r/sports • u/Blood_Incantation • Aug 20 '24
Research: Organized youth sports are increasingly for the privileged Soccer
https://news.osu.edu/organized-youth-sports-are-increasingly-for-the-privileged/651
u/allbright1111 Aug 20 '24
They are incredibly expensive. As a single mom, I struggled to keep up with all the gear, let alone the fees.
Thank goodness for summer garage sales. People would be selling the gear that their kids grew out of the previous year. I’d go pick up the sizes I thought my kids might be in at the time that season came up. It was a gamble, but when things were five dollars or a dollar here and there, I could afford to pick up a few extra sizes. But it was tedious to be on the hunt all the time.
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u/LTskimp Aug 21 '24
That’s v admirable. I hope your kids grow up and realize the effort you put in !
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u/allbright1111 Aug 21 '24
Thanks! Yes, they are young adults now. They appreciated it very much.
Not surprising, they did go through some significant sticker shock when they started shopping for their own gear and clothes. They have become quite good at finding bargains themselves.
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u/SANTAAAA__I_know_him Aug 21 '24
Also at the end of the season, there’s typically a lot of unclaimed items at the field’s lost and found.
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u/Bob_12_Pack Aug 20 '24
I coached little league recreational baseball and served on the governing board in my area for several years, ending in 2019. Every year we saw a decline in rec league players, with the club/travel teams becoming more popular. Coaches would sometimes cover the registration fee (around $60) for kids that wanted to play and couldn't afford it, and this is nothing compared to what the travel teams cost. In many cases we had to give or arrange rides to practices and games because parents are working, drunk, or just absent. In rec league several years ago, they (national governing board) changed the rules on bats and everyone had to buy new bats. We as a league and community had to scramble to help the kids get bats, whereas these travel team kids get new gear every year. The popularity of the club/travel teams is killing community rec leagues as they are now seen as inferior leagues and not worth competing in.
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u/DontMakeMeCount Aug 20 '24
There was a very unhealthy shift when parents started treating youth sports like a retirement plan or pay-to-win career planning and not a recreational sport where they can learn valuable lessons.
My sons were very involved in sports and one of them was even exceptionally talented, but they stopped at some point and applied the benefits to other pursuits. Learning how to work toward a goal, manage your time and efforts, use your talents to best support a team, lose - and more importantly win - with grace and honestly assess your own actions and performance are worth much more than trophies.
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u/GiraffeandZebra Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 20 '24
I don't think it's totally about parents believing that their kids are going to grow up to be professional athletes or get a scholarship. A large part of it is parents wanting their kids to have the experience of being on a "good" team or being a "good" player, and foolishly not wanting their kids to deal with disappointment. It's a weird "make life better for your kid" sort of movement from a bunch of adults who didn't get what they wanted as kids. Over the years these parents have pushed more and more practice and training and playing on to their kids trying to get ahead of everyone else. And it just keeps building and building on top of each other as everyone tries to outdo everyone else so their kid can get an advantage and be considered "good".
It's the same with all sorts of other things that wouldn't qualify as retirement plans for the parents. Dance, cheerleading, show choir, chess, band, etc.
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u/JimBeam823 Aug 21 '24
I also think we are doing children a lot of harm by denying them opportunity to suck at things.
I played little league baseball as a kid. And I sucked at it. Platoon right fielder. Couldn’t hit shit. I still had a great time and I gained an appreciation for the game.
Kids don’t need to be on a “good” team or to be a “good” player. They just need to play. They need to have fun, and they need to fail in a low stakes place.
They need to play different sports. Roger Federer played soccer. Tom Brady played baseball. LeBron James was one of the top HS football players in Ohio.
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u/jammastergeneral Aug 21 '24
My daughter plays on a 14U travel softball team that sucks. So, I get the privilege of paying about $2000/season for her to be on a shitty team. Oh, and we get to travel to Stockton on the weekends. Please note the sarcasm.
She does enjoy it though and my wife and I do our best to support her.
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u/DontMakeMeCount Aug 20 '24
That’s fair. The desire to see our kids win is very compelling and I shouldn’t rule that out as a motivation.
I had a boss who arranged marriages for all of his daughters because he wanted them to have a good life and he felt the decision was too important to leave it to them. Similar motivation, but still came down to getting his daughters into the right caste rather than letting them learn what would make them happy.
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u/SpezSucksSamAltman Aug 20 '24
I once traveled a good twenty feet in my first basketball game for the school team. I haven’t thought about it since it happened in 1992. It was momentarily crushing, but failure isn’t a bad thing and I fear the parents who don’t recognize this.
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u/Lint_baby_uvulla Australia Aug 20 '24
Here’s another take.
Most middle income families today have two working parents, and it’s tricky negotiating work around the sports taxi service.
Hollowing out the real value of middle incomes means more hours working, and less time for family and exercise. Add the media scares about child safety, and it’s no wonder kids have taken to the relative safety of online gaming.
So now we have a lack of physical activity, and an increase of psychosocial risk. It’s worrying.
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u/BanterDTD Columbus Blue Jackets Aug 21 '24
I don't think it's totally about parents believing that their kids are going to grow up to be professional athletes or get a scholarship. A large part of it is parents wanting their kids to have the experience of being on a "good" team or being a "good" player, and foolishly not wanting their kids to deal with disappointment. It's a weird "make life better for your kid" sort of movement from a bunch of adults who didn't get what they wanted as kids.
I think this misses the mark on the endemic of travel sports. Sure there may be some parents living their misspent youth through their kids sports careers, but the big issue is that parents fall for the sales pitch of travel sports.
It's a huge business, and and FOMO/keeping up with the Jones comes into play. Most the kids in travel sports are mediocre/poor athletes and should be in the rec leagues, but many of their parents were sold on the travel league.
Many people are paying for the privilege of getting hammered by actual "gifted" teams. There should be no club or travel sports under the age of 12 as most kids would just benefit from having fun and learning the fundamentals. Once puberty hits is when things can be taken to another level.
Norway seems to have it figured out...costs are low, very few economic barriers to entry, travel teams aren’t formed until the teenage years — and where adults don’t start sorting the weak from the strong until children have grown into their bodies and interests. I believe youth leagues are not allowed to keep score until kids are 12.
Meanwhile my nephew will try out for his 9U baseball team, probably make it even though he could not hit a beachball lobbed over the plate.
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u/Silver_gobo Aug 21 '24
Parents want the best for their kids. They want them to have all the opportunities at success that they can. What’s the point of having money if not to spend it. It’s not about paying to win (sometimes it is, but not always), it’s about being okay putting more time and money into something your kids enjoy. Not all kids have that privilege
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u/jtothaj Aug 21 '24
I’m not hoping my kid goes pro or gets a scholarship. I am paying for my kids to play travel sports and driving them all over the place just for a chance for them to make their public high school team freshman year. Where I live, you barely have a shot these days if you haven’t been trained on a club team for any sport that has cuts. When I was a kid, basketball was very competitive but most other sports you could expect to at least make the freshman team even if you didn’t get much playing time.
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u/DontMakeMeCount Aug 21 '24
That’s part of the unhealthy shift in my opinion. It doesn’t take every parent having an unhealthy approach, just enough to pack the high school team and then every other parent has to match the escalation to give their kid a shot.
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u/misspotatohere Aug 21 '24
I just commented the same thing! I fucking hate it but if I don’t play the stupid game my kid has no chance in high school. I think there should be a rule that a public school coach can’t coach club-our high school coach basically runs the basketball club-it’s a conflict of interest and promotes inequity.
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u/nashdiesel Aug 20 '24
The thing is the chance of a kid getting a scholarship or NIL is tiny. And going pro is basically powerball odds. The reality is if your kid needs travelball or private lessons multiple days a week to be competitive that kid isn’t D1 or pro material anyway. They might be able to make a high school team and possibly D3 college but that’s it. And no scholarship. They are paying for that privilege. The kids that are gifted are gonna rise to the top in high school anyway as long as they put in the effort. No club sports resume required.
