re: Youth Baseball Thread: the "What Are We Getting Ourselves Into" edition.

That's why my kid is going into professional gaming. He can practice from home. No travel. It's the future of competitive sports.

Your only real expense is the game system and the games themselves. I don't know why more parents don't look into this.

The sad part is that some parents spend $2500 per year in Lotto tickets. I guess that they hope they develop the next Bryce Harper or Alex Lange.

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If your kid isn't getting scouted by age 4, you might as well hang up the cleats

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Don't be silly, a kid could be a late bloomer. I've seen kids who sucked at age 4, but by the time they reached 7 they were throwing in the mid 30s and could take a ball 150 feet!

Now that's rare, but it happens.

When I was growing up

Fall = Football
Winter = Basketball
Spring = Baseball
Summer = Baseball if I made the All-Star team but it was just for about 6 weeks or so, not the entire summer

Basketball was easily my worst sport but I still enjoyed the hell out of it playing with my friends growing up.

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Aiden, Braden, Jayden. I'd imagine every travel ball team has them on board.

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I worked for a minor league team in college and one of the things they did was have little league teams come in and get to run out with the players during the lineup announcements.

Not only was there your oversampling of -Aydens, but there were random "-ie"s tacked onto names. I remember a particular team that had an Ethanie and Evanie.

My Social Media TL is filled each Summer Sunday with the "agony," of finishing out of the running or the idiotic senselessness of 8-year olds being given "rings," for winning a tournament that had 4 teams-two of which were the same team with too many kids from Erath who just formed a "B," Team full of the suck-arse kids-total that played two round robins and then a triple elimination four team seeded playoff.

fricking rings. For 8 year olds. Filled with coaches banging divorced MILF's whose son is going to be the next Alex Bregman when he isn't splitting the atom academically, helping old ladies across the street and singing in Church.

(Only on Wednesday Nights though. They have tournaments each weekend that can't be missed)

It is beyond ridiculous to teach these kids that doing this shite has any meaning beyond that of learning how to compete, lose or win in a team environment.

fricking rings...

It's absolutely a thing, and I hate it as well. My sons play travel baseball, as well as football and basketball.

I jumped into the BS because, unfortunately, recreational baseball is apparently a thing of the past after age 9. My oldest two kids are competitive, so we jumped into the fray. The oldest (11) got tired of baseball so he doesn't want to tryout. My 10 year old loves it and is a pretty good player , so we're in. However, I tell each coach that they will play all sports should they wish to play. If the coach has a problem, off we go.

I am vehemently opposed to having kids specialize in any sport, particularly before high school. It takes the fun out of the game, and leads to burnout. Youth sports are meant to be fun first, learn teamwork, enjoy success, and learn how to deal with failure.

I have no aspirations of any of my children going pro. I want them to have fun, grow, and become better people. Parents and coaches are sucking the fun out of sports. It's supposed to be a break for kids, not a damn job. If something comes of it in the future, awesome. If not, ok not a big deal.

For your 7 year old and your sake, travel baseball is unnecessary and, frankly, ridiculous.

Do kids play sandlot baseball anymore?

My son has been playing select baseball since age 8. He's 15 now. He loves the sport and doesn't want to play anything else. If your son has the talent then why not let him play?
My son has the talent to make it to D1 baseball somewhere. If that happens remains to be seen. He's 6'2 230 and was hitting 92 this past weekend in a tourney in Dallas. Crazy thing is, there were several kids throwing harder. When I played in HS, I don't think I ever saw that velocity from any kid. With kids throwing this hard this early, it's no wonder that so many are having UCL injuries before finishing HS.
But I do agree with the premise of this thread. Most kids don't have the talent to make it past HS. It's the parents living vicariously thru their children that's the problem. We've all seen it. But those kids are usually exposed early on and don't make their HS team.
I'm willing to bet that most on here have never been to any of these summer league tourneys. Almost all of these kids have talent and if managed correctky, will play college baseball somewhere. We faced a kid named Victor Mederos on the MVP Banditos who was hitting 96 regularly. He's only 15! Needless to say, we didn't touch him in the 2 innings he pitched.

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My son has been playing select baseball since age 8. He's 15 now. He loves the sport and doesn't want to play anything else. If your son has the talent then why not let him play?
My son has the talent to make it to D1 baseball somewhere. If that happens remains to be seen. He's 6'2 230 and was hitting 92 this past weekend in a tourney in Dallas. Crazy thing is, there were several kids throwing harder. When I played in HS, I don't think I ever saw that velocity from any kid. With kids throwing this hard this early, it's no wonder that so many are having UCL injuries before finishing HS.
But I do agree with the premise of this thread. Most kids don't have the talent to make it past HS. It's the parents living vicariously thru their children that's the problem. We've all seen it. But those kids are usually exposed early on and don't make their HS team.

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Sounds like your are one of those parents!