re: Tournament Baseball is a scam

My son played travel ball from 10-13. He played on a team from Central Louisiana that was very competitive. Had a great time, the team got along great and the kids had a wonderful experience. Played great baseball, won many tournaments, and were competitive with the best teams in USSSA, got to compete in two World Series, one in Houston and one in Los Angeles.

There are down sides, the cost, every weekend playing somewhere, and the kids taking it too seriously, but overall it was a great experience for my son. My wife and I loved it, and the baseball he was exposed to was far superior to what he would have encountered in "league" ball.

To each his own, travel ball has its negatives, and there are certainly scrupulous coaches and parents who are scavenging other teams for top players and actually "recruiting" some kids off of other teams. Deplorable, but it was also good life lesson for the kids, even though they were a little young to try to figure out why their good friend, who also happened to be the best player on the team was going to go play for another team, one of our competitors in Lafayette. There is no telling what was promised to that kids mom(she was a single parent) to get that kid to play in Lafayette. It never bothered me, but was confusing to the kids.

Overall, travel ball has its ups and downs, more good than bad, imv. The biggest loser in the development of travel ball is the loss of the best players and parents to travel ball from "league" ball. The level of "league" ball has gone down significantly in the last 10 years.