Little League, Yesterday and Today

U

Upgrayedd

100+ Posts
When I was a kid, I played baseball.

We had three or four helmets and bats that the whole team shared, one cheap-*** uniform, a simple package of pictures (team and individual) and nothing else. I think it cost maybe $50 to play a year.

Nowadays, my kid has to bring his own helmet and bat to every practice and game. The team has two hats, and a fancy game uniform and a practice one. (My kids practice uniform is as nice as most of my old game uniforms.)

It costs $250 to play, and then they want more money all year long, not to mention all the gear you have to buy. And now the coach is bringing in a ringer in the form of an ex-college stud to help coach the team, and we have to pony up another couple hundred bucks each.

Also, when I was a kid, the bulk of the baseball we played was not league games. We played in the backyard, from April until mid-August, from morning 'til dark, and then we turned to football. Now I never see kids doing any of that. My kid certainly doesn't do it.

What's my point? I am not sure. I just think it's sad that parents seem to think that kids' baseball has seemingly been taken over by parents, and that those parents make it so expensive and are so anal about micromanaging their kids affairs. Why can't we just let our kids play ball on their own?
 
Why can't we just let our kids play ball on their own?

Because "we" don't want to.

Seriously, it's mostly the parents who are driving this insanity, imo. Kids are specializing in sports at very young ages, getting repetitive motion injuries and (recently reported) knee injuries (acl type stuff).

"We" don't really let our kid play for fun. It has to be a means to an end: college scholarship, making the big leagues, etc.
 
You haven't even touched on the private hitting and pitching coaches at the baseball academies that seem to have sprouted up in every suburb.
 
Our LL season consisted of 16 games, the playoffs, and All-Stars. That's was it.

Nowadays, our local league has two 7-8 y/o teams playing spring, summer, and fall ball to the tune of 60+ games per year traveling all over Texas and the southeast United States. The $250 number is exceeded by a the price of gas and a hotel room for 3 nights in Biloxi for a tournament. And they'll do that 4 times a month.

Ridiculous. I've got a 7 y/o who's pretty talented at baseball but I refuse to be a part of something that has absolutely no long term benefit and most likely actually harms them physically, psychologically, and ethically in the long run.

In reply to:
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Kyrie, I'm jealous.

But I've sent my son out in the streets to play many times. The trouble is, although there are many kids in the neighborhood, we never see any except for one pretty profoundly retarded kid. So we send him in the backyard to go jump on a trampoline by himself.


At our old neighborhood, we lived in a quad-plex across the street from a park/school. There were a bunch of kids with recently divorced moms in the neighborhood, and one day I tried to get them and take them all to the park across the street to play ball with my son. The kids were all playing ball anyway in the courtyard of the apartments. They wouldn't let me because they wouldn't be able to see them at the park, but every time they would hit a foul ball where they were playing, one of the kids would dart between a bunch of parked cars out in the street to go get the ball.

Seems to me like far more kids get hit by cars than snatched by strangers, but that's not what these moms thought, even though they could the danger from the cars right in front of their eyes.
 
- the last two season my son has gotten lice from someone on the team - most probably from the catchers helmet. There is nothng more blood curdling than the scream of a mom who has just discovered one of her kids has lice...trust me.

Kyrie - I salute you...sounds like a great plan.
 
I think kids lives are overly "structured" these days. Everything seems to be in parentally supervised groups. While I'm not advocating wreckless abandon, kids need to deal with their peer group without supervision at times. Yeah the occasional fight is gonna break out, or injury from jumping bikes, etc., but it is a part of growing up.
 
I have nothing to add except to say that Kyrie is on a ******* roll today. Great long posts in many different threads. Hats off.
 
can't even begin to explain how many windows I broke playing baseball wherever I could when I was young.
I had one of those balls that would time how long it took to travel from your hand to another glove. It came with a chart and you could see how fast you were throwing. Just like the scene from The Sandlot, that was the only ball we had one day so we played with it instead of just throwing it around.
took one good hit and it was pretty much done for, but what a glorious HR it was.
Then we started using newspaper wrapped in duct tape and a stick. I'm only 33 so this wasn't in the stone ages either. Middle of San Antonio in the mid 80's.
Lice just means a shaved head and no haircuts for a while.
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What I want to do is get a bunch of like-minded parents to drop a bunch of kids off at some diamond at the same time, roll out a ball, and just let them pick their own teams and play.

We could sit off to the side and drink a beer or two and maybe break up a fight should one arise.
 
Some great parents out here with the right priorities!
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There is such a push to play just one sport and excel at it at an early age any more it is just sad. As someone pointed out in an earlier post - the focus for parents is college scholarships or professional sports. I remember a parent talking about how her 9 year old was leaving the soccer league we were in and play in a more competitive league because he wanted to play Olympic soccer and they wanted him to be in a league that would get him there -at nine years old!

Neither of the two older lostkids settled on one sport until at least high school. Lostchild #1 played multiple sports until high school graduation, Lostchild #2 settled on one in the middle of high school - and they are both pretty happy with where their respective sports have led them. Lostchild 3 is still happily playing baseball, football, basketball, track and swimming. When one ends the next one starts.

