Ball = Money

I've often said, if I were coaching youth sports today, I'm not sure how well #CoachJeff would fare.

I think I also told you the story about how the young mother approached me during tryouts for one of our youngest rec baseball leagues many years ago and asked for advice about how to guarantee "Little Johnny" would "make it." She meant to the bigs. 

I don't think, by any means, she was the only parent with gold dust in their eyes. And I don't think she appreciated my somewhat dismissive reply. 

But I'm sure I didn't deter her efforts and, according to an article in from the Wall Street Journal earlier this month, parents are lining up more than ever to pay top dollar to chase the dream. Er, um, I mean for Little Johnny to chase his dream. 

From the details included in the article, it seems many modern parents are willing to pay top money for top ball. For them, Money = Ball. Ball = Money.

In other words, a far cry from when the Concord Choppers made our pitch with an economical approach to filling a niche between rec leagues and uber travel teams.

I'll spare you from a recitation of the article. If you'd like to peruse it at the link above, I would highly recommend it. Well written. Well research. Lots of illuminating details.

For historical reference, the Choppers team budget, ca. late 2000s, would have been a few thousand dollars. And that was mitigated by a couple sponsorships. Otherwise, we passed the hat and parents chipped in.

We shopped for less expensive tournaments and we didn't travel out of the area. I sometimes wish we had done that, at least once, for the experience. But I sure wasn't going to go back to the parents had in hand after we made our initial pitch.

Not so, in the modern era, says the author of this piece, it is not unheard of for modern parents to pay an averge of $6,000 each or even upwards of $10K to play elite travel ball. I know there has been inflation in the last 20 years, but...

Another point the author makes, and I definitely saw this from my coaching experience, is that many of these parents are pushing their kids into these uber programs as a status symbol or for a fear of being left out. Others, of course, are hoping Little Johnny cashes in for the benefit of the fam.

The stats I really wanted to share with you are similar to the ones I told Momma so many years ago. 

Quotes the WSJ reporter, Harriet Ryan:

Less than 3% of high school players will play (college baseball) Division I, according to NCAA data, and fewer still will receive an athletic scholarship and NIL. The chance of a pro career is even more remote, with only about 5% of college players at any level making the draft.

When I started rolling out those sorts of stats, that's when Momma grabbed junior's hand and whisked him away with a dismissive "C'mon Johnny. We're not getting anywhere here." I do hope they made it. Really I do. It seemed so important to Johnny ('s mom).

As an old coach looking at this from the 10,000 foot level, there are a few things that strike me as troubling beyond the basic premise that Little Johnny is guaranteed to make it if pop ponies up. 

Truly, these programs are excellent and they serve a good purpose for elite youth talent. I'm not disputing that. 

But for others: Are we pricing out lower income families from the game? What ramifications will that have 10, 20, 50 years down the line?

Also, what of the families who aren't looking for the big payoff and just want their child to be able to have fun, learn the game, experience teamwork and camaraderie in a low-stakes environment? Is there a point at which rec leagues struggle because of depleted numbers? I sure hope not.

Long before the Choppers were champs and long before we stepped up to a travel schedule, our's was a rec team. And if you go way far back, we weren't a very good one. 

Bad News Bears? Hardly. But few people cared about wins and losses then anyway. 

• Spending time with your 7-year-old buddies
• Having the team snack after the game 
• Then going to your pal's house for a playdate later on Saturday

That was the important agenda.

But, I did see glimpses of what was covered in the WSJ piece from time to time.

For instance, one weekend, an uber team rolled into town from the Atlanta suburbs. They brought a branded travel trailer that toted all their gear up I-75. The parents brought designer tents and wore matching jerseys and jackets. 

I asked the coach why such an uber team had come here to play in a low stakes tournament. He shrugged and said, in essence, they needed a change of scenery. 

My fear is that these days, there might be four or five such uber teams and very few Chopperesque clubs to face them.

I'm too far removed from the game to draw any conclusions from what I read (and what I've heard). But I think I experienced some of what was to come in that scenario and in a few others. 

I'm glad we finished when we did and that I didn't stick around to see what came next.

JG