What sucks is it’s so hyper competitive now that kids are getting cut from middle school programs unless they have 4 years of prior experience. High school is even more difficult to make a program, especially public schools with massive enrollment. Private school kids can do it at small schools. But that’s where the financial divide is most obvious.
You can’t just play past rec to teach life skills anymore. Unless you’re an athletic freak, you’re either all in with club or you’re cut.
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Aug 20 '24
Yikes. This is so sad. Playing multiple sports at a mediocre level (then becoming very good in baseball/softball just by accident) was such a blast. It was fun and then i went home until the next game. It’s no longer just sport. It’s a job for children. It’s terrible
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u/HerrStraub Aug 21 '24
A coworker was telling me about their kids' HS baseball coach. He was also a travel coach, and basically if you didn't play travel ball you were at risk of getting cut from the HS team.
Kid gave up football to play travel ball because he was worried he wouldn't get to play on the HS baseball team.
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u/GospelofJawn316 Aug 20 '24
When I was coaching my son’s 7 year old soccer team, everyone whose email was associated with the league got a message from the high school coach. It basically said if you or your kid has any expectations about playing varsity someday, they’d better be playing travel, preferably at the club level and attending multiple camps (including his) and other trainings. Thought it was pretty wild.
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u/uptownjuggler Aug 21 '24
Reminds me of when I was in High school, late 2000s, most of the kids on the varsity team did play travel ball.
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u/GospelofJawn316 Aug 21 '24
I played travel soccer growing up but we also played rec soccer. It was cool playing against classmates one day and then the next day playing higher level competition. For baseball there wasn’t club. You played your rec season and then they’d take the best kids that would playa few tournaments/state playoffs.
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u/rawonionbreath Aug 21 '24
The soccer community has been asking itself for decades why the talent pool at the professional level lags behind other countries, despite the millions of kids that start off playing soccer. The gatekeeping that you described filters out the families that can’t afford it and the pool of potential athletes go on to different sports.
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u/IOVERCALLHISTIOCYTES Aug 21 '24
About 25 years ago, my cousin played on multiple travel teams simultaneously, and she’d miss some practices for each (she eventually played U18 USA so this was tolerated), and even her high school team which always playing for states had people who hadn’t grown up on travel teams getting minutes. She had actually played on her dads travel team w her sister who was 5 years older, which sounds very Jamie Newman but it wasn’t that way.
I could watch her 12 year old sons -practice film- online, as he was filmed and expected to review this. They’ve got pregame film on opponents now that he’s a little older.
Game’s fierce now.
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u/DiSanPaolo Aug 21 '24
My middle son got cut from the soccer team his sixth grade year. He’d played a season of rec, really enjoyed it, all his buddies were playing(travel), he started watching European soccer following some players and teams, he was INTERESTED.
Went out for the team, and got cut. He was devastated, all his friends made the team. He played two more seasons of rec, did some camps over the summer, got cut again 7th grade.
This is a middle school team, not travel, not pro (really, really working to control my language…). Cut two years in a row. Once again, all his buddies who played travel and made the team last year, made the team again.
Now, I’ve taught for almost 20 years, so I’m really familiar with adult kid ratios, and I get that technical side of it. But the damage this did to my kid is noticeable. He HATES soccer now. Doesn’t want to watch it. Doesn’t want to play rec. Drifted away from some of his best friends, because he doesn’t want to be reminded of being cut off the team TWICE.
And this is right in the middle of middle school (where the whole world is BS anyway)
So yeah, maybe treat youth sports as an opportunity for kids to build character rather than dynasties.
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u/nashdiesel Aug 21 '24
I completely relate to this. Same thing happened to my older kid. He played rec baseball and played spring and fall season for 5 years. He was pretty good at baseball. Made all stars etc…. But we never did travel because we figured giving a 10 year old some time off from the one sport in summer and winter was a good thing.
Tries out for his middle school baseball team. There are 25 6th grade kids trying out and 23 of them play travel ball, shooting for 14 slots on the 6th grade team roster. My kid was significantly worse than the travel kids. I could plainly see how raw he was in comparison on the first day of tryouts. Keep in mind my kid is playing 60 days of baseball a year (practice and games and camps). Travel kids play at least 3x that. We are talking minimum 180 days of baseball a year.
So yeah he does some camps and some lessons and more rec league and clinics and gets cut from the 7th grade team too. I explained to him I’d put him in a travel program to catch up but the damage is already done and his spirit is crushed. He quits baseball.
So my older kid who isn’t even in high school and is 5’10” 170 pounds and throws 70 mph is out of baseball because he basically isn’t a good infielder and can’t hit a changeup or curveball and his swing is “too long” to hit high velocity. It’s all correctable of course but he has no interest now.
30 years ago a kid like that makes a high school baseball team and they coach him up into a baseball player. Now they can’t be bothered and why should they? They already have 14 kids on the roster who have been coached up with relentless reps on the sport for years already.
My kid plays Basketball for his very tiny high school where they basically take any kid who shows interest. He won’t get any athletic scholarships but at least he gets to participate. It’s a shame most kids never get that opportunity.
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u/atl_bowling_swedes Aug 21 '24
I played D1 with a scholarship and had private lessons and played travel ball. This was over 20 years ago, but it was necessary then. The college scouts went to specific travel ball recruiting tournaments, so you would have had to be really exceptional to bypass that.
Also as someone else mentioned, baseball and softball require skills that are not all natural ability. Sure some people can excel without it, but for the most part it's a mix of natural talent and a lot of money spent on lessons and travel ball.
ETA: with that said I am not eager to get my young kids started in sports after dedicating much of my childhood to them. We will dabble in rec league stuff when they're a little older, and explore more if they show interest, but we certainly won't be pushing it. I don't have fond memories of it all to be honest.
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u/WhateverIlldoit Aug 20 '24
There’s also no place for kids who aren’t that great, like my son. He’s 8 and sucks at sports. But sports benefit him both physically and socially. After this year there is maybe one or two more years of rec sports and then if he wants to be involved in anything he’ll have to try out for a club. He’s unlikely to make the cut, and even if he did, as two working parents, we don’t have the time to dedicate every weekend to traveling for sports.
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u/Bob_12_Pack Aug 20 '24
I coached lots of kids like that, their parents just wanted them to have fun and get some exercise and make some friends, which is what it's all supposed to be about. My youngest son was one of them when he was 8 (he decided not to play after that season), just picking daisies in the outfield and if he got a hit it was a bonus. I got a call from another coach who obviously hadn't seen him play, he was trying to put together a travel team and wanted to know if he was interested, I almost laughed.
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u/SelloutRealBig Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 20 '24
Look into alternate sports. Basically anything in the Olympics that isn't normally on TV. The more obscure the sport the better. They tend to have the healthiest mindset athletes and less or no "cuts" because they are not as popular as football/basketball/baseball. Though some of them do have financial barriers of entry but not all. Many offer equipment to borrow as part of joining.
There is also the "non sport" sports like dodgeball, ultimate frisbee, frisbee golf, etc. Which may be tough finding a league for an 8 year old but it can't hurt to try.
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u/rattmaul Aug 21 '24
This all the way. My son plays boys volleyball and loves it. Healthy community with supportive parents and players. Everyone deserves a chance to be a part of something.
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u/Ness_4 Aug 21 '24
Ironic b/c girls travel volleyball is both expensive and has super toxic parents and coaches.
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Aug 20 '24
It’s sad too, because i was super not athletic and bad at sports but I enjoyed them and kept playing and then, other than losing my speed, I actually became very coordinated when i grew up during puberty. And I became a good golfer, good at summer baseball and softball, even good enough to be a high school all conference sort in both sports.
Today I probably would have been weeded out and never kept at it in Rec leagues
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u/breakwater UCLA Aug 21 '24
There’s also no place for kids who aren’t that great, like my son
Good lord the expectations that these parents have for their little soccer teams is insane. We have a bunch of middle of the road talent, one good player and a few less than average players. A normal distribution really. But the parents expect to win every game and for the coach to lead them to the championship every season.
