100% correct. The tournament play thing is exhausting and expensive. The unpredictability of tournament play scheduling (especially on Sunday) gets old fast and is horrific. I'm sick of my kid's team playing 5 games on Sat/Sun. We won three tournaments this summer, but like you said, it doesn't mean anything. The kids are so "done" at the end of the day they don't even care. I can see the burnout with a lot of the kids. The Orioles (our local MLB team) don't play that much, and it's their full time job. I wish it would go back to the way it used to be. Great video.
Yeah my nephew plays travel ball and seems to be in different tournaments every weekend. They are good so they end up playing quite a few games and the amount of time and money my brothers family ends up spending has me questioning it all. Playing baseball is great and all and I loved playing as a kid but really can’t imagine playing as often as these travel kids.. like you said, say you win a tournament - what good does that do? From what I can tell there isn’t a definitive travel ball champion at the end of the season either Yes I was curious about the burnout from kids - very few kids I grew up with had the desire to play that much! Then again these are different times and it’s better for them To be playing ball as compared to playing videogames Oh and I really don’t like the cost of travel ball - many kids are priced out right out of the gate
sounds like everybody would be better off with a dedicated regional schedule. You're going to play teams of the same difficulty. You're going to stay mostly at home. The whole point of a tournament is to ensure difficulty to challenge the players. There's gotta be other ways to do the same. Just a sports fan, I have no kids and I'm... genetically inferior (no natural strength, bad hand eye) when it comes to sports so any kid of mine would probably suck too. Just on logic... play strong local teams.
I coached girls/women's basketball at every level from kindergarten through DII college. For many years, I was affiliated with an AAU program that took kids to tournaments up and down the east coast 40-60 games from April-July. I also coached many years of boys travel baseball. Won't bore you with details but here's the bottom line: SKILL RULES BASKETBALL AND BASEBALL AND YOU DON'T DEVELOP SKILLS PLAYING IN TOURNAMENTS!!! In tournaments you get to display the skills you've developed through smart, well-planned, and well focused PRACTICE. Little Mary can't make a left handed layup in April. She still can't in July after traveling all over the country and playing 70 basketball games. And she's developed some bad habits along the way. Same for little Johnny who couldn't backhand a ground ball in the beginning or end of summer. Here's the remedy: 1. Train/educate coaches on fundamentals and proper workout structure. Scrimmaging for 2 hours/batting practice for 2 hours is useless. Youth sports are filled with well- intentioned coaches who really don't know what they're doing. 2. Spend your money on good camps and clinics....make sure you attend one's really focused on skill development...I've seen too many that are glorified baby sitting-services. 3. Make your baseball/basketball club workout and skill development centric, particularly for younger players who are outside the recruiting window....winter workouts, clinics, codified training routine/program for each age group. 4. Tournament schedules for kids not yet in HS should be cut in 1/2...at least. 7-10 year old's travelling to tournaments is insane. More practice. More intersquad work with other clubs in your area. I used to invite AAU clubs to practice and workout with my kids at least once a week. 5. When kids reach recruitment age....that's when you get more serious about showcases and tournament play. That's when you show off all your hard work through the years. It's all about SKILLS SKILLS SKILLS.......and genetics, of course. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
It’s all the tournaments that actually PREVENT me from signing my kid up for a club team. I want to get my son more practice. I would love it if club teams focused more on practice with only occasional games, but tournaments every other weekend is way too much. So we just stick to little league. On a side note, my kids also do jiu jitsu and it’s ALL PRACTICE! Most kids never compete. The classes are still packed with kids though.
You are dead on. Many kids only seem to want to play ("have fun") more than get better. I try to run local clinics and let younger kids attend stuff we do, but they just see it as us doing same thing every day (and we aren't!). We focus on the fundamentals. We try to find ways to make it fun but it apparently isn't as fun as a game. A kid or two get it. Most come a time or two now and then. Frustrating sometimes.
Coach wow you made a great point regarding run differential or runs scored. My son played in the Diamond tournament we had a 2-1 record at the end of pool play and beat the eventual number seed. BUT that team had run up the score on the worst team in the bracket so even though we beat them head to head we were eliminated and they went on.
American Legion already has a system and heritage in place. Stay local and play for a championship. The more local teams, the more games. They are developing a prep league now. Junior league is 17U, Senior is 19U. American Legion is the way.
I'm not a fan of travel baseball and my son isn't either. I don't like the atmosphere around the tournaments. Too many games, games played in bad weather, same type of parents saying the same things. Even most of the boys have the same hair cut. I'm the dad out behind the left field fence shaking his head.
@@cozygamingandvideos3914 got it. I like traveling but my rooms are paid by the tournament as an umpire. As umpires the hotel room on Sunday night has gone away. I’m usually exhausted on Sunday night and can be 1,200 miles from home. In Colorado last month I paid $200 for my own room on Sunday night and went hiking on Monday. I hope you enjoy the rest of summer and there is a solution to this issue.
Yeah that should be illegal to require someone to use a specific hotel. There is no contract between the hotel and the participants. Organizers can’t pass their hotel expenses just because they get a kickback from the hotel. That’s a conflict of interest.
it's crazy that it's mandatory - professional conferences, concerts, events - they suggest hotels and such, and im sure get kickbacks just the same, but they never bar someone from participating in the conference for not using their hotels.
