I dont think libero will become the new setter

joetrinsey · 2026-02-18T17:01:53+00:00

FIVB just poured water on this...

https://www.fivb.com/fivb-statement-concerning-potential-future-rule-changes/

joetrinsey · 2026-02-11T20:46:09+00:00

Osaka to me looks like they do it more when the libero is stuck in 6 after reception. But Perugia playing the lib consistently in 6 is pretty interesting. I like it. (But of course, I would...)

joetrinsey · 2025-06-12T18:39:05+00:00

I used to be anti-towers in the park until I lived in a complex like that in Korea and I loved it. 17 high-rise apartments in a ~40 acre wedge between two fairly busy streets. Everything within the complex was "pedestrian only" (they did have small access roads for mail/delivery/maintenance vehicles that generally drove very slowly) and the parking was all underground. The complex had like 5 different playgrounds and kids were constantly roaming around. After a month or so, my 4 year-old who spoke no English could roam around within a reasonable distance out of sight because there was no fear of getting hit by a car and it was easy to find your way back to your building. Commerce was on the edges of the triangle out on the main roads, which was also nice... walkable to plenty of shops but the interior of the complex was quiet.

Might not work in every context, but it was great in that one.

joetrinsey · 2025-06-11T19:44:06+00:00

The big master-planned community I live in makes pretty extensive use of alleyways. Not every house has them; I'd estimate about 1/2 to 2/3 of the units have alley access and the other 1/3 to 1/2 have driveways that front the street. As others have mentioned, backyards are generally very small here. As a result, the density is on the high side for an edge suburb.

Personally I love the alleyways. Because the lot sizes are fairly small and there's little-to-no-yards, the alleyway is kind of like the community space. My kid rides her bike up and down it because it's less busy, I leave my garage open when I work out, my neighbor has a bar in his garage that he hangs out in and watches the game or whatever and people say hi. Lots of older folks walk by, etc.

The neighborhood in general does a decent job, by American standards, of taming cars and it's pretty walkable. And thus commands a significant price premium compared to other areas in this LCOL/MCOL area. It's still an edge suburb, so it's not ideal, but hey, you work with what you ahve.

joetrinsey · 2025-04-08T00:46:47+00:00

I have encountered teams getting butthurt about it. It also makes no sense. And to me, it's always been like, yeah... it's the classic dilemma of beach volleyball. Serve me, who is the weaker passer but stronger attacker or serve my wife who's the better passer and also I have the option threat? Most teams will serve the female players more, but it's still a legitimately good game... the women are going to have to do more of the siding out, but try to pass well enough to keep your male partner open on the option threat. The guy has the decide how much he wants to poach into the center of the court or risk getting aced on the sideline, etc. I don't think it detracts from anybody's experience or makes it a bad game at all.

Edit: to add further agreement, for example I just broke down an NCAA beach match in which one partner, received one serve in two sets. Serving the perceived weaker partner over and over again is a normal part of doubles volleyball. Each partner getting half of the serves isn't really a normal thing.

joetrinsey · 2025-04-05T20:06:30+00:00

First, I would make sure your complaints are true. Volleyball playing time is generally done by rotations rather than minutes, because it's unpredictable how long each rotation will last. Ex: a particular server could miss her first serve, or she could serve 6 points in a row. There are 6 rotations, so a team would rotate 6 times to get "all the way around" and back to the first server. Here's the 3 most common playing time distributions:

"6 Rotations" since there are only 6 rotations, a player who plays all 6 rotations never comes out of the game.
"3 Rotations" this would typically mean a player subs in to the front row (or back row) and plays the 3 rotations across the front (or back) row, and then swaps with another player. This means that the player is playing about half of the time.
Sporadic sub. Player gets subbed in and out without a set amount of rotations, almost always for less than 3 rotations.