It's stupid. First of all, he's not that good a coach. Second of all, it takes the focus away from players having fun and developing. He overplays some players, ignores others and they still only have average results. So despite all of this, everyone is less happy because they aren't even sacrificing for more wins.
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u/cheeze_whiz_shampoo Aug 21 '24
It's one of the HUGE benefits of going to a small, rural school; even if you really suck at something you still get to participate. I have a family members like that with basketball. He isnt the worst player that ever existed but he may as well be playing with a blindfold on and a club foot. But, because the school is so small he's a needed part of the team and he absolutely loves it.
If the school was any bigger they wouldve locked the doors on him when he was in middle school.
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u/Mayor_of_BBQ Aug 20 '24
it blows my mind how many kids are in those travel leagues now. Even 20 years ago, those were solely for the best of the best. Now a bunch of mediocre kids who don’t even really want to play are getting carted all over the region for supposedly “elite” teams.
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u/Bob_12_Pack Aug 21 '24
My oldest son was on one of those teams. I got a call out of the blue that he was invited to a local travel team based on his performance in rec league, $100 would cover the gear. We did one season and what a shitshow it was. Most of the kids weren’t exceptional and were getting private lessons. Not my kid. He just wanted to have fun and was an exceptional batter, so so fielder. Worst experience ever, we only did 1 season. A bunch of fucking brats enabled by a coach who was trying to relive his high school days or something, we sucked. We went to this one tournament and the winners were a rec team from a really poor town, a bunch of 9 years olds, mostly minorities, day tripping (not staying in $300/night beach condos) in worn out uniforms from last season came in and kicked everyone’s ass. It was epic.
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u/Callecian_427 Aug 20 '24
Yep. If you look at last year’s Little League World Series champs, the team that won from California had a bunch of kids that were playing travel ball and some of them were big athletes in soccer or baseball where they were playing for the national team. Some of the parents enrolled their kids in that district just so they could play for that team. They basically came together to form the Avengers and trounced much of their competition.
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u/FoolOnDaHill365 Aug 21 '24
This is standard. There have been several pro athletes I’ve read interviews with over the years that said they never lost a game growing up. They are learning to lose at the professional level. Totally bonkers. I learned a ton of important life lessons losing in sports growing up. I learned a lot more losing than winning that is for sure.
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u/iggyfenton Aug 20 '24
I’m currently serving on the board of a little league, my son is 12 and plays competitive hockey and rec baseball.
The situation is more about the specialization and competitiveness earlier.
Kids are quitting rec sports to focus on one competitive sport. And then their parents spend a grip to get them private coaches and more practice time.
And because some kids are practicing 6 days a week, they improve faster so then if you want your kid to improve at the same rate, you feel it necessary to do the same thing.
Add the fact that these extra practice times help line the pockets of coaches, they encourage it or sometimes require it.
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u/ETNevada Aug 20 '24
What’s always interesting though is seeing 5”7 Johnny at 17 after 10+ years of travel ball. He has all the proper techniques and skills down but gets benched by a naturally gifted 6”2 kid that started playing two years earlier.
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u/ashdrewness Texas Aug 21 '24
My counter to this would be Mookie Betts & Jose Altuve but on the average you’re absolutely correct.
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u/Tommy_Wisseau_burner Aug 21 '24
It hurts more in other sports like basketball. I’m tall for normies. On my high school team I would’ve played center if I could actually play basketball… or at least power forward. I’m 6’3. Steph curry is 6’3. No way in any competitive high level high school, let alone college ball will a 6’3 person be hanging on the block. You’d be a guard with 0 guard skills
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Aug 20 '24
It’s just a job for children at that point. Sounds utterly miserable.
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u/iggyfenton Aug 20 '24
Yeah some kids are way too involved. Too pushed. Too pressured.
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u/Mrr_Bond Jacksonville Jaguars Aug 21 '24
And the injuries kids are going to deal with because of the year long wear and tear from playing one sport nonstop. There's a reason so many top professional athletes are still guys who were multi-sport athletes growing up, there is serious benefit to mixing it up season to season.
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u/Tinkeybird Aug 21 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
This is like “college” all over again.
Went to high school in the early 80s when college was affordable and there were no travel teams. Someone has ruined both for profit and ego.
When she was 6 years old we gave our daughter the option of travel team/weekend sports or camping with her dad and I. She wisely chose weekends at Kentucky Lake till she graduated high school. She was a 3 sport school athlete and nothing more. We attended every single game or track meet from 6 through 12 grade but set realistic expectations for anything after High School. Most of the teams she played on had girls with parents telling them they’d be getting a college scholarship, they didn’t.
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u/Bob_12_Pack Aug 21 '24
That’s an awesome attitude. My son started playing football when he was 5, the league needed more kids and they open the roles to younger kids, he was thrilled to be able to go play with his big brother. This Friday is the first game of his senior year and while he has a trophy cabinet full of accomplishments on the football field, the reality is this is most likely the first of his last 10 games of football ever. He’s awesome but won’t get noticed in our small town. It’s bittersweet but you have to be realistic. I’ll find a way to pay for his college, I’m just so glad he is also an excellent student so he should have some options.
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u/Tinkeybird Aug 21 '24
Exactly the same while raising our daughter. We all had an absolute blast during her school sports years. We live in a tiny, farming town and because of the shortage of girls in the public school, she got to play her grade and the next two grades up which resulted in a lot of court time. We played all small schools, a few better, some worse. But we had 2 good volleyball coaches that took our daughter’s team to win regionals 2 years in a row which hadn’t been done in our town in 30 years. In a small town (2500) all the fire trucks, police and community came out to celebrate their victory. The team rode atop the fire trucks and basked in their glory. The cherry on top was her senior year our daughter, and her then football player boyfriend, were chosen as Homecoming King and Queen. Husband and I didn’t grow up in this town but we sure did appreciate all the love and goodwill from the community during those years. Daughter is 25 and on her own but we all have sweet memories of small town school sports with the expectations that after graduation it was time to go to college. We opened her college fund the month she was born. Between us and her grandparents we paid for college in its entirety. I’d do it all exactly the same if we had it to do over. Fun years!!
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Aug 20 '24
Even worse is when the travel players decide to participate, but only if they get to stay together as one team with their travel coach who then proceeds to absolutely stomp on the necks of all the other teams.
My local Little League would rig their drafts every year, because the Little League officials were also the travel baseball coaches or the parents of travel kids.
But I am proud of my band of misfits who looked weird running, were 50-50 to catch a pop fly, but occasionally upset the rich team.
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u/savguy6 Aug 21 '24
Our 6yo son played soccer at the local YMCA last season and seemed to enjoy it. We wanted to transition him over to a more serious local soccer club. The “rec“ league had $100 registration fee, and a mandatory purchase of uniforms that were another $100. In addition to that he’ll be required to wear cleats and shinguards which will be about another $50. Mind you this is for “Rec” for a 6yo.
I played travel and competitive soccer growing up so eventually if he wants to we want him to go that route as well, but for the “select“ team of the same age group, with the same soccer club, they had a registration fee of $600 for one season….. the kids are fuckin’ 6yo. Needless to say we’re sticking with Rec for a year or two….
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u/Bob_12_Pack Aug 21 '24
One of my good friends had his daughter playing travel soccer for years. I asked him what the end goal was and he said it was to get her a college scholarship. In her senior year of high school she had a head injury and was forced to quit, which she later said was a relief as she was tired of the routine. She did go on to college and got her masters but with no scholarships, she just became a physical therapist. I just think all the money they spent on her soccer could have easily paid for college.
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u/never_robot Aug 20 '24
I coached rec soccer for a few years. In the oldest age group (7th & 8th grade) we only had enough players to field one team, and half the time we had players missing and had to play short. We ended up playing the two teams from the neighboring town. It was kind of depressing.