It’s crazy expensive. Funny thing is high school baseball is a big step down from travel ball competition as far as stacked talent on one team. I can see that value of those tournaments in summer ball scout travel for college recruiting but there is little value to the players at younger ages. That said…our family has incredible memories and great times in cooperstown and Omaha and other tournaments.
Gate fees are completely foreign to us, and most of our tournaments are an hour away. The farthest we go is 2.5 hours. It's STILL a lot for us! My son once tried out for a team that bragged about going to Las Vegas (we're in WY). F that! We just want to play baseball. That organization folded.
A lot of good stuff here, coach. The Stay2Play is an absolute joke. The prices are typically much higher than you would pay to stay at comparable hotels or even the same hotel if you just book direct, and there are some absolute dumps on the list. But the worst part about S2P is that they'll hound you to book the hotel the minute you sign up for the tourney, but the promoters typically don't assign the field venues until a week or so before the event starts. We've booked many hotels that end up being a good 45 minutes from the field cause you don'tknow where you'll play until long after your reservation...yuck. Combine that with an 8am game...double yuck.
As a former soccer parent we never stayed at the 'required hotels'...Not once. No way anyone is even keeping track of that unless you are booking through the tournament only. In most cases, plenty of good competition 'in town'. Same reason my kids never played at the 'highest levels' in Club, because the cost and travel were not necessary and yeah, both of my kids are playing in college & my daughter played NWSL-W- don't believe all the BS, parents. Same w/the push for D1 schools - go where you want to go, you don't have to go D1. If you're good, someone will recognize that.
I've heard this from multiple parents and I believe you. I think at the individual level, you can kinda opt out on your own and it works. What I'll tell you from my experience as a former organization owner, was that I absolutely could not risk it - if I had all our families drive up, pay, take time off work, then get disqualified and not be able to play because I assumed we'd be fine if we just opted out...I'd be refunding 15 families and they'd be absolutely furious. So for us putting these trips together, there's a lot more risk saying "eh, it's probably just a scare tactic."
Im with you bro. You have helped confirm or encourage me a lot. I coach travel ball in Tupelo, MS and your reasonable and thoughtful approach is much needed. Thank the LORD he's given you this platform.
Having been through it, looking back it seems that the tournaments were about the parents” egos (and opportunity to party if it was an out of town tournament). For those parents who are trying to “position” their kids for a college education or, pre tel, because they’re kid is that one in a thousand to get drafted, if you’re kid is good enough, the scouts will find him regardless if he’s in a tourney every weekend. You’re just making it easy for the scouts. Not ego here - just experience. Our son did get drafted pretty highly and we didn’t turn him into a show pony. Live life. Let him have fun. Try to keep your ego out of it (including the collective ego of the team parents that can be really ugly). Keep it in perspective for you and for him. Just my two cents.
Watching you from London,UK. Not a big baseball presence here, but there are very active lower leagues. Thank you for your videos, helped me get into baseball as an adult. I'd love more content around starting out in your late 20s.
Oh yeah man, you make all the great points here. I manage an 18u softball team, I told my families this year we will only be doing showcases and even then, showcases are always trying to get you for more money, one company makes you pay at the plate, 5 games at 60$ each, 300 on top of the 12-1500$ a showcase, not including mandatory camps and hotel fees. I really cannot wait to stop next season, I love coaching but dealing with the money is so bad, I hate having to remind parents to pay on time so we can pay for these over priced showcases.
I am glad I grew up in a time and place where everyone in town played in one Little League, as did the surrounding towns. And then I played in high school when the high school team was the first and best option. If you got cut, you played rec league. Travel teams in the summer meant playing the other high schoolers in an organized league.
Hello Coach Dan! I was told by my 9U sim coach in order to make it to the Allstars he needed to signed up for his select team he coaches. Thanks Coach for keeping the game real. God Bless
The worst is driving hundreds of miles, gas, hotel, meals and other assorted fees…just to end up in the finals of a tournament against a team who is 30 minutes away from your home market. What are we even doing?
I guess I don’t understand the importance of travel ball tournaments? Ok so you enter a tournament with 20 teams from the surrounding area and you win - is it just for a trophy ? Or is there a ranking system where winning certain tournaments qualifies you for bigger tournaments?
@@brianmeen2158 The concept as a concept is a good concept. Get the best HS players across the country playing in 3-5 day tournaments so that “theoretically” college scouts can get a look at prospects playing against each other. That’s the concept. That’s what they sell Moms and Dads who are paying the bills on. In practice however, it’s a cash grab masquerading as “high end developmental/showcase baseball”. Several travel tournaments in cities across the U.S. have cultivated good reputations because they have nice facilities and amenities and offer local attractions due to their locations. They run well organized and supported tournaments. That’s 5% of what we are talking about. The other 95% are just a quasi-sophisticated enterprises meant to separate people from their money. LL baseball has it’s flaws too however, they offer divisions all the way up to 18U with national championships which are buried by ESPN because they really only actively promote the Majors Division which we see on the last Sunday in August from Williamsport. Imagine if we could shutdown travel ball and just gravitate all the kids, including prospects into the LL Juniors and Seniors divisions? The framework is all there. Why are you not promoting this right, ESPN?
