1 - General

It looks like my team is not going to get 9 player but we still want to play…possible?

Absolutely!

Remember, it’s the most fun if we can make a ‘school pure’ team but sometimes that is hard, especially the first year…. but we will build combo teams as well (they will still wear school gear). These teams have been called ‘skittles’ teams by players. We wont add them to a ‘school pure’ team if they are complete but we typically can find a spot for them. You can see the MSM skittles teams all over our photo gallery. If we can not find a spot we will absolutely refund you!

The combo teams are usually very strong teams and we have actually had a two different teams take their combo teams and turn them into a select team after the brotherhood they built during MSM

Here is a link to how teams are formed

We are already on a team/club. We can’t be on another team!

Yup we understand. This is just for ONE WEEKEND and most ‘teams’ only practice one time (if at all) to prep for this tournament. It’s not supposed to be more work…it’s supposed to be FUN! 100% of the players that form middle school teams are currently on teams of all levels. You will just be playing for one weekend of fun.

I don’t see anyone from my school signed up yet?

No problem! Every school starts somewhere….and all it takes is just the first one, then it quickly snow balls into a team. Sign your kiddo up then start recruiting! The absolute best way to get a team together is to go to Facebook , grab one of our posts (this is a good one) and start tagging families with players. We have seen teams formed in as little as an hour that way!

I have never played on a team before. Is MSM right for me?

No. We want MSM to be your BEST baseball experience but not your FIRST.

With the unique format of the tournament there is little to no coaching prior to the games and mix this with different levels of talent on the field it can become a safety issue as well. There have been cases of a super athlete coming over to fill a team that has not played in a while but we want to keep it to players that are currently or very recently playing.

Are uniforms supplied?

We create a custom shirt for each player for each player. So even if you are a ‘combined’ team, you will still be wearing a jersey for your school. Coaches will decide what pants you wear.

Uniform numbers – Right now we are not doing custom numbers. It’s a big task just to get the shirts ordered with so many different schools.

Caps– we want the kiddos to wear the caps from their current team they are regularly playing with. This gives it a cool all-star game feel…and looks really really cool as you look across the diamond. There are teams that get together to purchase team caps…that’s fine too and up to you guys.

How are teams formed?

Timestamp is everything!

Most of the hard stuff comes when you have two teams in one grade. That is still just a small portion of the teams but it does need to be addressed.

The following is a very high-level view of how teams will be formed. A detailed documentary will be coming out soon 😄

MSM Terms
School Pure – A Team with 9 or more from same school
Two-Team – A school/grade with enough for two teams
Combo Team – When you have 3 or more we combo you up with a school.
Free Agent – a player form a school that could not form a team. Has a chance to still backfill a team like a pick up game.

9 Players – 13 Players – we build a team just like normal. School Pure

13+ Players – we start building team two. The first 13 by timestamp are given spots. We try like crazy to build two teams with the remainder.
18+– Two teams, divided by timestamp. There is no longer a talent consideration. People were gaming the system. The timestamp is true and irrefutable what someone puts on the registration form isn’t.***
If we can’t get two teams, the ones on the bubble will be dropped or offered to play on a combo team if available.

Two Teams Last Year – if the same players register we do our best to keep them together.

Two Teams Last Year – But not enough for two this year – It’s timestamp like the normal 13+ players scenario above. This one can hurt… a lot.

4-7 Players – Combo Team (you still wear team colors)

1-3 Players – Can be a free agent, or may be able to play you in a creative way (playing up) but most likely a refund.

-Team MSM reserves the right to build teams how we see fit and will sometimes make exceptions to the guidelines above.

-Team MSM builds teams before coaches are even contacted. There is no coach input – promise. It’s just a couple of guys in a war room building 200+ teams.

-We can’t do friend requests. You can try to register side by side though and get similar timestamps.

-If two team school – sometimes coaches can swap players with TD approval (of course parent approval).

** if you want to attempt to line up a more talented team you can attempt this by registering at the roughly the same time. We call this the ‘Prosper Special’ from 2014. 🙂 It can backfire though.

What is the difference between the VIP List and Registration

Great question.

VIP List – Because of our unique format, we really need a heads up on who’s is intending on coming to help us get a good vision of how teams are going to shape up, so that we can order jerseys, umps, fields, etc. So we initially just ask you to show interest by signing up without paying. Once you sign up you will show up on the ‘who’s coming list’ when it’s updated next. We send out invitations early to everyone on the WCL. This is important to you because many teams sell out in an hour…so you are going to want this early access if you are serious about playing.

Registration – This is when we officially launch and open registration where we take payment and are asking to fully commit to playing with your team. At that point you will get highlighted some way on the who’s coming list and teams will officially start getting formed.

The tournament has different phases or steps.

1. VIP List
2. Registration/Payment Opens then Closes
3. Team Building by Tournament Director
4. Coaches selected and notified. (who will then tell the players)
5. Gear Distrobution
6. Tournament

What is the refund policy?

Bad Weather – Our tournament director is excellent and we will do our best to make games up during the week or find another weekend to play. With our unique format we do things a bit different than other normal tournaments. Other tournaments do not have to order shirts or mess with custom awards so early. Because of this, if by chance we can’t get this tournament to play there are no bad weather refunds. Again, we will do EVERYTHING we can to get this tournament completed.

Player Dropping – Once teams are made and uniforms are ordered there will be no refunds. Because of our unique format, when a player drops it can really create a domino affect on a whole division. Especially when dealing with mixed teams. We may work with you on a case by case basis to see if we can grab someone off a waitlist etc, but our general policy is no refund.

https://middleschoolmatchup.com/