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Journalist Bill Geist made that approach pretty famous in "Little League Confidential," his tale as a kids' baseball coach. I think his other main criteria was you have to pick a kid whose family has a great pool so you can have a really cool team party.
Mark, I like the hat-pick action for no-shows at tryouts. How does your league handle latecomers -- those who decide they want to play after the draft, eval day, etc.? My kids' league always has some, and I agree they should get a shot since it's house ball.
But it seems you get either very good players or very weak ones who do that, the former often miraculously knowing one of the coaches really well -- a gracious type who will usually offer to absorb the poor stud onto his roster. Or the mom/dad simply says Billy can't make practice a certain night so, voila, wouldn't you know he can make the top team's practice night ...
Also, does our league make coaches 'seed' their own kids so that at draft day those who have all-star sons aren't automatically two steps ahead (their 'assistants' have great sons, too, of course) of good-natured volunteers who might have weaker players for sons? House ball stinks if there's no attempt at parity. I say that as coach (whose been on both sides of the ledger), parent and official.
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