A lot of these issues are dependent where you live. I live in Florida. Travel basebll tournaments are all over Florida. We rarely have to stay at hotels and have to drive more than an hour. Yes, it's still expensive, because of the insane fees for the tournament and gate fees. I think part of the problem is the monopoly for these tournaments. Options around here are USSSA, GSA, GOB, and the occassional PG. PG already has a bad rep with prices. We need more competition and more independently ran tournaments to compete against these larger organizations..
Wonderful video. What we also see over and over is with the amount of games and need for pitching, organizations bring players from their “A” teams and have them play on their lower level team just for tournaments to get the wins.
Nailed it with time limits. Many youth softball games are 3 innings 1hr 15mins. 3 innings is not a game. 1 at bat, maybe 2. Not learning to make adjustments (pitching and hitting).
Yeah imagine working 5 games umping in a day 2 hour 15 min time limits. 90% of the games go over time early or get last inning called by the 4-5th at latest.. 12-13 hours straight 2 or 3 days straight. And nobody is ever happy lol. You hope for enough time to pee. Travel is the worst. Everyone is good and can't accept losing hehehe. I would be working 5 games m-f and 9-10 on the weekends. Between local and travelling tourney's. Crazy.
There are kids all over Latin America who spend the majority of their time getting reps in the yard while we travel. The result is 30% of players coming from outside the US and that number is climbing.
Totally agree and I wish leagues would gain more popularity. I'm hopeful parents will start pushing organizations towards them to help keep baseball life reasonable and obtainable for more kids.
I like how the older tourneys are run it’s basically 3 or 4 games over four days. For those who like four or five games on Sunday’s how come high school, college or pro’s don’t do have that many games a day….because it’s not healthy.
We're starting travel hockey this year and I've already noticed a lot of the truth you've said here applies to what they're asking me to do this year. Especially on the predatory tournaments. When they told me we had to book a hotel room at a specific hotel without my input or ability to opt out I was pretty miffed and knew that the tournament organizers were getting some sort of kickback for that business. It immediately soured my outlook on the whole thing. They've created a monetization scheme that greatly diminishes my enthusiasm at my kid's effort and accomplishment, and ultimately the kids are the ones that suffer when the price for all this comes due :(
Maaannnn…. Travel hockey (my daughter is in) is ridiculous. The parents are something else. Our team consciously tries to keep the younger team’s games within a “day trip” distance, with a couple fun travel events thrown in.
@@Chameleoxplus how many kids are priced out of travel baseball or hockey right out of the gate? I assume the number is pretty high? My brother pays around $2,200 for his kid to play travel baseball and I was like 😲
Good video. I think technology and social media platforms have changed how athletes think they’re supposed to progress through life and set unrealistic expectations. My son has friends that play for well known teams that recruit from all over the area and state. They don’t lose many games. They are stacked with plenty of pitchers. On the other hand, my son is fortunate to be on a community based select team and play competitively with kids in both league ball and select tournaments they go to middle schools in the same district. The core group of this team has been together for a while. There are no coaches fees, the goal is development and preparation to make the high school team. We are not stacked with big kids or hard throwers. But we go compete with what we have and go home at the end of the day. To each their own, but long story short, the business side of travel baseball doesn’t always serve the athlete as well as they want you to think, in my opinion. Hard work and determination will take you just as far.
Parents want their kids exposed to travel ball and high caliber teams but no one wants to coach them. Thus you end up on a team or going to a tournament with your own team farther away. Everyone on here says we need more competition and there’s nothing stopping a local mom or dad from fielding a team and trying to bring a tournament to their local town. We were sick of traveling so we did it in our hometown here in Mid-Michigan and after a few years of mostly subpar tournament teams…we started seeing some decent talent roll in and now it’s a great time. We even got a splash pad in the same park for families and kids to enjoy outside of the games. Parents need to start stepping up instead of asking people to help them out. Guess that’s the millennial generation.
While you can play a bunch of teams in big metro areas, in Rural America (which is most of America by the way) it's simply not a thing. If you want to play high caliber teams, you must travel. There simply is not enough teams of the same caliber within 45-60 minutes drive time. If we tried to do that in this area, we would literally play the same 3 other teams constantly. While I agree that tournaments need to make some changes, playing the same 3 teams all summer long isn't useful. We can't play the local rec league teams, we can't even play the 'tournament' or 'select' teams the rec leagues put together. It's just blowout after blowout. That's not fun for our kids or the rec league kids. I absolutely agree that gate fees, required hotel stays, 4 game bracket sundays, wednesday/thursday games, and all that are terrible and need to be reduced/removed. However, tournaments are just reality for rural America. There's really no other way to do it with how spread out the population is in most areas of the country.
@@rayray4192That's JUST Baltimore itself. The Baltimore Metro Area is 2.3 million. That's over half the population in my entire state. The population density of my area is about 1/4 that of the Baltimore area. So him using his childhood memories of playing against a bunch of teams within easy driving distance simply isn't reality for the vast majority of Americans. There simply isn't enough people to make enough teams. Let alone make enough teams with quality talent.
