13 pure or bantam A/AA

[Guest]

My son moves up this season and all I hear about is 13 pure. Rumor mill is swirling about who is and who isn’t putting together a team as  was well as which players are moving organizations. Is 13 pure really all it’s cracked up to be, or is it a way for parents to not cringe when little Johnny gets rocked for the first time? If you had to choose between trying out for a 13 pure or making a bantam AA or even an A team what would you choose and why?
For reference, I’m at an AHF rink and 13 pure is full check. I was told NJYHL is non contact at 13 pure.

[Guest]

My son played 13 pure and little johnny is still getting rocked whether mom and dad like it. You will still play 14u teams and there are 13 year olds as big as full grown adults who are around 175lbs and over 5-8 tall. Get your kid checking lessons, teach him how to skate with his head up and how to anticipate plays. 13 is the make or break year when your Conor McDavid superstars decide if they play again at 14. Its where head down danglers who scored 80 goals a season at 12u and 10u find out if they like hockey anymore and it's only non check if you can find a non check league they have them for all the way up to 18u.

[Guest]

Look at the myhockeyratings.com.    13 AA "pure" is the same as Bantam A "hybrid" ability level.  It's stupid.  Instead of all those kids being in one division, a dozen or so teams decide to be in their own 13 AA "pure" division.  So you have two divisions of kids at the same playing level, resulting in fewer teams in each division, less teams to compete, and more travel for both.   All because parents want to say their kid is on a "AA" team.  It's not "AA"... it's just "A" ability level pretending to be "AA".

[Guest]

I played two years of peewee AA and then for my first year of bantam many of the other kids my age played for the "13 pure" team but I opted to "play up" for the bantam AA team of all kids a year older. Took a little bit of time to get used to the hitting, but ended up being a big part of the team and we made it all the way to nationals. The next year I ended up making the jump to tier 1 and now it's my second year of that. I'm a top two forward and get first line PP and PK time. I am super happy where I am right now and if your son has the opportunity to take a similar path than I would highly recommend it(as long as you guys are willing to make the stupidly large financial and time commitment). Good luck with whatever route he ends up taking!

[Guest]

would not be a bad idea at bantam level to just have a major and minor team , or start checking at second year pewee but calling it pure in my opinion does not make it AA but with all the focus on the letters development is taking a backseat across the board from what I have seen over the past 15yrs

[Guest]

if AA is really A, then what is A these days? maybe its not letter chasing, but having your kid play at the appropriate level (which is highly influenced by so many AAA teams in NJ). There probably should only be 2-3, and we have what, 8-10?

[Guest]

Yeah pretty much every pure team I see advertised as looking for players for next season is “AA.”  It’s just a way for the parents to say their kid plays AA or to charge them AA prices.  Most would get crushed by typical AA teams.

[Guest]

disagree. not much of a difference in price between AA and A at most places. also, the best 2009's and 2010's are playing AAA (along with a lot of kids who dont belong there). then if 2010's are going to pure teams (along with a few kids who again dont belong there), what exactly is left at the A level for 14u, in PA/NJ?