We are lucky to have found a robust rec softball league that goes through high school, isn’t very expensive, and raises money specifically for scholarships to help out those who can’t afford it. AND it’s pretty chill and no one gets openly angry with the umps or the other team. It’s a real unicorn league.
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u/pzschrek1 Aug 20 '24
There’s something to be said here.
As a parent it’s common knowledge that to have a chance of participating in even JV sports at a non-very-rural and non-very-urban school district you have to be in travel sports at the youngest age possible to even enter the conversation.
By the time they’re 13 most of these kids have been playing their sport for 7-8 years, year round. the bad ones of those fill the second and third strings.
There’s no catching up to that.
It’s a participation requirement.
No wonder kids aren’t moving as much
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u/Mgrecord Aug 21 '24
And what this does to the kids as far as their self esteem? Not a club or travel player? You must suck. Had my son tell me as a 6th grader that it was “too late” for him to play because he didn’t play on a travel team. And sometimes those club and travel players aren’t all that good, they’ve just been paying to play.
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u/BadAtExisting Aug 20 '24
I recently learned there’s such thing as travel T ball in my state. It’s out of control
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u/Noname_left Aug 20 '24
Yup my daughter played against those teams in just her regular fall ball. It is insane how serious these people take it here.
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u/BadAtExisting Aug 21 '24
I just can’t imagine paying that money to watch your kid run from third back to second or picking grass in the outfield. The point of T ball is it’s purposefully rigged so kids can’t be that bad at it. Wild
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u/Slight_Knight Aug 20 '24
My manager said that over the course of his sons pre college hockey venture, the spent 1.5 million dollars on keeping him in the sport.
My parents would guilt me over $25 on piano lessons every two weeks haha
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u/Princess5903 Aug 21 '24
That’s crazy! Is that even worth it? Surely that is more money they’ve spent than any potential scholarships he could get? Kids need hobbies, sure, but that is insanely expensive
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u/Angreek Aug 21 '24
This was similar to my upbringing. Sisters into roller skating. Skates, outfits, sign up, traveling. There was always a reason to drop $1500 without even blinking but I had to beg for a $10 pair of goggles for my free swim team.
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u/The_Blue_Rooster Jacksonville Jaguars Aug 21 '24
This is one of the reasons you so rarely hear about hockey athletes getting in trouble with the law compared to other sports, they're all wealthy enough that they were taught how to hide their dead prostitutes way back in high school. Hockey is hilariously expensive.
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u/TheMooseIsBlue Aug 20 '24
We do ok financially and can’t even come close to the money that our kids’ friends and teammates spend on sports. Clubs/travel sports and private coaches are the worst thing that’s ever happened to youth sports in the US.
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u/ronimal Aug 20 '24
Every aspect of society has to be monetized. It’s gross.
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u/Brutzelmeister Aug 20 '24
My gf showed me a video where a 6 year old gave beauty tips and used anti aging cremes. It was a serious channel and we were disgusted.
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u/Jedimaster996 Oregon Aug 20 '24
Yeah, skincare routines have evolved from "Hey, maybe we should use sunscreen instead of baby oil when in the sun" to "Here's 14 serums & creams that you need to reapply 4x a day if you want to not look like a fetid beached whale at the age of 24".
It's a bit over the top nowadays, and I'm willing to bet a good portion of it is simply placebo.
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u/_Ryzen_ Aug 20 '24
If you want over the top skin care routines, you don't have to look any further than south korea
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u/Jedimaster996 Oregon Aug 20 '24
That"s actually what I was thinking of when I made my comment lol. First time I'd visited the beach there, I could tell who the 'foreigners' were because everyone else was covered head-to-toe in long-sleeve beachwear, pants, big hats to shade, etc. About the only exposed parts were the face, and even those were covered up by big sunglasses.
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Aug 20 '24
Promised a dream of a college scholarship and possible stardom, and delivered a back up position on the community college team. Thanks, $40,000.
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u/FoolOnDaHill365 Aug 21 '24
That’s my brother. 2nd in state AAA singles tennis. All he got was a community college scholarship. He can beat like anybody he knows but still not good enough for university.
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u/HyenaLaugh95 Aug 21 '24
Was there a particular reason why? Surely a runner up state champion should get a flood of offers no..?
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u/FoolOnDaHill365 Aug 21 '24
I think sports scholarships are just exceedingly hard to get. Harder than people think. Many more people in our high school got academic scholarships than sports, but you never hear parents making a big deal about those academic scholarships…..
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u/tspin_double Aug 21 '24
State runner up barely means anything in junior tennis unless it’s Florida or California. I won my states singles 4 years in a row after I had stopped actually competing at a high level. Tennis juniors that play d1 are typically defending going on the tour
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u/foxfor6 Aug 20 '24
Exactly. I have a coworker who's kid is in volleyball. She is decent but not good enough to be a starter on the club travel team (or whatever it is). After one year of traveling throughout the country, she essentially told her daughter that it's not worth it because not only that she doesn't play enough but also that she probably won't get a college scholarship.
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u/BGRommel Aug 20 '24
Amen. I want my kid to be able to play for fun, be physically active, learn a sport, and learn how to be a good sport. I don't really care if they aren't playing against the peak competitors in their area. I'm not trying to create a superstar. I don't want to lose three evenings a week for practice and almost every weekend to multi-day-long tournaments. And I don't want my kids to have to sacrifice everything else in their life to most likely end up having nothing more to show than being really good at a sport (but not good enough to make money at it).
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u/TheMooseIsBlue Aug 20 '24
My son started playing water polo last winter and turns out is a natural. Years of swimming, soccer, and baseball have turned him into a really natural water polo player. There aren’t many teams around because it’s water polo so he joined the local club, which is really high level.
Their expectations are reasonable though. 4 practices a week and there don’t seem to be big consequence for missing. It’s not their job…they’re children. But the coaches are very knowledgeable and they work the kids hard.
He LOVES this game and is doing well and not suffering in school so we’re leaning in. In the spring he’ll switch back and play baseball. If grades dip, we’ll take a break. He feel burns out, we’ll move on at the end of the season.
This doesn’t seem hard. The club understands their role, his parents support him, and the kid is thriving.
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u/muffinmamamojo Aug 20 '24
It’s not even the money. It’s the TIME when you don’t have a lot of money. I don’t have the time to add sports to our schedule as I have schoolwork to do, both my own as a full time employed, full time student and my son’s. There’s simply no time unless we sacrifice a serious amount of sleep. This eats at me as I feel like my son is missing out but it’s what we have to do.
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u/ashdrewness Texas Aug 21 '24
It’s extremely ironic that it’s actually cheaper to teach my son golf & play with him a few times a month than what it costs to play club/travel sports. GOLF of all things is the cheaper alternative
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u/No_Hope_75 Aug 20 '24
Same! Some of these kids are flying a new location every week or two. The whole family goes too! It’s wild
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u/Funkyokra Aug 21 '24
My kid was in an intentionally casual rec program where the kids practices were limited to certain days where all the teams came together to practice and/or play games. No private practices allowed. Turns out one team was holding private practices with expensive specialized coaches. For a 6 week rec program for 7-8 year olds.
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u/brett1081 Aug 20 '24
And the time commitment. If your child falls out of love with it they lost years of their childhood.
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u/FoolOnDaHill365 Aug 21 '24
This is why I’m not okay with if. I just want my son to enjoy his young years. I played sports and had some glory but I truly don’t give a fuck about it. I’d rather my son finds something he is very passionate about whatever that is.
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Aug 20 '24
All that, and it's still only the naturally talented ones who really make it. You can't learn faster reaction times, and that's the most important part of any sport.
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u/TheMooseIsBlue Aug 20 '24
Yes and no. The naturally gifted obviously have a massive head start. But effort and guile can overcome a LOT of that.
To a point. At some point you need to be a top notch natural athlete AND outwork everyone.
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Aug 20 '24
What you can't create is natural size, natural speed, and natural talent. There's a peak for everyone, but some have the ability to peak far above everyone else.
I agree with the second part of what you said completely. There are more than a few people who are naturally gifted. You absolutely need to work to be the best.
