Youth sports business - viewed by Michael Lewis

[AgronAlum]

PE has bought everything and just like every single thing PE touches, it has turned to ****. There are instances of PE firms charging parents memberships to be able to film their kids from the stands. It's masked as a "safety" issue so people aren't recording random kids playing sports.

We've been rec league, I9 and school ball so far. I think next year will be the first for club sports.

Also, I think the increase in cost of everything has given parents the mentality that they can do whatever the **** they want from the sidelines because of how much they invested. It's time for sports to scale back and for parents to shut the **** up.


At least stuff like the Take Back Sports movement is starting to be nationalized.

Take Back Sports - Positive Coaching Alliance

Español PARENT WORKSHOPS PCA workshops provide practical, research-backed strategies to create positive, high-performing environments where athletes thrive on and off the field. Workshops are led by experienced trainers and sessions are interactive, actionable, and built to help Take Back...

positivecoach.org

This is the message we got after my son’s 8th grade season was done and what is expected as a kid going into their freshman year. There’s no such thing as a basketball season even for school ball.

 

[Drew0311]

The Youth Sports industry is praying on parents / grandparents, and the biggest loser in this madness are the kids. Parents are "buying" into their sales pitch that in order to compete, we need to participate year around in training / competitions.

What is happening is the kids' childhood is being stolen from them for the whisper that your kid is special, and for only a few dollars and some weekend travel your kid will develop into a D1 athlete.

Here is the honest truth....if your kid is truly one of the 1% that has the ability to play D1 athletics...that talent will be discovered regardless of all the money you have spent.

And the worst sin is the amount of valuable family time that is being sacrificed for this lie. Family vacations...sorry we have a AAU tournament in Minneapolis, Sunday Church...no we have a 5 year old soccer game scheduled in Waukee, Grandparents want to take us fishing...no our baseball team is playing in KC for the 3d time this month. Absolute madness!

I think the thing you are missing here is this. It will be discovered. However, it will be discovered by an AAU coach or Club Soccer team. Not a college. College coaches don't go to see some random high school game for a kid they heard about. They go to AAU games and USAAA baseball games. So if you do have a kid that is in the 1 percent, they will end up on one of those teams. Now if you have a complete stud, the chances of you paying for the AAU team is very low. The parents who pay are the ones with very average kids who pay the fee's. That is the catch. If you just enjoy spending time with your kid and know they are not going to be the big "D1" kid and you know what you are paying for, it's awesome. The biggest issue is the parents who are trying to talk to the recruiters and their kid is not that good and they think they are that good.

 

[brokenloginagain]

I post this on CF all the time...its my favorite haha.

 

[coolerifyoudid]

I spent a ton on my daughters soccer when she was growing up. She played on a Traveling team at VSA in Waukee. Ill never regret it. We spent so much time together traveling around. Hotels all over the country, driving all around the midwest to get her to games, the time she spent with her team. She didn't want to play college soccer so we didn't have to go through all of that. A lot of college soccer coaches tried talking her into playing and she didn't want to. So we had no delusions of paying all this money for a D1 scholly. I knew what it was. So I would highly suggest if you have the money and don't mind doing it, it's so worth it. It creates a great bond. I think the problem exists is parents who think they have the next D1 star on their hands and they are spending the money to get a payoff.

My situation is similar to yours, but with less travel. My daughter is playing intramural soccer in college, but she was done with the committment needed for anything more.

As a competitive person, I initially bought into the sales pitch from clubs. It's hard not to, especially if your kid is having early success. When it started feeling like the sport was starting to not be fun for her, I had to do some self-reflection and get back to realizing that this is for her, not me. There was also a learning curve for me to know how to talk to my daughter after games. Sometimes, she wanted to talk about it and other times, she wanted to talk about anything else. Once I figured out to let her instigate the car ride conversation, it was night and day.

There is a lot of value in the time you spend together as long as you're not an overbearing parent that wants to criticize your kid about everything they didn't do perfect. My daughter's team was made up of girls from all around KC, so she had a friend group completely separate from school, which I cannot recommend enough. I realize you can get this from all levels, rec included, but this is really valuable to girls. They are inevitably going to go through some **** with their school friends and having an outlet is really valuable.

