FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

With travel baseball programs popping up annually everywhere in the state, there are a lot of questions and many decisions families face when choosing a program for their player.  We understand this and want to help you make the best decision, whether it with the Knights or somewhere else.  These are some of the questions we are asked often about Knights Baseball.  We hope it helps!

There are certain things some families consider more important in making decisions than others.  Some of the factors include geographic location of practice and game facilities, number of games, level of competition, cost to participate, quality of coaching, etc.  There is a program to suit every desire. Make sure you identify the most important reasons you are playing and do your homework. For over 20 years, our New England Knights, Diamond Kings and Parisi School staffs are proud to have worked diligently to build our brands in the New England to be reliable, reputable, and respected. 

Since we started our New England Knights teams in 2007, the New England Knights program has the skill and character development of the player as our primary focus.  Although winning games provides some excitement and can be the primary focus of some programs, we judge our success as a program and coaches on how much better the player gets from the beginning of workouts to the final games of the Spring and Summer. 

We first and foremost take the time to teach, learn how each player responds to different types of coaching, and only get on a player when they don’t adhere our mutually defined standards of effort and attitude. If you’re looking for coaches who are yellers and screamers, the Knights won’t be for you. 

Our pro staff has well over 100 plus years of collegiate and professional playing and coaching experience. Our players receive a comprehensive baseball program developing them into confident, successful student-athletes.

Developing skills sets requires consistency, commitment, structure, and discipline. Player commitment to excellence--weekly over months--is required to join our team program. Our practices are driven by attention to detail, repetition, structure, and world class instruction.

To make the right decision for your family, you need to understand what you are looking to get out of the program.  With the commitment we ask, we will make your son better. 

Depending on the age group that you participate in, our teams are members of different leagues and tournaments, and some are not in a league at all.  Our younger teams are 10u through 12u and sometimes some of our older teams are members of East Shore Travel Baseball League and sometimes our older teams simply play a tournament circuit with individual games or double headers mixed in.  Most of our 10u-12u home games are played at Terryville Plymouth Little League on Worhunsky Field just minutes from our facility.  For our 90 ft diamonds, we use St Paul Catholic HS around their team’s schedule and fields through the municipalities of Bristol, Burlington, New Britain, and Plainville.

Being a developmental program, we consider our coaches the foundation of our success.  We identify non-parent coaches to lead our teams.  Most of our coaches are former pro or college players, high school or college coaches and are very knowledgeable not just of the game, but how to teach it.   We first and foremost take the time to TEACH, learn how each player responds to different types of coaching, and only get on a player when they don’t adhere our mutually defined standards of effort and attitude. If you’re looking for coaches who are yellers and screamers, the Knights won’t be the program for you.  All our coaches are paid, and on occasion we do have a coach with a child in the program.  We pay close attention to this and require that in addition to being a qualified coach, they make decisions in the best interest of the entire team and program. 

Player fees vary for most levels of the program, depending on tournaments, games, gear packages, number of workouts etc.  The price each family pays includes everything except for travel, lodging and meals.  Everything--Parisi workouts, player gear, tournaments, games, and all other fees -- are included in the tuition.  It is important when evaluating programs you look at the VALUE of what you get, and with our program it is tough to beat.

Getting as many players involved in our organization for teams at each level every year is the goal, but not always the case.  As a developmental program, we place emphasis on a progressive approach to teaching the game. and making sure we have the right coaches for our teams.  As a young player they need to learn certain important aspects of the game on the 50/70 and 60/90 diamonds, and that is the focus, to get them acquainted with the nuance of the game. Then as a 14u player we can begin to fine tune certain components as the adjustment to the big field should be complete.  At every level there is only so far you can take a player without over coaching, as they need to build a strong fundamental foundation before anything else.  So, having said that, we look to bring players along in our system.  We do avoid just putting teams together for the sake of having a team, and some years we are without a level simply because that is the way the numbers turn out.