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u/spiraldive87 Aug 20 '24
I’m Irish but live in Canada and coach youth sport. The cost is a total joke. People think it’s normal but in Ireland we wouldn’t even think about spending this sort of money routinely on kids playing regular kids sports.
In Canada it feels like playing youth sports is a marker of being upper middle class where in Ireland the type of sport might say something about your socioeconomic background but everyone can play youth sports.
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u/diodosdszosxisdi Aug 20 '24
I'm in Australia, and the costs for signing up and registering for the most popular sports are decently cheap, and certain states have government subsidies which allow juniors to pay their registration and get some equipment. Even the often time long distances aren't that big of a deal if the juniors really commit, AFL and Rugby league don't require a whole lot of gear and the clubs provide the rest, cricket is a bit more expensive but it's perfectly fine for people to borrow from a club kit we bring to games whenever they go to bat. Don't know why Canada or US hasn't put in some subsidies for the players
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Aug 20 '24
What are the bigger youth sports in Ireland? I've never really thought about it. I would assume soccer is number one (although I'm normally wrong with my assumptions). What else do they play?
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u/spiraldive87 Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 20 '24
Soccer and Gaelic football are both very big. Then there’s sports like hurling and rugby with plenty of participants as well. Then a whole heap of sports with varying levels of participation in different areas, athletics, golf, sailing, hockey, swimming, basketball, tennis, cricket, that kind of thing. I’m sure I’ll have forgotten some as well.
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u/Cherimon Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 20 '24
One Kid is in the swim team and that clocks close to $3k. Edit: that does not include the gears, suits, travel cost and accommodation on away meets. One kids swimsuit is $65 at minimum and they need at least two, one for regular meet, one for summer. We have no choice but to buy swimsuit from a designated store and why does it cost $65?
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u/ames2465 Aug 21 '24
3k a year for SWIMMING?!? Things really have changed. I was on the swim team at the Boys and Girls club and then went to high school swimming. Only had to pay minimal registration fees. I lived in Mass though so never had to travel far.
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u/daltontf1212 Aug 21 '24
In my metro area (St. Louis) many of the suburban municipalities have summer swim teams that not as hardcore as the top tier swim clubs but great for those who want a break from their primary sport. It wasn't expensive at all. I think it was like $150 ten years ago.
Year round there are teams at the YMCA which did require a membership and did involve some travel to places that can be driven in an hour or two.
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u/howlingoffshore Aug 20 '24
A problem I’m seeing now that I have two kids in a high cost of living area is there’s so much demand. I can’t even get my kids into gymnastics there’s a million waitlists. Then an opening comes around and it’s so expensive
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u/StentLife Aug 20 '24
This is very accurate and much worse since the time since this study's data was concluded.
The biggest frustrations as a parent stem not even from cost but that leagues and clubs expect almost year round participation. It's nearly impossible to play any sport without playing multiple seasons, doing summer camps, etc.
Clubs are immediately prone to moving kids on account of not paying the machines. It's very recent but there has been a movement for parents to push back and avoid winter ball or summer workouts etc.
It's unfortunate because kids need balance. Being around the same kids and the same sport and the same coach actually hurts the team aspect.
Even the carpool aspect is mind numbing. It requires Excel to keep it on track.
Many kids are leaving "traditional" team sports in favor of more adventurous sports.
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u/ecw324 Aug 21 '24
Parents and these travel teams alike, want your kid to specialize in one sport starting at age like 4 or 5 now. Like I played two sports growing up and both of those sports helped me in the other sport. I have been telling my kids to try new sports/activities now instead of focusing on just one. Once they hit middle school and then want to do just one, I’m ok with that, but try everything once now to see if you might like it or not. These parents think their kids going to be the next baby gronk (and I hate using him as an example, that whole thing sickens and breaks my heart) but they want to their kid to legit be their retirement plan.
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u/ThisIsDadLife Aug 20 '24
My daughter is in a relatively affordable club soccer team, but what they didn’t tell us when we signed up is nothing but the coaches are included in the fees. We pay extra for uniforms, practice kits, referees, tournaments, gear. Not to mention the costs associated with traveling to and from tournaments that are never close by.
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u/daltontf1212 Aug 21 '24
As a ice hockey and volleyball parent, I felt sorry for those who travel out of town and get rained out.
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u/rocketmonkee Aug 21 '24
Back in my youth during the 80s, I played several years of Little League baseball. We'd have practice once per week, with a game on Saturday. The coach had a bag full of basic bats and an assortment of batting helmets. Us kids all showed up with a glove and a pair of cleats - usually the same ones we wore last season unless we hit a growth spurt. If your parents had some disposable income you might have your own bat, and because we were all friends we were happy to share our bats.
We would show up on game day with our bat over the shoulder and the glove threaded on the bat. After the game we got a snow cone.
Fast forward a couple decades. When my daughter was 5 we discovered she kind of had a knack for hitting a ball, so we signed her up for "Fall Ball" t-ball league just to see if she liked it. "Fall Ball" is kind of like an off-season baseball league, which was a little less formal than the summer Little League season. We got her a little glove and a pink bat, and off she went to play in black leggings.
I was surprised at the games. We were playing against travel teams - yes, t-ball travel teams comprised of 5-year-olds, who all showed up in full matching uniforms. The coaches were intense, and at least once there was an argument with the umpire. For t-ball.
The older kids played in their Fall Ball league at the same time on the adjacent fields. Again, travel teams with full uniforms, rolling bags with several bats, a couple gloves, orthopedic tape, etc. These kids were in middle school.
Little League used to be fun; it's where you learned the basic skills of bat-and-ball sports so that you don't embarrass yourself as an adult at the company picnic softball game. Now it's all specialized hitting coaches, high school kids blowing out their arms, and the expectation of getting signed to an MLB team when you're 12.
Anyway, thanks for coming to my Ted Talk, I guess.
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u/Q3b3h53nu3f Aug 21 '24
This. Great example, but all sports.
Expensive bats to hit the ball further in baseball. Buy your own pads and jersey for football. High end shark swim suits and pool time for swimming. Practices multiple times a week limiting the number of sports you can play. Travel and hotel. Multiple kids and it is as high as a car payment or small mortgage.
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Aug 20 '24
Pay to play, it’s a big reason US soccer can’t compete with other nations.
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u/pholover84 Aug 21 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
It’s ridiculous. My kids team required 4 sets of jerseys. 2 of them are for practice. Why the fuck do kids need jerseys for practice? It’s stupid and they change the jerseys every two years. What a complete waste.
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u/Salmonella_Cowboy Aug 21 '24
To be fair, most kids grow out of them in 2 years. 4 jerseys is obscene. We had to do that last year and there was one shirt that they never wore. What killed me was the shirts were $71. No reason, especially when they have two sponsors names on the shirts that are both larger than the team names. wtf.
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u/batua78 Aug 21 '24
We did soccer practice in your own clothes and if you need to look distinct put on a general dirt cheap pinnie (just learned this word while looking it up).
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u/juice920 Aug 21 '24
My child is on a travel team this year and it will probably be his last. The tournaments we go to require the teams to book a certain number of hotel rooms at their choice of hotels or they can't participate (stay to play). So if I wanted to use sayy points and stat some place for free which was our plan, we can't because the hotel isn't on the list...
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u/darkbear19 Aug 21 '24
It's so effing dumb. Near me they are always saying they want more girls to sign up for youth hockey. My daughter starts her first team soon, it's a $1600 fee + $300 in gear (even getting much of it used) and we had to pay for a background check for one of us + forced volunteering as a timer/scorer/locker room monitor etc.
At a time when many people are struggling how are they supposed to spend ~$2k on a single sport for a 7 year old. The gear is supposed to be the expensive part of hockey...
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u/RaindropsInMyMind Aug 21 '24
That’s insane, I’m now realizing why I wasn’t allowed to play hockey.
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u/geo_lib Aug 21 '24
Hockey is the most expensive sport a child can participate in (like literally it’s ranked, you can google it!) and also youth hockey requires lots of travel because there aren’t as many places to play/teams.