@@eclark53520now are most young talented kids playing travel baseball now instead of little league? Or can they play both? In my area I’ve heard some dads talk as if they’d never put their kids in little league as if that’s below them .. I know the little league World Series is going on right now and the teams are quite good but not sure if they are full of travel ball players…?
Tournaments my son played in this summer were "fixed" so the home team always gets the easy pool. And then the good teams have to beat each other up in their pools. Better teams get worst seeds or moved to silver bracket. Plus, I hate timed games!
Another problem with tournaments: massive shortage of umpires. The culture of treating umpires as 2nd class citizens means fewer umpires want to work. Payments are not nearly enough to put up with that. Tournaments just mean that the few umpires available are doing 6,7,8 games a day. That's not sustainable.
While I agree that people can treat umpires poorly, that is only a small part of the problem. The bigger problem is that the promoters aren't paying them enough and are getting the quality they deserve. I'll put up with some BS if I'm getting paid well. I won't put up with that same BS for little pay. If you do the math on the entry fees alone, a lot of these tourneys are bringing in huge pay days before you even count gate fees and merch. There's nothing worse than traveling hundreds of miles and paying thousands of dollars only to have an ump call strikes on balls in the dirt and not even know some of the most basic rules. You're just gonna have pissed off parents in those scenarios, and I don't blame them. Promoters: PAY THE UMPS MORE. You'll get better quality.
Another thing i don't like about tournaments is the first round bye in bracket play. You'll have multiple teams in each pool with 2-0 records but only one team gets the bye, which pretty much guarantees a spot on the championship because everyone else has ran out of pitchers. So like you said good teams will absolutely crush inferior teams in pool play so they can get that bye, because just getting in to bracket play doesn't cut it.
This fall our middle school is forming a team to get the boys ready for spring school ball. Yes we will be in 3-4 small local tournaments but its more focused on practice and getting the boys to form a cohesive unit for the school. Its getting crazy
Very well said. I so done with long tournaments, they absolutely exhaust the kids. Even the pro's don't play this much baseball in two days..... There should seriously be laws enacted to hold these money grabbers at bay.
I've been coaching travel softball for 5 years now under USA Softball in Northern California, never seen a required hotel nor a buyout fee. Also, we've only had maybe 5-10 of 40 plus tournaments that had a gate fee, never seen anything more than $5. I will agree that the time limits suck, 70 minutes is not uncommon. So we've had over a dozen games that never even saw the third inning. But ultimately if you want to play softball after May, at least around here, there's no other option than the tournament format.
My sons last tournament game of his 13u season ended after 3 1/3 inning due to time limit, and having a rain delay mid game. Tournament director wouldn't even let us finish the current AB with bases loaded and 1 out.... complete joke. Most tournaments at the youth level are just money grabs. It's sad.
You are dead on. Great video. I think it is also hurting high school baseball. Kids are getting recruited to play at other schools. There is no sense of community. You get kids who think they are "all that" just because they play summer ball and the kids who cannot afford it are left out of playing, since not enough kids left to play school summer ball, and they end up quitting. We need to get back to summer area leagues and/or high school summer ball. Plus, it is a lot cheaper!
“And the kids who cannot afford it” Yeah and I have to believe that’s a decent % of kids. Plus, I doubt most parents have time/ability/desire to drive their kids for hours to weekly tournaments .
Preach! Travel soccer is very similar. "College Showcase" tourney might have 200 teams in 5 divisions at 10 sites. Coaches are only going to the main location and will only watch the "platinum" or "gold" level division. They're not traveling all over to see 1-2 kids in the "ruby" division an hour away. 90+% of the kids would be better served and get more $$ from colleges staying home and spending 6 hours on a weekend studying rather than traveling and playing for a total of 15+ hours combined. They'll get more money and still have a ton of time in their weekend to do other things. Lastly, just because you can go D1 doesn't mean you should go D1. If grades are important to you and your child, consider the time investment throughout the year, not just in season, because it's a lot. Rant over...
My son was doing this stuff 15-20 years ago. We'd play full seasons of Cal Ripken Ball in house league 98 yo thru 12), Ripken All Stars, then Districts, then States, then take that team to tournaments all summer when they were 12 and under, with daily practices all week. A lot of kids had private hitting coaches (Epstein Hitting guys), sports psychiatry coaches (like Buddy Biancalana). At 13 it was Northern Virginia Travel Baseball league until early August and back at it in the fall, with out of town tourneys thrown in the mix, with East Coast Travel Baseball, Ripken Tourneys in MD and SC, Sports at the Beach, Baseball Heaven, and random others thrown in like Cincinnati Flames or 18U World Wood Bat National Championships in East Cobb, GA when they got to 16 and older. All Winter working out at indoor facilities like Diamond Sports in Sterling, VA, speed training at Velocity, and on and on. Parents have no life, its all super expensive, and can be frustrating as hell if your kid is sitting while some parent/coach favors his kid. Some of it is dangerous too. One tourney got rained out Saturday and the kids played 5 games on Sunday to get the tournament in, and we forfeited the Championship because it was late, they were hungry and tired, chafed legs, etc., and we had a long drive home. I can only imagine it has gotten crazier and more expensive in the ensuing years. I did have college coaches approach me at times asking about my kid or specific players at tournaments, but never found college showcases like Perfect Game to be of much value unless you were a super-tall pitcher. The best place for scouts were at HS games if a kid had gotten a buzz going in the local news or at the major tourneys like World Wood Bat, with 75 radar guns behind homeplate when certain kids were pitching or nationally known kids like Bryce Harper were playing. And usually a kid will not win Tourament MVP awards if his team loses, even if he was hitting and fielding better in every game than a winning team player. A lot of it was a money grab back then, and I'm sure its worse now.
