 9-10 all-star team 3 times. This second change will line things up more with the school calendar so kids from the same grade will mostly pay together, I think that's good. And whatever change they make again next year....so long as they keep grandfathering in the May-Aug 2005 kids I don't really care (my kid is May 2).
 

Heinie Wagner

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Grandfathering kids in so that no one misses a year seems like a key to keeping people happy - the initial change, taking a year away from a lot of kids with no grandfathering, was a really bad idea
 

TheYaz67

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May 21, 2004
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My 8 year old born in August unfortunately gets screwed by this - he will be "baseball age 9" for the entire Spring and Summer seasons, while actually being an 8 year old the whole time.... he has actually lost a year of eligibility unfortunately it seems, in that he jumped in one year from baseball age 6 to baseball age 8 last year.
 

Heinie Wagner

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Nov 14, 2001
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Simsbury, CT
My 8 year old born in August unfortunately gets screwed by this - he will be "baseball age 9" for the entire Spring and Summer seasons, while actually being an 8 year old the whole time.... he has actually lost a year of eligibility unfortunately it seems, in that he jumped in one year from baseball age 6 to baseball age 8 last year.
I agree - really unfortunate for your guy. Any change is going to make some kids lose a year and the winners are whoever ends up being the oldest in their group - huge advantage at LL ages to be the oldest in your group. Very few people realize just how big the relative age advantage is. If I understand it correctly, your son loses a year and then will be the youngest in his age group going forward.

Better to go from 6 to 8, then 8 to 10 though or older. Small consolation for your son though.
 

Doug Beerabelli

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The initial change was late 2014 IIRC, and it affected the 2005s. That change kinda put everone 2006 and beyond on notice of the change. It was then tweaked to make it so 13 year olds couldn't play in the LLWS. The grandfathering is for the players in the system when the initial change was made.

Someone was going to be unhappy about things no matter what they did, which sucks. I was fine with the initial change, as my kid was unlikely to be playing LL, but I'm happy for the grandfathering. I could see him wanting to play both LL and travel for his 12 year old year, or maybe just LL. Prior to grandfathering he would have gone from 11 to 13.