One last note to younger parents. I think girls typically hit a burnout stage around sophomore/junior year unless they are completely enamored with the sport, so don't be too surprised when that happens. They will see friends that are not in competitive sports have a better social life and want it for themselves.

 

[Clonefan32]

So much of the problem is the early age we do all this stuff. So much of early success is dependent on physical development. You have kids that lose interest and not playing that grow into good athletes, and you have some kids that get extra attention and coaching never develop physically. "Good" is so often equated with physical development.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

The Youth Sports industry is praying on parents / grandparents, and the biggest loser in this madness are the kids. Parents are "buying" into their sales pitch that in order to compete, we need to participate year around in training / competitions.

What is happening is the kids' childhood is being stolen from them for the whisper that your kid is special, and for only a few dollars and some weekend travel your kid will develop into a D1 athlete.

Here is the honest truth....if your kid is truly one of the 1% that has the ability to play D1 athletics...that talent will be discovered regardless of all the money you have spent.

And the worst sin is the amount of valuable family time that is being sacrificed for this lie. Family vacations...sorry we have a AAU tournament in Minneapolis, Sunday Church...no we have a 5 year old soccer game scheduled in Waukee, Grandparents want to take us fishing...no our baseball team is playing in KC for the 3d time this month. Absolute madness!

Yeah your bolded part is 100% false. Plenty of kids who have that talent miss out because they can’t afford the high end opportunities.

Any sport that requires more then just size and athleticism those plays will far extremely far behind from a skills perspective.

If you take a simple and cheap sport like soccer most kids will start the same but the ones that keep advancing through the higher end travel and club teams are the ones getting scouted and the ones that develop the skills.

Most of this comes down to having actual coaches with experience and skill themselves vs just some random parent that signed up to be a parks and rec coach.

 

[BigTurk]

I have a middle school kid playing club sport lacrosse. He has tried almost every sport other than soccer and basketball. Lacrosse is a bit different since it is a niche sport in Iowa. The costs haven't been too bad, about $500 for the year, with very little travel. We have the opportunity to participate in two out of state tournaments (IL and MN) this spring but are not mandatory. Thus far he loves it.

We were approached by a recruiting service. Pay $2K and we will help your kid get discovered. We bit. As of now he does want to play college lacrosse, but I have my doubts the $2k will land him a big scholarship so I feel torn about spending that money. Having said that from a motivation and an academic standpoint it was totally worth the cost. The service provides work shops on things like academics and time management, the coach gives him academic tasks to do (interview three people and ask them about their educational journey) all of which he has done with great enthusiasm. If we asked him to do those things we wouldn't but knowing we spent that money he is all in. Again, DI athletic scholarship is a pipe dream, but getting him off his PS5 and into more academic and athletic activities as a result is worth every penny.

 

[Bigman38]

Yeah your bolded part is 100% false. Plenty of kids who have that talent miss out because they can’t afford the high end opportunities.

Any sport that requires more then just size and athleticism those plays will far extremely far behind from a skills perspective.

If you take a simple and cheap sport like soccer most kids will start the same but the ones that keep advancing through the higher end travel and club teams are the ones getting scouted and the ones that develop the skills.

Most of this comes down to having actual coaches with experience and skill themselves vs just some random parent that signed up to be a parks and rec coach.

With kids middle school age right now this is the exact opposite of their experience and their peers. It didn't matter how many years of club volleyball/basketball they played, the best athletes went on the top teams. Many hadn't played in years because they were focused on another sport like soccer or softball. And logically I assume there was some skill gap, I wasn't at practice, but by the time they were playing games you couldn't see much of a difference in skills if any.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

With kids middle school age right now this is the exact opposite of their experience and their peers. It didn't matter how many years of club volleyball/basketball they played, the best athletes went on the top teams. Many hadn't played in years because they were focused on another sport like soccer or softball. And logically I assume there was some skill gap, I wasn't at practice, but by the time they were playing games you couldn't see much of a difference in skills if any.

Yeah middle school it’s just who has hit puberty first and stayed most coordinated, as the years go by that gap will get larger and larger with the best kids going on to play club sports.

Out of curiosity what are top teams in middle school that aren’t the club teams?

 

[JEFF420]

i have 5 and 2 year olds. more loading. We ain't playing the travel sports game.