Any baseball parents anywhere near Virginia should be looking into three Kids on First Foundation. They are based here in the Richmond/Petersburg area, and they are having a tournament this coming week, and it's COMPLETELY FREE for ALL teams. The foundation is covering any and all costs, minus the hotel, but the rooms are at a VERY HIGHLY DISCOUNTED rate. It's their FIRST tournament, and there's going to be 11 teams, and the BEST part about that is, they are ALL MINORITY TEAMS!!! It's a FANTASTIC foundation that started only 3 years ago, and they are REALLY GETTING ROLLING!!!
I've read recently that IHSA (Illinois) no longer allows students who play high school baseball Or softball to participate in "all star games", looking at how they explain the rules it would include "travel ball" as an all star team, I could be wrong on that , but that's how it seems written
The Lexington Whoevers. Hmm. If you didn’t trademark it yet, I am taking that name. 😂 In addition when they pitch in these tournaments, the coaches refuse to let us use them during the town’s regular season.
Good point. There have been times we couldn't field a HS summer team, or at least be competitive, because those who play travel are pitching every weekend. Glad they are playing, but they don't realize it is hurting our program because the HS team gets destroyed in summer games. As a result, the kids think we aren't good and some choose to quit playing summer ball or, worse, for good. It is not that they aren't very good, we just don't have our better pitchers/players available so we don't match up.
there is a little give and take with this video. As a parent, I do see the greed in many of these tournaments and it should be reeled back in some, however, there is something about traveling and playing some other talent from around the country. I think it is a good experience for the kids to see and get to know kids from other areas of the country as well as styles and ideas. With all that being said, tournaments in all sports have gotten ridiculous. We pay to play as well as to get in to watch the event? Its ok to make money, but many of tournaments are going for Filet mignon and trips to the south of France. lol
I agree that travel is good for young people, especially international. I wish tournaments could go back to being a special thing, something to achieve or look forward to - then they'd serve a solid purpose again.
@DanBlewett I see your point and agree with that totally. My son is travel baseball as well as travel basketball, they try to cram as many games in as they can, in doing so, as you said in the video, it robs the kids of the experience
Unfortunately I've had parents from a local travel team tell us they've gone to tournaments across state lines where there'd be another local team playing. I have so much conformation bias coursing through me with this video because in Rochester, NY where we live there are easily 12+ different towns + the City that could/should be playing one another, but the FOMO these travel teams/tournaments put out is something else.
Parents...don't rely on your coach(es) to help you and your child get exposure/scholarships...many egos get in the way and it suddenly becomes more about the coaches than the players...good points, good video - just Subscribed
What you just wrote tells me you're as bad as the coaches you rightfully criticize. "Get your child exposure and scholarships?" What the hell happened to playing sports for fun and to learn the value of team play? Yes, sports CAN lead to those things. But the vast majority of kids who play any organized local, city, club or AAU sports will NEVER get a scholarship. People who think colleges miss out on athletes because coaches don't push them are delusional. In this day and age scouts and recruiters have a myriad of ways of finding out about prospective athletes, even in small towns and rural areas. The reason manyh youth coaches get as bad as they are is because most of them come out of the same pool of parents that all think their kid is a star and "deserves" a scholarship. They push the kids for years until the kids are so sick of sports they can't wait to get out of them.
Coach Dan… I’m on the basketball side of this and believe me when I say it’s exactly the same. But check this out, I would go referee in VA from NY only for the 2 teams to get matched up both from NY. So the parents pay all this money to play a team they could have stayed home to play. It’s such a racket
We once drove almost 2 hours (and stayed in a hotel) so my daughter's team can play the team that's located 5 minutes away (next town over). I know that I am not the only one.😆
Let's say you passed a law where gate fees couldn't be charged. What would happen is tourney entry fees would go up by that amount they expect to collect. A diff scenario where all tourneys except one charge a gate fee...... teams change where they are playing almost daily in the week leading up to the start. They are either looking for the best competition or running from it. So that one park not charging a gate fee won't change anything. If you really want to get down to the root problem of "tourney ball" or "travel ball" is that 50% of the teams doing it, shouldn't be. Yet their parents are so concerned with FOMO that they will pay whatever it takes to get that $5 ring on Sunday - just look at how many parents take their kids to lessons and then do nothing outside of it.
100% Agree. Junior tennis is more ridiculous. But back to baseball…All false pressure from organizations is to make a profit off of fear and miseducation around the “dream” of playing D1 or being drafted out of high school. The truth is most parents have already paid for a D1 education twice over by the time they are finished shelling out all that money. Then if your kid is lucky enough to get recruited to one of the D1 power schools, they are given less than 20% of a scholarship and told they must major in ‘parks and recreation’. Which ultimately will result in them not be very employable if/when the dream comes to an end. Craziness..
