Cincinnati Hornets

The Cincinnati Hornets Select Baseball Organization is an organization committed to the development of youth baseball players from the White Oak community. It is understood that we will supplement our roster with players from outside of the White Oak boundaries but the core of the team will begin with the White Oak community player pool.

We will develop the players by teaching the proper fundamentals of the game. We will teach sound hitting technique from our previous experiences in the game. Each coach will also be receptive to attending coaches clinics put on in the area. Keeping in mind the theme of development, each team will roster bat as long as it allowed by league rules. As we look to develop each player in the organization defensively, we will keep in mind that each player will need to learn to play multiple positions. We will give each player an opportunity during practices as well as games to get experience at multiple positions.

We will not overthrow any pitcher in the organization. The SWOL promotes safety for  pitchers by limiting pitch counts at each age group. We will adhere to those guidelines at all times and will also track pitches at tournaments not regulated by the pitch count restrictions.

Our success will not be determined by our win-loss record. Therefore, we encourage each team to seek out a competitive regular season and tournament schedule to adequately challenge each team. We will continually push each team to play at the highest competitive level achieved. Development is the main driver of success but we also see the need to promote a winning atmosphere. Winning is the secondary goal of the Cincinnati Hornets Select Baseball Organization.

Specific goals for this 14U team:

1) Skill Development – work hard to develop baseball skills of every player with the upcoming goal that each player makes their high school baseball team.  Ideally, aspiration is to keep these same 12 players together for many years progressing together!

2) Fun Baseball Environment – plan to play in the SWOL American Gold Division as a fifth-year team where we want to build a successful team by winning league games, but we will schedule games against teams at lower levels as well.  We want our sons to have fun playing baseball and not evaluate our season only by wins and losses.

3) Building Team Camaraderie – build personal friendships amongst our players with both complimenting good plays and picking each other up after mistakes happen.  Respect for each individual is important to build strong team unity, which applies for the parents as well.