 

[Bigman38]

Yeah middle school it’s just who has hit puberty first and stayed most coordinated, as the years go by that gap will get larger and larger with the best kids going on to play club sports.

Out of curiosity what are top teams in middle school that aren’t the club teams?

I'm talking about the different levels of school teams, A, B, C, etc.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

I'm talking about the different levels of school teams, A, B, C, etc.

Ahhh got ya. Never had those, so that’s out of my experience level. But for middle school that tracks. It’s just basic ability then more then skill, as everyone’s bodies catch up then the skill matters much more. Obv a big sport dependent and for football there isn’t much in the way of clubs, just camps

 

[cyclonespiker33]

With kids middle school age right now this is the exact opposite of their experience and their peers. It didn't matter how many years of club volleyball/basketball they played, the best athletes went on the top teams. Many hadn't played in years because they were focused on another sport like soccer or softball. And logically I assume there was some skill gap, I wasn't at practice, but by the time they were playing games you couldn't see much of a difference in skills if any.

With volleyball, 14U is the latest you can start playing competitive club without being too far behind. Even then, it's going to take someone that has high athleticism combined with good coaching.

 

[cycloneted]

With all the money flying around I find it interesting that the Ignit facility went belly-up so fast and the Kettlestone facility in Waukee is having such an issue, property tax exemption or not.

 

[Big_Sill]

i have 5 and 2 year olds. more loading. We ain't playing the travel sports game.

See @coolerifyoudid post above. There is a way to do it that is fun and beneficial for your kids.

 

[qwerty]

I have a middle school kid playing club sport lacrosse. He has tried almost every sport other than soccer and basketball. Lacrosse is a bit different since it is a niche sport in Iowa. The costs haven't been too bad, about $500 for the year, with very little travel. We have the opportunity to participate in two out of state tournaments (IL and MN) this spring but are not mandatory. Thus far he loves it.

We were approached by a recruiting service. Pay $2K and we will help your kid get discovered. We bit. As of now he does want to play college lacrosse, but I have my doubts the $2k will land him a big scholarship so I feel torn about spending that money. Having said that from a motivation and an academic standpoint it was totally worth the cost. The service provides work shops on things like academics and time management, the coach gives him academic tasks to do (interview three people and ask them about their educational journey) all of which he has done with great enthusiasm. If we asked him to do those things we wouldn't but knowing we spent that money he is all in. Again, DI athletic scholarship is a pipe dream, but getting him off his PS5 and into more academic and athletic activities as a result is worth every penny.

A college roommate of mine is a college women's lacrosse official. Travels all over Midwest. He says there is not a single college lacrosse official in Iowa (he lives in KC). Goes as far as Wisconsin for weekend tourneys.

He tried to talk me into it, said it is just like basketball. I watched a couple of videos and said, Hell No.

 

[cyclonespiker33]

With all the money flying around I find it interesting that the Ignit facility went belly-up so fast and the Kettlestone facility in Waukee is having such an issue, property tax exemption or not.

I coached one season at Ignit right after they moved into the current facility, about 9 years ago.

Their biggest problem was the same problem you see with a lot of failing restaurants and bars. The owners didn't have the business acumen to run a club. They didn't know the numbers and it eventually caught up with them. I could see the problems back then and got out quickly. They have always had a high turnover of coaches.

 

[AgronAlum]

I coached one season at Ignit right after they moved into the current facility, about 9 years ago.

Their biggest problem was the same problem you see with a lot of failing restaurants and bars. The owners didn't have the business acumen to run a club. They didn't know the numbers and it eventually caught up with them. I could see the problems back then and got out quickly. They have always had a high turnover of coaches.

I'm also betting their failed venture in Johnston with the golf thing bled over into Ignit and they just couldn't pay the bills. It sounds like they bit off more than they could chew and are in way over their heads.

 

[Cyclone06]

I was recently at a conference last week that had a speaker discuss travel sports and the effect on kids and parents. He mentioned that kids struggle mentally because that sport becomes their identity and once they get to a level of failure, they don't know how to handle things because it is all they know. There is a reason why many college coaches have stressed the importance of playing multiple sports because it actually helps the athletes

In summary, they need to learn how to lose and come back again.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

In summary, they need to learn how to lose and come back again.

A lesson Gen Alpha and younger Gen Z are stuggling with in general