PT tournaments were the worst. You think you’re playing at a D1 college field but you won’t. Only the final is there but the pool games are at crappy high school fields in the area and on top you have gate fees and this season they started charging for parking!!! It’s soured me off baseball for kids.
Playing under pressure is my son's favorite part of baseball. Actually it's when he plays his best baseball. He loves getting an 0-2 count while batting.
@@joshua.snyder nothing, he mentioned young players learning to play under pressure and how games ending in a tie can take that away from the game itself. Of course you don't need me to tell you that since you watched the video
5:18 I guess we’ve had it lucky. Our teams travel within a couple hours for games and it’s 2 games on Friday or 2 on Saturday for pool play. Bracket on Sunday, I’ve never seen more than 4 games! I love tournament weekends! Except them fing gate fees! Pay per day to see your own child play, wth?? 😠
I just have a hard time understanding how these gate fees remain legal, especially when Attorney Generals have sued restaurants and airlines for hidden fees and predatory "junk" fees. How is this not in the same category?
Yeah things have changed quite a bit since I played as a kid. Travel ball is getting popular and I’m Not sure what to think about it. It’s expensive and time consuming as these teams play 50 plus games a season. There are different tiers in travel ball too. It’s pretty extreme for 10-12 year olds
11:33 we have problems around here with good teams playing badly on purpose in pool play just to come back in the bracket and wipe the floor with these poor kids who never saw it coming
I’m an 11U coach and we don’t coach games or tournaments in the way that you are saying. We play everyone! Johnny no throw plays just as much as Stevie stud. Main reason is that your team is as only good as your three worst players! I don’t mind playing tournaments and my kids love it. The fall formats suck because it’s score as many runs as you can in pool games or you’re out of bracket play. We don’t care about the bracket games as much in the fall. We use the season to get better for spring. There are better players in the spring season because some play football, soccer, or other fall/winter sports. The competition in spring is better. I hear what you’re saying but we don’t coach or run the team in that way. If parents choose to get fleeced, it’s their own fault. We will play a PG tournament every once in a while to see where we stack up against better teams. We keep the same kids for the most part. We actually are thinking about having two teams because of all the success we’ve had and the parents that would like us to coach their kids. More proud of that than anything. I know I’m doing something right! All while playing locally. Love your content!
@@DanBlewettget a grip on reality. Baltimore is a huge city. If a family is in a city of say 25,000 people there is not a big enough pool of players to have valuable tournaments. When I was a kid we played 20 games in a summer season at a local level. To improve a player must play at least 50 games. Some areas play 48 weeks per year. You are right and I appreciate your time and energy making this video. I don’t have the answers. I do appreciate you saying umpires need more money. I get up at 6 AM to drive 1 hour at times for a 8 AM start and get home at 9-10 PM. I’ve been on the diamond at 11 pm. It’s absolute bullshit.
The problem is people want to compete with the best. The best players are already playing in the bigger tournaments and are stacking teams and the directors are giving the bigger teams the better state and national rankings. So you can’t go play scrubs just because it’s free
that's not really true. The overwhelming majority of teams don't play in the top tournaments. And this used to work just fine, as I mentioned - I played in a metro-area league that featured many of the best players from the entire state of Maryland, reaching into DC. Caliber of play was outstanding. Most parents and coaches understand that no matter the tournament they're in, they're still playing a similar caliber of competition that they'd find in their home state, with only rare exceptions.
@@DanBlewett PG is running everything now. It’s not ideal, I don’t like what it’s all become but the best players and teams are playing in the PG NITs and invitationals. PBR does a good job but PG is dominating
All your reasons is why I refuse to put my son in Tournament Baseball. My son is 13 and his body is still developing. I know AAU basketball is just as bad bc these kids are blowing out their knees bc their ligaments aren’t developed enough to take that much stress.
@@DanBlewett I agree and also that’s going to be on my son on how bad he wants it. I don’t want to make the decision for him like my parents did for me when I played AAU basketball. When he’s ready I’ll find a team that fits. Thanks Coach
USSSA for sure wants their money but my son loves his travel ball team way more then he did his rec ball teams. We are pretty local tho. Most tournaments are less then an hour away. Its worth the money for him to play with other kids who actually care. Rec league is full of kids who would rather be somewhere else.
This is exactly why I formed an 11u team for kids in our area. We gathered 6 kids from our little league, and picked up another 6 from other nearby leagues. We played 18 games in total, and practiced a lot to help develop their skills. Total player costs are a fraction of what the competition is, but our goals have nothing to do with profit.
Is it just me or do some of the worst teams do the most traveling? My son was on a very good team this year and all of the tournaments were within two or three hours meanwhile friends of mine had sons on teams that only won five games all season but they went to Southern Florida for a week just to get destroyed and spend $1,500
Kids can get better at sports without playing in all the tournaments. There are plenty of ways to develop strength and skills without traveling. How about just normalizing kids playing sandlot style baseball in their home town on their home fields.