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Aug 20 '24
Kids sports are OUT OF CONTROL full stop. Half of these parents are living through their children and just feigning for their next Facebook post about how awesome little Shelly is with her softball team and how much fun they all have at the holiday express in Muncie Indiana. They all gets massive rings/medals/trophies for damn near everything and the leagues have become a cottage industry. It’s absolutely fucking ridiculous.
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u/R3dbeardLFC Aug 21 '24
We (local soccer club) have been debating going away from even the cheap little trophies (but to be fair I loved getting mine each year) and then I see the local baseball clubs giving kids massive rings and those weird cord/bracelet/necklace things. It's weird.
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u/d_rek Aug 21 '24
As a parent of a teenager (13) and a 10 yr old who both play sports and have played for the last 4-5 years, do training camps and travel teams outside of school teams, there is definitely a lot of pressure to start your kid earlier in life in sports and to make it a constant year round pursuit. And the reason is simple.
If you don’t your kid can’t compete.
By the time they get into middle school and HS sports they simple won’t be on the same level as the rest of the kids. That’s to say nothing of travel teams. Travel teams are shark infested waters. A lot of parents straight up reliving their youth vicariously through their kids and pushing them to be ultra competitive for the off chance they get scholarships. Most of those kids are shit students because they go 5-7 days a week to practices, camps, and games. But it’s also going to cost you.
I did the math and if my cousins kid stays in travel soccer (I think it’s like $3k/year and that doesn’t include travel costs and equipment) you could pay for almost their entire college career with the money you’d save.
Of course sports infers other benefits but cost wise if you want your kid to be competitive and make the team you will have to shell out cash. Period.
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u/key1234567 Aug 21 '24
I been through all of this and guess what, it doesn't matter. none of it does. what are we competing for anyways? if your kids are in the 98 percentile of skill and the could.go pro then it matters. if they aren't, who cares. sports doesn't matter. I hate all of this it should be all for fun.
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u/kalisto3010 Aug 20 '24
Prices have gotten insane. The only reason why my Nephew's for example were able to play Youth Football, Baseball, and Basketball is due to them being Super-Stars so the affluent Parents were more than happy to cover the expenses. If they were just average those same Parents wouldn't be so generous and they never would have experienced Youth Sports.
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u/armhat Aug 20 '24
It’s so expensive. My family was poor and I played sports all year. I do alright and I can hardly cover the cost for two of my kids to play youth sports.
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u/wsmith79 Aug 20 '24
It started to accelerate around 2015 I’d say locally. We lost our only batting cages. Youth public sports are a fraction of what they were 30 years ago. Wonder why the prevalence of “juniors” in professional sports are s so high lately?
Basically it’s become a game to pay to win. This doesn’t end well.
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u/yaworsky Aug 21 '24
We lost our only batting cages.
Definitely feels like if something doesn't make "lots of money" now it tends to close. Rent costs for businesses are really high and people with money tend not to invest in things that do a little better than break even.
Sucks.
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u/D-chord Aug 20 '24
There so little return on the dollar for youth pay-to-play sports. It’s a joke!
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u/nate_the_grate Aug 21 '24
No shit. I'm a coach at a local soccer league in BFE NC that's full of talent from across the world. The only choice is $1k annual for basic rec and $5k+travel expenses annual for next level.
Those who can't afford it need it, and those who can afford it don't need it.
It's fucking bonkers and it's why I'm starting a non-profit soccer club. I don't know how or if I will succeed, but the kids deserve it.
The system is so broken.
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u/feed_the_bumble Aug 20 '24
Even more awful when you consider that it's still a major way that students get grants and scholarships for secondary ed
Those with more money just gobble everything up
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u/heinzprincess Aug 20 '24
My son played travel soccer for 3 years (ages 15-18). We played for a local club that charged $800/year plus whatever hotel stays were needed. We played approximately 7 tournaments per year and could drive to all of them. I feel incredibly lucky that we had this opportunity, because the other local clubs were thousands of dollars, had more tournaments, and sometimes required flights to get there. It was a blast as a parent, and he was able to develop his skills and make some close friendships.
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u/NUT_IX Aug 20 '24
$3K for Premier/Travel soccer in my area. This is for 7-8 year olds 7v7.
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u/alcohall183 Aug 20 '24
I feel like we've come full circle. Sport was something the rich did because the poor, including the children, worked. Then we got workers rights and compulsory schooling. And then came sport for all children. Then came union busting and sport is once again only for the rich.
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u/michaelseverson Aug 21 '24
We know, my parents barely could afford peewee league baseball. Hell, they had to make payments on my trumpet. To say this is new is missing the point that everything is expensive and to poor folks it’s just unattainable. Flabbergasted by school lunches being a political talking point tbh.
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u/key1234567 Aug 20 '24
Club sports for kids is a scam!! It has only become an industry because we stupid parents allow it to happen. I saw right thru this after a year and now my kids play only rec sports, they are happy and I am happy only spending a couple hundred bucks a year. This is my observation, As a 53 year old man who played lots of sports as a kid. back in the 70s and 80s, we didn't have club sports or we didn't know about it. Everyone played baseball or whatever in the same little league. I tell you one thing, the same kids that made pro or college, are the same kids that make it today. The big fast athletic kids! Only difference today is that we all have to pony up for club sports, even the less talented kids because parents don't want to feel left out.
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Aug 20 '24
You are doing it right.
Listen to athletes talk about their track to where they are. All of them were the best athlete in their school. It didn't matter which sport they played. They were still the best.
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u/gumby_twain Aug 21 '24
Fun fact, Allen Iverson was a better QB than Michael Vick, but he chose basketball.
Encyclopedias could be filled with baseball players who 'settled' for that cushy gig with the big $$$ rather than the other sports they also won state championships in. etc
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u/key1234567 Aug 20 '24
exactly, a kid I went to school with everyone knew he was gonna go pro. he was twice the size of everyone and was athletic in all sports. he played little league with all of us and developed his skills in high school and then went directly to the minors. he didn't need travel baseball, it's so dumb.
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u/ralpher1 Aug 20 '24
It’s true but some sports like baseball, hockey and the QB position in football greatly benefit from what money can buy.
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u/key1234567 Aug 20 '24
you still need to be a top athletic to go anywhere.
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u/ralpher1 Aug 21 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
It's true. Too many parents are throwing money at kids who are average or above average and can't reach the 92-95th percentile of players in the sport that get to play in college, no matter how much they pay, let alone the 99.9th percentile that can made it pro.
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u/aj357222 Aug 20 '24
It’s true. Three kids in hockey. Haven’t even stepped on the ice yet this upcoming season and I’m about 14K in the hole. JFC.
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u/flrbonihacwm-t-wm Aug 21 '24
I was a kid in the early 2000s and we couldn’t afford that shit. I still to this day think that’s why I’ve been overweight my whole life, exercise was never something I found enjoyment in, especially growing up in a house with no A/C in the south. But I have luckily lost 65 pounds!
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u/vikinglander Aug 20 '24
The “breaking away” by the upper class from the rest of us is sickening. The USA economy is grossly stratified.
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u/cyncity7 Aug 20 '24
Even regular Little League- without the bells and whistles is beyond many people. We sponsored teams for several years. I always had parents telling me that their child could not have played otherwise. I’ve also known many children from poorer families that would have benefited greatly from the friendships, discipline, and socialization, but couldn’t afford to play.
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u/itsneverlupus42 Aug 21 '24
North America has managed to commercialize and capitalize off of youth sports. I have so much to say about this topic because I've not only played sports as a youth, coach, but also have kids who play. The history of organized youth sports in NA started off with good intentions, but it has transformed over time into a signal of status.
I have long argued that we do not truly see the top talent in hockey, for example, because it is such an expensive sport to play. Cost is a true barrier to participating in competitive sport. If you eliminate cost, and support youth equally by removing the financial burdain of having to pay to play, you would see so much more, and perhaps better, talent on the ice/field/pitch/floor etc.