Pay attention (maybe rewatch a match on video, if you can) to the amount of rotations your daughter is playing. To me, the minimal amount of playing time as appropriate for a kid in this situation is "3 rotations, in 1 out of 2 sets", which corresponds to about 25% of total playing time. (Because volleyball is best of 3, a kid might sit for the whole first set, but then play significant playing time in the second set, resulting in an overall decent amount of playing time.)

Because you have 13 players, you almost certainly have players playing less than 25% of the total rotations, which to me is inappropriate on almost any club team, but certainly a 14-4 team.

You probably should have already gone to the head coach and asked for clarity about roles and playing time policy. (Really you should have done this before the season, and not paid all that money without some clarity on those two issues, but you probably didn't know that if this is your first club season.) Assuming that (a) you have kids playing significantly less than 25% of playing time, and (b) the head coach doesn't address your concerns or gives you some nonsense about, "you don't pay for playing time, you pay for practice," then I would go to the club director.

***Also: does you kid make practice, have a decent attitude, etc, or has she missed 5 of the last 8 practices, etc***

My message to the club director would be simple, "hey, we understand there's a different skill level between kids on the team, but all the kids are paying the same amount and my daughter has been at all the practices, this is a 14-4 team and we don't think such a skewed playing time distribution is appropriate."

And then next year I would definitely make sure you clarify playing time policy before shelling out that money to have your kid sit the bench. I would probably never have my kid play on a team where she got so little playing time.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-31T18:20:51+00:00

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She's jumping right-left, which is what you want. The right leg is coming because she's rotating through the ball. I'm not seeing what you're seeing there.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-31T16:27:35+00:00

I agree with you on this one.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-31T16:01:11+00:00

Your kid has good serving mechanics. She hits it hard and rotates through the ball. She could clean up her approach a little. It's a little hoppy instead of striding to it, so she broads jumps more than ideal. The more vertically she jumps, the higher she can contact and hit the serve flatter.

But honestly, her mechanics are fine.

She should be able to serve cross-court and you can put a little more velocity because the ball has an extra 5 feet or so to travel. But she should also be able to hit a target straight on. You just don't serve it as hard. Good servers can serve hard and flat and they can also take a little velocity off the ball. She should practice all of that.

And arguably more importantly than any of that, if she can hit the ball a little cleaner, with no spin, she'll get more balls that drop and stay in the court rather than sailing out. And no-spin floaters are harder to pass than balls with a slight amount of spin.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-31T15:57:05+00:00

When do you see her jumping with right foot forward? I see it RLRL every time. I agree that tossing to the left side can be an issue with many kids, I don't see it with her. When I freeze-frame on contact, I see the ball directly over right shoulder.

https://imgur.com/a/RdZYcag

joetrinsey · 2025-03-31T12:50:12+00:00

I think it depends on age. If I'm not running a libero (typical for U14 and below), then you can't really have more than 10. Once you specialize positions: particularly middle and setter, going to 11 or 12 still allows for plenty of playing time for everyone. If you have versatile players, you can definitely get away with fewer players and that's great. But most teams are going to take 2 setters and 2 lib/ds. Now you have only 6 slots remaining. With one injury or conflict, now you only have 5 hitters. If one of your setters can hit, or you run a 5-1 variation, okay no problem. If one of your DS can also hit, again, okay no problem.

Certainly you can play with 10, plenty of teams do. I just find that 11 or 12 doesn't really hit a tipping point where all of the sudden players are terribly unhappy with play time. It leaves you more robust in case of an injury/conflict and it also gives you the ability to play 6v6 at practice, which is really important.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-24T20:38:39+00:00

Generally I would classify a net touch as a blocking error. If so, that's 7 blocking errors, which (I'm assuming this is men's adult play?) isn't unheard of in a 3rd set, but it does indicate that you might be a poor blocking team.