How about you guys try prioritizing your family life, because chances are your kid is NOT playing division one ball anyway. Playing 100 youth baseball games a year is not the best use of a young person’s time and a parent’s money
While I completely agree, I think the problem with these youth tournaments is only a microcosm of a much larger problem with youth sports today. At some point over the past 20 years, youth sports has turned into a "for profit" business. I find it disgusting and as you said completely predatory. When I grew up (80's & 90's) playing high level competitive sports (hockey) here in Canada, it was much more of a volunteer, community based environment. This community based environment meant that you grew up playing with a core group of kids and families. The make up of the team would change slightly from year to year but you typically played locally and went school with the kids on your community club team. To this day some of my parents best friends are other parents from the community teams my brother and I grew up playing for, 20+ years ago. It's now an arms race where most parents are only looking get little Johnny or Mary a leg up, and don't really care what happens to the other kids on the team. Your child's so called "teammates"... More like place fillers on your child's journey to their next big thing. Famillies move around looking for the best opportunities for their kids, changing teams and organizations every year. Withholding / guarding information from other families about great camps or off season training programs. For fear that another teammate could also benefit from the training and could replace their child on the depth chart. As opposed to the thinking that "A rising tide lifts all boats" and the extra training will improve the team overall. Unfortunately youth sports is in a pretty bad state. The prevailing attitude of parents that I've heard countless times is "I don't like it, but I have no choice" or "like it or not you have get on board". This attitude fundamentally comes from FOMO (fear of missing out). It is going to be a very difficult if not impossible thing to change. It's going to take leadership from people like yourself, who have platforms like this and can speak from experience to convince / empower parents to stand up to a multi billion dollar youth sports industry and say NO MORE. Thanks for making this video....
There is only one solution to this but not likely to happen. There needs to be a return to local league play. Baseball academies need to dissolve for local leagues to flourish again. This resolves almost all the concerns mentioned in this video. Not likely to happen. Other youth sports are suffering similarly as youth sports becomes more of a business. For better or worse.
Overall, don't disagree with the vast majority of your reasoning. However, in smaller metro areas that don't have large baseball communities, teams do travel to tournaments because they'll get a different set of competition at typically a higher level. Living in Eastern Washington where population density is considerably smaller than on the East coast, there aren't nearly as many teams/organizations and there is a very distinct gap in talent/ability. So, travelling to the Seattle area (4 hrs away), tends to offer a wider set of competition at a higher level. It is expensive to do and 100% agree with it being taxing on families, but I'm not entirely sure that there's much else to do.
Agreed. Most teams in this area play all the local tournaments and play double headers against other local teams and supplement with the out of town tournaments.
Greedy owners pack tournaments with too many teams. I end up at times umpiring with incompetent umpires on terrible fields. West Coast Premier is guilty of this despicable practice.
I’ll tell you the problem with youth Baseball is we talk so much about what’s wrong with youth baseball. the problem is this or that whith youth baseball. People say the parents are ruining youth baseball. The coaches are ruining youth baseball winning mentality is ruining youth baseball tournaments are ruining youth baseball. It is so bad it’s crept into practices. Don’t do that. Don’t do this. Don’t do this. Don’t do that. Great advice I heard probably on this channel is don’t say don’t. Instead give them tools. Give them a yes do that. Don’t just yell at little Johnny to keep his eye on the ball. Tell him why he needs to keep his chin planted over his front shoulder and see the ball with two eyes. teach him to keep his weight back and his head stacked just in front of his back leg, I’ve coached Park and rec league T-ball on up to 10 under travel baseball and I’ve had nothing but great experiences. I will say though participation, trophies and winning doesn’t matter that does hurt and I’m not just talking about Baseball . Why can’t we celebrate the teams that are exceptional and the players who excel. Envy is a sin. Why not admire and emulate top performers what are they doing that you should be doing to be successful? And no, I am not a tournament only team coach we went .500 in league this year. In my 10-year-olds did not get equal opportunity all over the field winning does matter if I played everybody we would’ve won three games this year you got them put them in places to be successful as a team they can learn how to star in a role. And you know what if they don’t like their role they could always just work harder and play better easier to teach him when they’re young then when they’re older, have fun cutting off the dopamine stream of participation trophies for 17 and 18-year-olds who’ve been told they’re all the same their whole life. It’s not true stop lying to the kids.
You seam to forget one big thing. If your not a all in travel baseball family you probably should stick to playing rec. Ball. Travel baseball is not for everyone. But I can say this your player will struggle to make a high school baseball team not having I high level travel background. High school coaches don't want to have to teach rec players all the advanced baseball that travel kids learn very early on. But just remember , just because you can play dose not mean you should play tournaments
SAME thing in soccer etc.... its all kickbacks gate fees and if your age group is big enough you end up playing your own damn club in a glorified scrimmage
just like any other movement - voicing opinions publicly, putting pressure on heads of organizations and banding people together and voting with their dollars. this is why I'm making these videos. it's a consumer choice movement that has to happen.
