Travel sports are killing American families

[Anonymous]

It’s a total racket but “killing the American family” seems a bit much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No idea who this guy is, but it’s absolutely true that the youth sports industry is not set up in the best interest of kids and families. It takes away time from free play and pick-up games, and all the social skills that children get when they organize themselves, set and enforce rules, etc. And because so many kids participate, even the families who would prefer to just send their kids to the park to play kickball with the neighbor kids feel they have no choice.

And ironically, it often sets kids up to become sedentary adults because they don’t learn the joy of living an active lifestyle for its own sake vs. training for a highly competitive and very specific setting. Only a small number of kids can actually be the best at an elite level, and it’s easy for the rest to end up internalizing “this isn’t my thing” and end up applying they attitude to exercise more broadly.

I recently heard a high school coach identify the bolded as one of the biggest issues he saw with childhood today. With kids having 30 minutes or less at recess they don't practice those skills much there either. At our elementary school they usually get in fights over the rules and exasperated teachers just shut down all games to keep the fights at bay. Definitely a long way from The Sandlot (not that that was every reality, but you know).

[Anonymous]

The parent of a kid who is not particularly athletic, I’m selfishly grateful for travel sports. He’s in 7th grade and all the athletically talented kids are now very involved with their travel teams so my son’s rec league is finally just boys who like to play and don’t take it all super seriously. My son gets a lot of playing time and just has fun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is what John Delony stated on his show [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvkpAkDmf-Y]. It's a 1 hour show, but the sports discussion is in the first 20 minutes of the show. His argument is that the family should not revolve around a 10 year old's sport. He also talks about younger and younger kids playing their sports to the point of getting injured from over-using their bodies.

Who is this and why is his opinion about anything valid or influential.

See a previous post for information about John Delony. I am not claiming that his opinions are valid or influential: might be just confirmation bias for me. My DD is in a travel team and - similarly to the caller into the show - I have a gut feeling that travel sports are a business that doesn't necessarily care about kids as much as they are trying to get them hooked in a multi-year enterprise that they are benefiting from.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Travel sports seem dreadful and I honestly can't understand how so many parents get sucked into this.

I said the same thing and then ended up with three in travel sports. The problem is that the rec sports sort of die out after 6th/7th grade. And if you want to play a HS sport at your 3000 kid public HS, you need to be playing on a pretty competitive team in 8th grade at least. I really discouraged all my kids but at the end of the day was not willing to put my foot down and say no when it was something they really wanted to do. On the upside, we do what is sort of “travel lite”—usually 2 practices a week and then tournaments 3–8 tournaments a year. If we only had one kid that would be totally doable—but again I wasn’t willing to tell my youngest she couldn’t do something I had left the oldest do.

I wish there wasn’t such a market for travel draining all the kids from rec leagues. We would have stayed in rec leagues through MS but it becomes hard to find teams, or the teams are filled with kids that are brand new to sport so it’s not so fun.

I'm assuming most people think the tween/teen years are ok for travel (assuming they don't object to travel sports in and of themselves)

But there are 7 year olds doing travel, and playing a sport year round, which is more of the problem I think people are referring to.

[Anonymous]

Wow so much hand wringing!

People, travel sports can be positive experiences for kids. Families too! It got my family out of the house on weekends, and often our other kid wanted to join.Overall it increased our family hang out time.
My DD was burned on it by 8th grade and moved on to High School stuff.

It was a challenging experience overall for her and helped give her clarity about how she wanted to spend her time in HS

But it’s not for everyone and it’s okay to opt out.

[Anonymous]

Why is it the people who have a problem with it are the ones who don't do it? Why do they care? Because nobody came to your kids birthday party at 2pm on a Saturday because they were busy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow so much hand wringing!

People, travel sports can be positive experiences for kids. Families too! It got my family out of the house on weekends, and often our other kid wanted to join.Overall it increased our family hang out time.
My DD was burned on it by 8th grade and moved on to High School stuff.

It was a challenging experience overall for her and helped give her clarity about how she wanted to spend her time in HS

But it’s not for everyone and it’s okay to opt out.

I’m other words, travel may have made your DD burn out and quit her sport by high school, like 70% of young athletes apparently do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is it the people who have a problem with it are the ones who don't do it? Why do they care? Because nobody came to your kids birthday party at 2pm on a Saturday because they were busy?

You are reading selectively: I am the OP and my DD is on a travel team. Despite what you seem to believe, even people who do it have a problem with it. Please don't read this as "all people involved in travel sports have a problem with it."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow so much hand wringing!

People, travel sports can be positive experiences for kids. Families too! It got my family out of the house on weekends, and often our other kid wanted to join.Overall it increased our family hang out time.
My DD was burned on it by 8th grade and moved on to High School stuff.

It was a challenging experience overall for her and helped give her clarity about how she wanted to spend her time in HS

But it’s not for everyone and it’s okay to opt out.

You seem happy that your DD moved on to HS stuff. What if she decided to give you four more years of family hang out time?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it the people who have a problem with it are the ones who don't do it? Why do they care? Because nobody came to your kids birthday party at 2pm on a Saturday because they were busy?

You are reading selectively: I am the OP and my DD is on a travel team. Despite what you seem to believe, even people who do it have a problem with it. Please don't read this as "all people involved in travel sports have a problem with it."

It’s funny. I find it’s often the travel parents complaining and being defensive about how they wish they didn’t have to do travel. Um it’s a choice! You are showing with your participation, time, and money that there is a demand for travel. If you and other travel families opted to stay in club or local… well then the house teams would have a higher quality of players and if enough players would likely split into tiers. Not necessary to travel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it the people who have a problem with it are the ones who don't do it? Why do they care? Because nobody came to your kids birthday party at 2pm on a Saturday because they were busy?

You are reading selectively: I am the OP and my DD is on a travel team. Despite what you seem to believe, even people who do it have a problem with it. Please don't read this as "all people involved in travel sports have a problem with it."

Sorry but the vast majority of people here are complaining about what others are doing. Few are saying "I feel so ripped off! My weekend are ruined!!" I have 2 kids in travel sports, btw.

[Anonymous]

This is silly. Our child is in a travel sport and little to none of these completes resonate.

Also people always argue that childhood should be more unorganized and free but I have been shocked at how much her friends sit at home on their computers playing Roblox for hours on weeknights and weekends. I far prefer her travel sport lifestyle for her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it the people who have a problem with it are the ones who don't do it? Why do they care? Because nobody came to your kids birthday party at 2pm on a Saturday because they were busy?

You are reading selectively: I am the OP and my DD is on a travel team. Despite what you seem to believe, even people who do it have a problem with it. Please don't read this as "all people involved in travel sports have a problem with it."

So quit? Why would you let it kill your family? But you don't speak for everyone.

[Anonymous]

Its OK for some families. Those for whom it's not are not obligated. Also its ok in some seasons and not others. Im glad there are enough teams fo fit whatever works best at that time for us.