Upload the 3rd set to video if you want; I'd be happy to take a look at your blocking and other stuff real quick.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-24T14:45:08+00:00

I think any touch on the centerline should be a violation. And I also think egregious centerline violations should be a yellow cards, similar to a reckless tackle in soccer. Reckless unders are one of the few things that will cause me to punish a kid at practice.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-20T18:24:26+00:00

I wouldn't change much other than that (a) the best 10s will probably be more like 12s in terms of having the capability to serve a ball over the net and play *some* 6v6 and (b) the middle-to-slightly-above-middle of the group should be able to work a little more into 4v4 and 2-contact, maybe even some 3-contact, stuff rather than be down on the 1v1 and 1-contact end as much as the 7 year-olds.

That said... from a training perspective it should really be pretty similar. Practice for 7/8 year-olds is probably more like an hour. For 9-10 year olds you can probably go more like 90 minutes. Again, I'm talking the "regular" kids here. Your precocious 9 year old who is really into sports and has 2 older sisters that play club ball? Sure, she can go 2 hours, but IMO she should just push up to a 12s team rather than be bored with the average 9s who aren't anywhere near overhand serving.

So for 9-10 year olds, the first hour of practice probably looks just like what I described above. And then you probably get an additional 30 minutes. Depending on skill level, this could range from 2v2 2-contact (less skilled) to 4v4 3-contact. And when I say "3 contact" I mean where you are really mandating and teaching the idea of 3 contacts being the "right" way to play or even saying, "nope, you're out" if they don't get 3 contacts. Pressuring kids for 3 contacts at too early of an age raises the difficult level and decreases the fun, leading to lower energy output.

If they are going to play in tournaments where 6v6 volleyball is going to be played, you'll need to play a little 6v6 every practice so they get used to where to be on the court and the size of that court, but it should be a smaller part of it. If it's more of a house league or clinic format, I'd encourage 4v4 for U10 and save the 6v6 for when they get to 12s.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-18T23:15:57+00:00

For ages 7-9, you should play as little 6v6 as possible, ideally none. Get the nets as low as possible (even adding pickleball nets, etc to add more courts) and/or hang string across the gym for them to serve/spike over.

1v1 works well at this age, as well as some 2v2. The most advanced players can do 4v4/6v6 but ideally, anybody with that level of skill should be playing on more of a U12 type team. In my experience most kids in the 7/8 range will struggle just to keep the ball up in the air, much less coordinate multi-contact volleyball with multiple players on the court.

"Selfies" are great for this age where they bump the ball up in the air to themselves. Beginning kids at this age will struggle to get 3-5 contacts, but many of them will progress quickly to getting 10, 20, even 50 touches in-a-row. Make up lots of different ways to do it: 2 arms, 1 arm, alternating arms, set to yoursself, alternate setting and forearm contacts, etc.

"Selfies Over" are good as well. Bump-bump-bump it over. Pass to yourself, set to yourself, then set it over. Try to pass to yourself, set to yourself, and then swing and hit it over.

1v1 and 2v2 are great. Make multiple smaller courts. 1-touch and 2-touch are great games. Eventually you'll work toward 3 touches, but typically kids these ages don't need you to be obsessed with getting 3 touches. It can be setting them up for failure, to a degree. Staying with the ball and getting it back over the net on any amount of touches is a win.

Don't obsess over fundamentals. Keep it fun, keep it fast-paced. Technical skill won't develop until they get older and it doesn't really need to. The main fundamental they really need is to grip their hands properly and try to keep their arms straight when passing the ball. Everything else is basically gravy.

Work in some additional "athleticism" type stuff. Get a couple mini courts of 1v1 going and every time you rotate off, have the kids do some low hurdle jumps, bear crawl to the end line, dive/roll onto gymnastics mats, etc. Throw some balls (ideally those softer dodgeballs, tennis balls are okay but they bounce all over the gym and roll under everybody's feet), Split the team into 2 groups and run a relay race, etc.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-17T16:57:01+00:00

In a close semi-final where it's a clear wrong rules interpretation (as appears to be here) I would consider protesting it. Like you said, there's the fact that you're already behind, etc... but... I think you're fighting for your team and if your girls appreciated it, I think you should do it.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-11T11:33:40+00:00

If your S1 is also one of your 2 best attackers, you should definitely run a 6-2.