The NCAA commercial that always airs during NCAA championships are always so great - 95% of NCAA athletes go professional in something other than their sport. What do we want our kids to learn from sports? Teamwork, grace in losing, humility in winning? or how to do a great flip turn, throw a drop curve or jack up a three pointer?
 
My 7 year old is playing in Bellaire Little League which compared to anything I played in at his age 25 years ago is light years different, both good and bad. With all the additional instruction I don't think these kids are anywhere near as good as the teams I played on at that same age, I guess its less time playing on their own versus only putting on the glove while at practice.

One thing that was said I above I have to ask about...How do you limit your kids TV to 30 minutes? I mean it would kill my son to not be allowed to sit and watch the Longhorns, Rockets, or Astros which is more than 30 minutes a couple nights a week.
 
Kyrie,

It is good to known my wife and I are not alone in the world. Friends, family and co workers give us a lot of grief about we allow or do not allow our kids to do. My kids are 5 and 6. On top of the TV restrictions there are video game restrictions: 30 minutes a day on Fri, Sat, and Sun only and thats only if he did well in school for the week. We encourage our kids to read every night and listen too music. The only time they get on the computer is too play educational word or math games. No Candy, No Coke's except they can have a Sprite when we go out to eat on weekends.

I coach both soccer teams for my son and daughter. Our goals are simple: everyone go the right way, do not score goals on ourselves and have fun. I end every practice encouraging the kids to get in the backyard and play soccer. I tell the parents to get out there with them.

We are not perfect parents but I want my kids to enjoy being kids. There will come a time and place we they are forced to grow up but not right now or anytime in the future.

I would much rather have my kids get an educational scholarship that a sports.
 
i think some of you are getting stuff confused. the $50 YMCA leagues still exist in almost every sport. however, today you have choices. we play in a "upgraded" soccer league here in dallas. it isn't comprised of all select teams, but there are usually a couple in our league. same with baseball. i had tons of friends that played on the city league teams (15 games, no travel) and i played on the county team in 5th and 6th grade. we played about 70 games during the summer and traveled every weekend to tournaments. i'm 33, so that was 20 years ago.
 
bradford, right there with you. But to be honest, if they have a particularly good day...school, keep the room clean/picked up (and the royally SUCK at that), mind their manners and respect each other....I'm not above making them a badass chocolate malt and throw them a small Reese's.

I'm an asst. coach on my 7 y/o son's coach pitch team. The 3 of us called a meeting at my law office with the parents on Monday (after "draft" day which is ridiculous BS, too...there were coaches trading draft slots...for 7 y/os) where we laid out the ground rules: no negative yells, only positive (eg. no "Aww...c'mon. You know better than that" and instead "That's it. Good hustle. Next time.")....no cursing...no yelling/harassing the other team....and do whatever it takes to encourage them to have fun w/o tying their fun to winning.

Now, don't get me wrong....we the coaches get to tell them "don't do this" and get on 'em. But what won't the lines to be real clear: once they cross that white line they're OURS for the purpose of baseball and baseball only...not momma and daddy's.

As for how I keep them away from watching the 'horns, that's not really a problem.

My degrees are from LSU undergrad and Duke grad school. So not much to worry about west of the Sabine.

And for those who think the wife and are one of these never lay a hand on our kids folks, dispel the thought. I have before and no doubt will int he future belt their *** in a heartbeat for things like lying, being disrespectful, or generally doing something that they know is wrong. We're certainly not unfair about it....it's a rare thing to happen. But because we do it's becoming more rare as they grow older, which means they're getting it.

I don't understand parents who refuse to issue corporal punishment. That's just going to cost the kid in the future.
 
I think the overall play might have been better when I was a kid (due to us being outside much more than kids of today), but I there are many of these kids who due to professional training are light years ahead of what some of my teammates could do. In our league we've got a group of 9 year olds that are so much better than anything I saw as a kid it's not even close. They play select ball so they have a leg up....before anyone comes down on the parents, they all also play football, basketball and soccer. They're just really busy. I can't think of one of their parents who harbors a dream of them playing in college or professonally - there dreams are reserved for law school, medical school, etc.
 
My soon to be niece is a sophmore in high school and has been playing soccer for years. She plays varsity and on a club soccer team. IMO, one of the major reasons behind Upgrayedd's (2 Ds for a double dose of pimping) question of why they can't just go out and play ball, the pervasiveness of parents who live vicariously through their children. Its pretty pathetic to watch.
 
In an affluent area of Seattle where I live sports, club activities, and "playdates" are the only chance the kids get to socialize outside of school. Personally, this is the downside of living in the city. When I grew up in Nebraska we played outside ALL the time. Heck, the rule was "come in when the street lights come on" and "dinner is at 6pm and not a minute later". Now, my 3 boys (8, 6, and 5) never get to simply walk down the street and ask the neighbors to play. I spent $25,000 upgrading my backyard last year with a basketball court and trampoline (built into a hill) just to create some room so the kids had a place to go outside and play. We have a greenbelt next to our house but my wife isn't comfortable with simply letting them play in the woods. Maybe it's my midwestern roots but I don't see a problem with letting them play unsupervised.
 
I coached one season of basketball at WAYA and the players were all in elementary school. At the first coaches meeting, I was shocked to learn that we would be watching the boys scrimmage so that we could rank them for the league draft!
 
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