@@DanBlewett very good point. Tournament I was in this past Friday- Sunday charged $10 to watch mediocre baseball on terrible fields and my umpire partners were pathetic
@@DanBlewettIn Rochester, NY we must have 12-15 towns + the city in our area, all within 30 minutes. My son is currently doing U10 spring and fall rec ball. He's getting tons of reps. He's getting on to all star teams (which play around the metro area). And the travel parents don't mention any of the stuff you're talking about. The stuff they do tell me is how they're getting out coached and losing games by up to 20 runs. It's not actually selling me me on having my kid try out. You however, have encouraged me to see what's possible to coordinate locally. Unfortunately travel/tournaments have appeared to be more of a 'status' thing with little discernible evidence of developing their players.
$25 to watch your kid hahahaha, that's crazy. I made it to a semi pro adult hockey league in europe and my Dad never in his life paid a single ticket. For free in youth, free tickets for relatives of players as adult. What is going on in US sports. Too many gambling ads?
Quit traveling and play local Little League. I have coached and umpired over the last decade and games run April through the end of September at our little league. For 12U on down that is plenty of practice and play to develop and work on baseball. Plus not a one of these private pay tournaments has the clout of LLWS… just sayin!
This is a pretty hyperbolic opinion of Select ball. You’re not wrong about the tournament promoters (we have Perfect Game here), but consider the alternative. The idea you proposed most cities already have and it’s called league ball. Aside from that, teams want to scrimmage all the time. What is stopping you from contacting any of the, likely dozen or more, teams and asking them to scrimmage? Promoters make the money because they do all the leg work to organize and facilitate. Do they charge too much? Perhaps, but who’s going to do it better? That’s the nice thing about America, you’re welcome to try. And I have not once seen hotel stays mandated. The opposite however is true in that they’ve offered discounts to teams traveling. And the whole gate fee thing, most of these premier facilities aren’t managed by municipalities, they’re privately owned with their own staff, maint crews etc. And how often do those events get rained out? Hardly ever because the fields are turf and that shit’s expensive. So if I have to go pay $20 a weekend to park in a nice facility and be guaranteed games, sign me up. Geez man, Select ball ain’t that bad, and in fact our kids love the competition and occasional travel. You want to make a change, start an organization to give us better umps, I think that would make everyone happier.
@@DanBlewett haha! I’m a select dad just like you man. Opposing opinions are sometimes tough to take. It’s easy to air out all the negative on a social platform like yours. I’m just offering some balance.
@@DanBlewett your argument is based on supposition, but you’re welcome to prove me wrong. If you want to choose to live in an echo chamber, go ahead. All I know is, if you want your ball player to make it to the next level here in NW Houston, it runs through select ball and private coaching, end of story. League ball ain’t cutting it.
@DanBlewett Correct. All the Triple Crown events are stay to play. The Hershey tournament up in PA is stay to play. They put a radius on them at least, so if your team is within x miles, you don't have to. But I completely agree with this take. Our organizations older team played space coast this summer and dad said it was 20 or 25 a day gate fee on top of all the rest, printing money. Our area (hampton roads) has so many local tournaments and teams that you don't need to drive all over the place, and our org is doing just that. You can easily fill a fall with DHs and never leave town. Only the top are going all over the place from what I can tell, for the most part.
I strongly disagree. I coached youth baseball for many years and we usually entered 2 tournaments, the players loved it. As a coach, I love tournaments because it’s a chess game trying to out manage other teams. The winner is usually the team who manages and navigate the pitchers the best through a lot of games in a few days.
You're preaching to the wrong choir. It's the coaches that are fed up with tournaments and wish they would all disappear. The problem is the group that you are talking to here, the parents. It's the parents that are brainwashed into thinking tourmwnets is the way to go. Us coaches can't do different because if we do, the parents will lose their mind and will definitely be gone after the year is over, if not before the year is over.
I agree with most of what you say. I've been an assistant coach with a softball team for 6 years. We've won lots of tournaments, and doing it our way by focusing on the girls development vs trying to win at all costs. The biggest drag for me is 12-14 hour days. It is exhausting for everyone. I think it burns out kids and parents. I like a round robin type tournament, play 3 games on Saturday and 2 on Sunday or something like that. No trophies involved just play and learn. A few years back we thought about trying to round up a bunch of teams to do a mini-league. It's not as easy as you think. We held our own friendly tournaments inviting local teams, one day 4 game max (3GG). As for showcase, I like them when there are no pool/bracket involved. I'd say the college coaches are semi-engaged. I've had some ask about our players while others barely pay attention and just berate the girls for not playing hard enough.
The game time limits are about greed. Too many games are scheduled on one diamond for the day so time limits are necessary. In Mesa Arizona I was required to work 7 games on a Thursday as an umpire. Ten minute break between games. My partner worked 7 plate games in a row because there was no time to change gear. You know who you are West Coast Premier. 14.5 hours on the field in one day. It’s bullshit. Tournament owners do not care about umpires.
1) You can compete locally. 2) International travel, seeing how other people live, visiting and exploring major cities, national parks, monuments, small towns - those are transformative for young people. Sitting in a suburb hotel and spending all day at a baseball complex is NOT the same. Certainly, there are good things about the tournament experience - they're not all bad by any means - but as a default format? It's killing youth sports.
@@DanBlewett I work a tournament in St. George Utah mid November, and then camp inside Zion National Park, and hike. It’s life changing. But I am a solo umpire who is retired. A very difficult situation than a family. If a family can take a day to visit a National Park after the tour it would be the best part of the adventure
