Travel Sports - "They Love It"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My friend's son was drafted in the first round for baseball. He didn't start playing travel ball until high school and that was only because it was becoming obvious that he was a major talent.

Playing travel ball at 10 means nothing. This kid played little league and pop warner football. Don't waste your money.

That's not the point of the thread. Even though I agree that this is a huge waste of money, the question is whether the kids love it. I also agree that most kids won't play in college, but that's still not the question. Kids can love a sport even if they don't end up playing in college.

[Anonymous]

I think there needs to be a distinction between parents feeling the need to attend every single out-of-town tournament vs. their kid's loving it.

It's safe to say that any kid would love to go visit an amusement park with friends and stay at a hotel with a pool...so it's strange to say "my kid loves the sport" but the answer is because of all the other things they do beside playing the sport.

I get that the travel sport makes arranging for overnight stays easier because it's a date and place that everyone will travel to and is set by the sports schedule vs. trying to arrange a group weekend vacation somewhere.

I say my kid "loves it" because once they were able to drive, they were excited to get up at 6am and drive to Fredericksburg or Richmond on their own to play in a tournament, even though they needed to be back in DC the same day for something else.

It was painful and we gave them the choice to skip that particular day...but they said no chance.

Before they could drive, we split travel duties with 3 other families so parents only had to attend one tournament a season. We enjoyed that one tournament...but one was plenty for each of our group.

[Anonymous]

Ok. I was one of those- “travel sports is not for me!” parents.

In our baseball travel experience- very few kids are forced to play it. They really love it. They ask to be on the team. They give up school friends for it. They sacrifice their time and money (their own money!) for it.

So I really didn’t want to do it. No chance my kid will get recruited.

And now…. It looks like he might get recruited.

You just don’t know. And honestly, I know this is weird, it creates an automatic club for them in school. They are part of something and it helps them form lasting relationships.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend's son was drafted in the first round for baseball. He didn't start playing travel ball until high school and that was only because it was becoming obvious that he was a major talent.

Playing travel ball at 10 means nothing. This kid played little league and pop warner football. Don't waste your money.

That's not the point of the thread. Even though I agree that this is a huge waste of money, the question is whether the kids love it. I also agree that most kids won't play in college, but that's still not the question. Kids can love a sport even if they don't end up playing in college.

There are probably some who don't love it. But I think the majority do love it. I can't imagine most parents are spending that amount of money and time to bring their kids to tournaments and practices kicking and screaming just so they can say their kids play a travel sport.

The minute my kids complain about going to their sports or asking to skip practice is when I save my money and they stop playing.