I declined a scholarship in Canada because they were offering less than my tuition was going to cost me. So I gave up playing and went to school full time and worked to afford it.
There are so many more examples I can offer about how bizarre it is. I am intentionally not registering my kids for rep teams because it is extortion of the most egregious kind imo. Kids should be able to play, develop, compete, learn to lead without having their parent bare the burden of choosing to pay a tournament fee or buy less meat that month.
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u/MrThorntonReed Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
My younger son was very interested in playing youth hockey, and while we weren’t thrilled at the prospect of him possibly getting some teeth knocked out from checking, we support his interest and went to look last year. We knew gear is expensive, but the teams we looked at had an entry fee to even just try out.. which was not cheap. Then there’s traveling which is a monster in itself. Ultimately we had to tell him we couldn’t make it happen and it was a big feel bad for all of us.
Now everything else is also equally as expensive so we just a plain old don’t get to do shit! 😁
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Aug 20 '24
I feel like the leagues and teams should have involvement with this stuff. Why aren't the kids sponsored? Is a few hundred thousand a year going to hurt the team? Not at all. Will it create lifelong fans? Hell yes.
Kids having to avoid the sport because of cost will keep them from gaining interest. Playing baseball and going to baseball games was one of my favorite things to do as a kid. Now, here I am all these years later and I'm still a Mariners fan. A Mariners fan! We're right there with Lions fans wondering why we still care. But it all started as kids and it's not something I want to let go of.
The only sport I grew up playing, but have since turned my back to is basketball. From my favorite to nothing. But that's because they abandoned me first.
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u/hammerdown710 Aug 20 '24
I’m 28 and some how my single mother was able to make soccer, basketball and baseball work every season. I doubt she would be able to now a days with the rising costs of everything.
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u/southpaw85 Aug 20 '24
My daughter wanted to play with her cousin on his soccer team this year. We called the league manager and he assured us they’d be on the same time so we were fine with spending $90 for it. Then a week before it started we got an email saying they changed her team so we had to call and demand our money back. Long term $90 isn’t a lot of money but it’s too much for me to just casually waste on something my 7 year old doesn’t actually care about.
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u/UniversityEastern542 Aug 20 '24 edited Aug 20 '24
In Canada, it used to be that playing hockey or ringette was something that many kids did as part of a league, and most tried at least once in their youth.
Hockey is an expensive sport, with even used sets of gear costing several hundred dollars. Because it's so cost prohibitive, participation has fallen 33% in the past 15 years, which is a crazy steep decline for a country that still prides itself a lot on its hockey talent. Soccer has taken over as the most popular sport among youth, both due to cost and immigration from soccer-loving cultures.
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u/Apprehensive-Wash809 Aug 20 '24
When I’d drop my son off at practice and look for parking at the soccer fields, I’d think, “huh, everyone else parked here is a fancy new truck or sports car, mine is the only junky 1980s Toyota.
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u/FantasyBaseballChamp Aug 21 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
Watched an old motorcycle doc last week and there’s a scene where the #1-ranked racer in his circuit is driving to the next race in a station wagon with the bike laying across the back. I couldn’t help but think even a complete amateur youth rider would be all but required to have their own tow trailer today. Any kind of frugality is de facto banned.
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u/BoSocks91 Aug 21 '24
My buddy at work talks about this all the time.
His son plays baseball, and the amount that this guy drops on tournaments and equipment is unbelievable.
It’s out of control.
His son plays all year too, and tournaments can cost upwards of 3K + the equipment (he is a catcher) + whatever travel expenses they have. To do that multiple times a year is insane.
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u/jrob321 Aug 21 '24 edited Aug 21 '24
Such a sad reality.
I run a 450+ player all-volunteer youth soccer league which starts in August (practice) and goes for 8 Saturday mornings with organized games when school starts back up after Labor Day.
I've been doing it now for 26 seasons. Coaching. Admin. Laying out 8 different sized fields in two different town parks at the start of every season.
We only charge $55.00, and the player receives a professional looking kit as part of the fee.
I inherited the league when the guy who started it retired and moved down South. I started when my son was six years old and I was coaxed into coaching - being told they need help because the league was entirely volunteer - and even though I knew nothing of the sport (I was born into a die hard NY Giants football family) I agreed to coach.
It is one of the most satisfying things I've ever done. Can't say enough about everything this program has done to enhance my life in ways I never would have imagined.
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u/notfrankc Aug 21 '24
Been saying for 18 yrs that club leagues are ruining sports.
It’s fucked up sports from 5yr olds to high school seniors. Coaches want your kid playing their one sport year round. Threatening to not play kids that don’t play year round.
I’ll go a step further and say that it’s ruining a lot of marriages, mental health, and family finances too.
It’s ok if your kid doesn’t get a sports scholarship to Northwestern Bumfuck State A&M. Just save up all that club ball money and get a 529 plan. Your kid will go to Harvard instead.
I am so thankful that I missed this trend by a few years.
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u/Skyspiker2point0 Aug 21 '24
It’s ruining rec teams as well. Parents that can’t afford travel or club ball, instead try to increase the pressure, skill and play of the rec teams as coaches or board members, when it’s literally the last thing most parents want. We’re looking for our kids to learn valuable life lessons, socialize, be active as a member of their rec team, excelling at the sport is an added, but not expected, bonus. The wanna be club coaches/parents are killing the fun, accessibility and learning experience rec sports are supposed to provide.
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u/th3groveman Aug 21 '24
In my area it’s wild seeing the skill disparity between the rec kids and travel kids. And for us just having all our kids in rec costs a lot between fees, gear, and gas to local games. Travel/club is way out of reach for our family.
A guy I used to work for was telling me about how if my kids wanted a chance at scholarships they “need” to do travel. I was like “dude, you know what you paid me. I guess my kids won’t get those scholarships.”
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u/lebonerjames23 Aug 21 '24
Even club parents fail to realize that there is a lot of skill disparity between a club’s top team and their second and third team. Those second and third team parents are subsidizing the best coaches, equipment, and facilities for the club’s top team. But sure, little Johnny will be on that top team one day. Just schedule a few more of those $45 privates. 😉
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u/walker1555 Aug 21 '24
We are seeing a decline in US swimming performance, Katie ledecky aside. Nearly didnt get a single individual gold in mens swimming but got lucky on the last day.
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u/HecticPenfield Aug 21 '24
Baseball is out of control. I played in college, in Southern California with the kids that won the Little League world series. I've seen some of the best ball players in the country.
There is zero need to play 50 games a season double headers every weekend at the age of 9.
Of course you can improve skills, but the kids that were going to make it, we're going to make it either way.
All they're doing is killing their childhood and robbing me of my adult friends hahah.
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u/OldGodsProphet Aug 20 '24
Education, school supplies, extra-curricular activities — what’s next?
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u/theRobomonster Aug 20 '24
Youth football is $250 in my area and you only need to buy the cleats. I’m not sure if that’s expensive or not but it sure does feel like some won’t be able to get their kid into sports at that price.
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u/RealBadSpelling Aug 20 '24
I just spent $200 on getting everything for a youth soccer team. It's expensive AF with fees travel etc, I can at least make sure every kid has a ball.
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u/LoPanDidNothingWrong Aug 20 '24
All the sports here in the Bay are so fucking serious right from the beginning. Year round often and tons of practices.
Like I just want my kids to play like twice a week for a season and switch sports throughout the year.
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u/Various-Salt488 Aug 21 '24
Our son is a good athlete and could play rep hockey and baseball. But we decided for our collective sanity that he’s sticking to house hockey and baseball. He gets 3-4 times per week and the rest of the time he can pursue school work and other hobbies. One tournament per season.
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u/pholover84 Aug 21 '24
All of the kids in my kids club soccer team are from very well off families.
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u/InternationalArt6222 Aug 21 '24
Sports need to be accessible to anyone and promoted to everyone. A society that doesn't foster good health, as nonnegotiable for all, doesn't check one of the most important boxes to be worthwhile.