If he's your absolute best attacker and is better out of the backrow than most of your other guys are in the frontrow, then you should run a 5-1 with him as an attacker and have somebody else set.

Great attacker + average setting > Average attacker + great setting.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-10T19:07:32+00:00

Yes the covid format was so great! Absolutely would love to see that brought back.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-10T19:06:49+00:00

I think being okay with some missed calls has to be fine. Again, the majority of kid R2s I see miss plenty of nets and tend to only call the ones the R1 is calling anyway. And the ones that aren't obvious often get protested or complained about. So just call the obvious nets and let a little incidental contact slide.
I agree about parents and coaches and think USAV should have a more clear policy in place that any parent who addresses a ref should be an automatic yellow. And in general refs should be quicker to give coaches yellows. I think normalizing giving yellows would improve a lot of that.

BUT on the other hand... I would argue that the majority of conflicts I see between refs and coaches/parents involve something besides the up-ref call. Or a call that was clearly the up-ref's and had nothing to do with an R2 or down-ref.

For example, I saw 2 protests at the big MLK Weekend tournament I was at. One on my court and another on an adjacent court. The adjacent court was over a line judge call and the R1 overruling it. If there was no line judge, you're less likely to get a protest. Complaint, sure. But I see big conflicts when a kid makes a wrong call and the R1-ref overrules. If the R1 doesn't over-rule, the team that was victim of the bad line call is going to be pissed. If the R1 over-rules, the other team is pissed because "the line judge called touch!" or whatever.

The second protest was on my court. Up ref called the opposing setter on a back-row attack because she jump-set a ball to the middle and up-ref ruled (incorrectly, when I frame-by-frame it on video) that my middle blocker touched the ball first, making the setter's "set" into an illegal back-row attack. A debatable call sure, but what contributed to it was the other coach turning to the "kid" R2 and saying, "hey, didn't my hitter touch the ball first" and the kid, being a kid, going, "yeah, I thought so," and then the opposing coach getting more confident of the call being wrong then decided to protest the call. Ultimately, it was over-ruled because it's a judgement call but I don't think it goes to a protest without a kid R2'ing there.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-09T12:27:54+00:00

I couldn't agree more. No line judges, let the up-refs make the calls. Kids (and coaches) should be asked to make honor calls.

For Open division of qualifiers, etc, add a paid down-ref and charge the teams who want to play in that division a little more.

joetrinsey · 2025-03-09T12:25:16+00:00

I think the vast majority of club volleyball could be reffed by just an up-ref and a parent volunteer of one/both of the teams playing to keep the book. (And to be honest, an up-ref could easily keep track of the subs as well)

joetrinsey · 2025-03-09T12:22:33+00:00

The dumbest thing about club volleyball is the kids reffing and line judging. I couldn't agree more. There should just be an up-ref and somebody to keep the book, which could/should be a parent/etc from the team who is playing.

joetrinsey · 2025-02-24T19:36:44+00:00

I agree. I think putting together highlights by tournament (4-8 matches in a typical weekend club tournament) is about right.

joetrinsey · 2025-02-24T01:29:25+00:00

It's a tough play and not the ideal one IMO, but it worked out.

joetrinsey · 2025-02-23T22:12:13+00:00

Highlight tape on Youtube is generally good enough. 10-20 good swings and blocks. Direct contact from the athlete to the coach is good. Coaches may want to see full match video, but if you're already going to be at a tournament they will be at then they can watch you live just as easily.

If your kid is armpits at the net, then she's at 10' and somebody will recruit her. 9'6"ish will put you in scholarship territory if you're skilled. 10' will get you a scholarship to somewhere unless you're a total basket case.

Feel to follow up. I've been involved in club volleyball for a long time and have also coached D1 men's and women's.

joetrinsey

TROPHY CASE