Good Evening Everyone,

I wanted to make this announcement tonight at AFT, but unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate with us.  So, I will take this opportunity to share some very exciting news with you all.  

Being in this game for over 20 years, I have been approached by several parties who have offered to join forces in an attempt to enrich our softball experience.  A couple of weeks ago, Tera and I were approached about Monarchs joining the fastest growing and one of the most popular national softball brands in the country - Lady Dukes, based out of North Carolina. 

The Lady Dukes, in just 4 years, have burst onto the scene as a nationally recognized organization with highly ranked national teams, have grown to 160+ teams, and have many recruits and alumni in major power 5 programs.  The majority of their teams are on the east coast and southern region of the country.  We were offered to head up the California Region with the hopes of growing the Lady Dukes name in a similar manner in our softball hot bed.

Joining forces with the Lady Dukes organization puts our group in a stronger position because of the following:

  1. Being a part of a more national brand will increase the popularity, recognition, and marketing of our teams and players.  Our players will be recognized on the Lady Dukes national platform, and our group of teams will be recognized as the West Coast Region of Lady Dukes teams.

  2. Our players and teams are automatically part of the #4 ranked club softball organization in the country.  That brings recognition from college coaches, national tournament directors, and national softball publications such as usclubrankings.com and extrainningsoftball.com, just to name a couple.

  3. After joining the Lady Dukes organization, there will be a marketing campaign announcing our involvement to the softball community as to create interest in our faction of the Lady Dukes organization, with the goal to create interest amongst top players, coaches and teams in the area, as well as to increase popularity from college coaches.

  4. Our players will benefit from this by having a more comprehensive recruiting environment including online marketing and the availability of extra combines, camps, and clinics.  While some of our teams and players in the 10U and 12U division may not benefit from this today, but they will benefit in the coming years especially as we grow and become more established.

  5. Our younger teams and players will benefit from the opportunities of online recognition on the national softball platforms, including team and player rankings and features.

  6. All age divisions within our California Region of West Coast Lady Dukes - Blanco will benefit by receiving two berths to PGF every year.  This will help us attract and recruit competitive players to our teams since two of our teams in each division will not have to qualify or lobby for a berth to PGF Nationals.

  7. Beginning in the fall, at the beginning of next season, this merger should allow us to reduce our monthly dues for our families which is another good recruiting tool.  In addition, we should have the ability to have a nearly fully sponsored 18U team and a nearly fully sponsored 16U team.  Obviously, this will help the parents on those teams as well as help us attract other top talent in those age groups.  As we continue to grow, we should be able to reduce fees and add sponsored teams to our group.

All of that being said, this is not a difficult decision as this merger benefits our players, parents, teams and coaches.

The only sticking point in all of this is the uniforms.  Obviously, our families have already paid for their uniforms for the year with Monarchs.  In the several discussions that I have had with the director of Lady Dukes, James Lamar, we have come up with a plan that will not require parents to pay for any uniforms out of pocket.  

Instead of running our Hit A Thon Fundraiser, we will scrap that and join the Lady Dukes March Madness and raffle fundraiser.  This will allow us to purchase the uniform items we will need from now through the summer.  We will still be able to keep our helmets, bags, light gray pants, black pants, and black socks.  The funds for the rest of the items we will need will be raised through the Lady Dukes Fundraisers, including a full white uniform being donated by James Lamar and Lady Dukes.  More info to come this weekend regarding these fundraisers.

Spirit Wear - we are in discussion with Lady Dukes Management on a way that we can sell some initial items such as tshirts, sweatshirts and hats at cost or at a more significant reduction.

James Lamar will be flying in tomorrow so I can introduce him to our group and he can have the chance to meet and address our players, parents and coaches before he flies out to Texas on Saturday morning for a softball clinic.  

We will have this “meet and greet” tomorrow evening from 7pm to 8:30pm at:

Downtown Anaheim Community Center

250 East Center Street

Anaheim CA  92805

When you arrive, let the front desk know you are there for the softball meeting.

Parents and players are welcome and highly encouraged to attend.  Note: due to the short notice, we will only have 2 chairs per family available at this event.  

In addition, This Sunday, I am planning on making myself available at a local pizza place, if anyone wants to come out, watch some softball on tv, and discuss the merger.  I will have more details out for this by Saturday morning.

All questions will be answered by this weekend.  

Tera, the coaches, and I are very excited about joining forces with the Lady Dukes organization.  Our players and teams just became stronger!

Coach Jeff