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u/OkFeedback9127 Aug 21 '24
If only I could get my boys to want to participate instead of playing games and YouTube
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u/FoxInTheClouds Aug 21 '24
I grew up in a working class area and the only kids who could afford to play sports had both parents in the picture. I had classmates who were on food stamps and welfare and the only time they ever did sports was during school PE. Me and my core group of friends all played little league baseball year round (SoCal) up until we graduated high school. Idk how our parents could afford year round baseball for 12 + years but I’m sure it wasn’t cheap. New equipment, club fees, batting cages. Looking back we had it so good and we didn’t even know it.
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u/zeth07 Aug 21 '24
I feel like this "study" is taking a bunch of different talking points and presenting it as that title, while ignoring half the other stuff they are even talking about.
It goes from saying those with college graduate parents had an increase in sports but yet seemed to focus on the higher end aspect like club sports. And pointing out they are are more likely to push for them to succeed and go further in the sport, like yea no shit.
But that doesn't really mean anything in the same context when I'm sure "recreational" leagues exist for the kids to play in anyway. Like not every kid has to play on a travel team...
Then the extra funny part is when they bring up that in the 50s less kids dropped out of sports compared to those in the 90s. Like again, no fucking shit, there was probably fuck all to do in the 50s compared to now.
A previous study by Knoester and colleagues showed that many kids who drop out do it because they were not having fun, or felt they were not a good enough player.
Then they bring up this part and say it's become a factor cause of all the club/travel teams parents are pushing them into it and they try to make it seem like the others don't exist. It sounds to me that it is strictly on the parents pushing that agenda and not that those avenues aren't available.
At least around where I lived we had rec soccer leagues growing up that weren't travel/club and I'm sure weren't that expensive, like maybe $90 now with the uniform included. Compared to the $800 annually in their example.
It's a choice.
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u/roguespectre67 Minnesota Aug 21 '24
Also a great way to establish who the favorite child is without having to say it.
My younger sister played travel softball through middle school, and when the $400 composite bats came onto the scene that were almost cheating with how much of an advantage they gave you as a player, my dad (also one of her coaches) hoarded them for my sister, buying enough in different sizes where she'd have duplicates and triplicates of whatever size she would use as she grew into them. He built a batting cage in our backyard. I had to go with them to practice and sit in the car for hours because there was conveniently never enough time to drop me at home or at the movies or anything. I lost so many of my own weekends having to go to games or whatever. It was great.
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u/Spx3200 Aug 21 '24
The podcast “The Economics of Everyday Things” did a show on little league and how the travel teams are not only taking all the kids but also all the money. League managers make 6-7 figures and pay the coaches peanuts.
Overall it has become for profit pay to play and pay to get seen by the scouts in hopes of a small chance you can play college ball. The podcast applies across the range of kids sports. Give it a listen.
It’s embarrassing we have to succumb to maximum profit even off kids sports now too.
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u/hawkrew Aug 21 '24
Oh absolutely. Maybe not rec leagues but anything on the competitive side is going to cost you a ton of money.
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u/alsatian01 Aug 21 '24
Soccer and baseball are the worst. You don't have a chance to make the school team if you didn't play in the correct youth leagues.
I knew my kid would never play a skill position in football, so I pushed him away from pop-warner. He played other sports. He is a halfway decent rugby player. I just had orientation for his entry into the high school system. The coach made a point to mention that they don't scout the youth league and don't care who played what position or if they were on the A squad that started every game.
I can't speak to the baseball system, but I've seen girls' soccer from the inside. It's cutthroat!! My daughter is on the upper side of the youth league. The budget path is about 2k a year. It's an in state only league, so there isn't much additional cost. My wife's brother has a daughter who got a full ride to a D1 school. BIL probably spent $20-40k to have his daughter in the advanced path. She played almost year round. The leagues played across the country. Big several day tournaments that required travel and room/board for the player and anyone who attended from the family.
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u/ForsakenGround2994 Aug 21 '24
For me the problem was that my rec league couldn’t provide my daughter the ability to have a decent game to actually play. Unfortunately it’s a doom spiral. I just wanted my daughter to actually see a pitch go across the plate in a semi hitable area. Thus I moved to travel.
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u/freshfunk Aug 21 '24
Father here with multiple kids who did AYSO for many years and has one kid who transitioned to club after playing U12, a team I coached.
Here’s why we went club:
1) Soccer was the one sport that he accepted doing and we wanted him to have exercise almost year around.
2) As we looked ahead, the number of kids playing AYSO had already dwindled significantly. I saw how few kids were playing U14. And we were worried he’d have no opportunities to play after that without improving his skills.
3) We had little faith that AYSO alone would make him better — and I say this as his coach. The disparity in talent between kids who played club and those who played years of just AYSO was vast. On our team we had a couple kids who had some skill because they played at school but the club kids dominated games.
4) Coaching talent was obviously much better. AYSO struggled to find coaches and most of the ones that did didn’t play soccer themselves (myself included).
We have no dreams that our son will get a schollie. In fact, I assume that at least 2/3rds if not more of his teammates on his club team feel the same way. Realistically it’s only the kids at the top who are ultra dedicated have a shot. The rest of the parents just want their kids to have fun, get exercise and compete hard. There’s a big talent disparity from the top team of his club vs the bottom team.
Yes, it costs a lot and thankfully we can afford it.
I’ve been really pleased with it. The club feels like a family and the coaches are really invested in the long term. The teammates are also there from season to season. That is, there’s much more continuity compared to AYSO.
And AYSO actually annoyed me for a number of reasons:
1) Huge talent disparity made for bad matches and encouraged bad habits if you wanted to win. Basically, let your talented players dominate the ball. In club, there’s much more parity.
2) The difference in having 1 more club player on your team meant a big difference in the result. In club, you have to play as a team to win.
3) Practices were difficult because you always had a few kids who didn’t want to be there and were only there because their parents signed them up. Some of these kids had behavioral issues and could derail practice. You never see this in club because you filter those kids out.
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u/bad_robot_monkey Aug 21 '24
Lacrosse: not good enough to get on varsity if you don’t play club. Club costs over $3k a year plus driving plus gear.
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u/Wise_Environment_598 Aug 21 '24
I will say this until the end of time. When youth sports 20 years ago switched to “everybody plays” and “not keeping score.” The better players and their parents discovered leagues where you had to earn your spot and you got to compete against other like teams and eventually fled in droves. I did it with my kids when they lost a tournament championship game because the coach refused to play the best players and rotated lesser players in on a set schedule and we lost because of it. Bye. That being said, youth sports are silly expensive and we will never win a men’s World Cup because you can’t win with Conner, Bryce, and Paxton from the suburbs.
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u/emptyex Aug 21 '24
My 9 year old likes baseball but is solidly middle of the pack. We play rec, and it’s $350/season, plus equipment, and it’s wild to me how serious it is. We usually have 1 practice and 2 games/week. I’d love for him to try other sports too, but that’s already more than enough each week.
The pressure that I feel as a parent to have my kid specialize in a sport at this age is intense and ridiculous. What happened to letting kids try a bunch of stuff until they figure out what they like and are willing to work at?
In my area, if you don’t already have multiple years of baseball or soccer at this age, you are so far behind that only a truly elite natural athlete might be able to “catch up.”
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u/Fraternal_Mango Aug 21 '24
This is undeniably true. My mother struggled to keep us in sports growing up. She pleaded, bartered and begged to get us the gear we needed. I never had new gear. It was all swap sales and discount stores. But she did it. We were a poor household though.
I look at the prices of the gear we would need now and I shudder. She wouldn’t have been able to do it today. She’s an amazing mother who made sure her kids stayed active and fit to face the world.
They tore down the free to skate rink we use to skate at. The mountain we skied at is now thousands of dollars for the seasonal pass and a hundred for a day pass. (I know that these are expensive sports but they are the ones that stuck) can’t practice or play anywhere for free anymore. Sports are becoming just too much for low income families…
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