Your team's Captain Selection Process

1) We keep track of attendance in the offseason and in order to qualify you must make 90% attendance or higher.
2) All players above 90% and play varsity level are on the ballot for varsity. All players above 90% and play junior varsity are on the ballot for JV. All players above 90% and play sophomore are on the ballot for sophomore.
3) We have a leadership class where we talk about leaders and explain the traits of a captain. We then let each level vote for their captains.
4) Just like BLB, I have 1 more vote than the kids do. If we have a tie or we get a kid that we don't think should be one (haven't had a kid over 90% who would possibly win the popularity contest that I wouldn't want as a captain yet) then I can veto. We do a closed vot and announce the winners at practice.

They don't have the chance because we pick them. Made that mistake years ago and they elected a first-year senior with a bad attitude so we never let them vote again.

At the end of the school year I hand out a Captains Nomination Form with 10 criteria listed that our team captains MUST HAVE in order to be named Captain. I have our returning players write-in the names of three seniors as their "nominations" for team captains based upon that listed criteria. The players turn in their nomination forms to me and I count the "votes". The 6 seniors with the most nominations are informed by me that they have been "nominated" by their peers for captains positions. At that point I issue each one a Captain's Bible which they must review with their parents, and return the signatory back page within one week signed by both the player and parent(s), and keep the rest of the "Bible". At that point I meet with ALL of them to let them know that the coaches and I will observe their leadership over the summer, and during double-session practices. Prior to the first scrimmage the team will meet again, voting forms with the criteria will be distributed again with the names of the nominees. The players are asked to submit the names of three of the six nominees they believe met all (or most) of the criteria over the summer and double session practices. The coaching staff tallies the results, breaks any ties based upon our own observations, and the nominees who have "earned" the respect of their peers and coaches are named team captains. Have done it this way for 16 years and once we only had two captains, and once we had four. The cream always rises to the top.

We have the players vote on 5 captains at the end of two-a-days. We always talk about what a captain is and what you want in a leader. We give them the whole don't pick a rah rah guy or the popular guys. Our guys have been really good with it overall and usually there are clear cut favorites in the votes, we had a Jr elected last year and he truly was our best leader.

Just remember if you do vote the UN isn't there monitoring the elections...so you can always make sure the coaches candidates win

One thing to be careful of that we ran into last year was using off-season attendance and similar things to base our captains on. We had a simple captains policy and the players chose whether or not they were captains. If a kid made weight lifting attendance, participated in more than 1 sport, kept his grades up above a certain level and had 0 good conduct issues he was a captain. We had parents this year who thought that because there son was a senior he should be a captain and complained, took it all of the way to the state and we were penalized for it. Their issue was using off-season measures for in-season rewards. It wasn't a good deal for us and now we have to change a lot of what we do.

We know a lot of programs that do things similar to this (almost everyone) and the state reps even told us that was the case but still against the rules on our part. Your state may be different but be careful.

Players vote for either two or three (usually three). I pick the remaining captains (sometimes weekly). I also count the votes. Generally, players do a good job selecting if you make it plain what you want and if you have the right kind of kids in your program. However, once again, I count the votes.

We, as a staff pick the captains.

We did the democratic election process and got tired of the kids electing the King Of The Dipsh-ts every year. They turned it into a popularity contest so we were vetoing them anyway.

We as a staff only pick captains. Other sports allow kids to choose, and it has been a disaster.

We will make sure that the votes are the right choices though.

For the first time, we are picking the captains. We have three captains selected already that are beginning some leadership training. Their selection was based on their attitude during the previous year (which was rough) and their off-season attendance (relied heavily on this). We are playing around with the idea Captain's contract, in which there would be accountability to the selected captains that don't live up to the initial selection. After two a days start, we will have the team vote on the MVP of camp and use that person as our 4th captain if he is different. Should he be a previously selected captain, we will use only three.

We feel that captains are an extension of the coaches so we just choose

Top 4 vote getters (team votes) after the summer workouts and first two weeks of camp ... haven't had an issue yet where players voted for an undeserving captain.