Definitely Not A Cop said:

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My child is going to be the Tiger Woods of Deep Snapping. He will be in camps from the time he is 5, he is will not be allowed to play any other sports.

It's the best position in sports. Nobody values it, so anyone dedicated is guaranteed to make at least league minimum in the NFL, and it's illegal to touch them, unlike being a kicker.

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You joke but that is already a defined path with summer camps and year round practice. My extended family was caught up in it, and it gave the son access to a tier of universities he wouldn't have been able to attend otherwise.

Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Don't get me started on what a poor investment I believe travel sports are for many people. If you think little Kaden is going D1 and neither you nor your wife did so, you're probably better off having family time on the weekends, putting the travel-ball money into a college fund, letting Kaden play in the local little league and on school teams when he's older, and not forcing younger siblings to tag along to another family weekend at a crappy Hampton Inn.

It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

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Yes you're wrong and your post makes you sound envious of people with money and/or athletic kids. Nobody we played ball with was doing it for the scholarship although a couple of our teammates did get partials. We did it because the kids loved playing and it was a great way to spend time together. Also, your kid isn't making the school team if he's just playing Little League so you'd miss out on that.

BTW Little League is a bigger time boof than tournament ball because it is one game every weekend and usually practice on Sundays. Travel ball was typically every other weekend so we'd get to have our adventures on the off weekends. The money we spent would hardy put a dent into a college degree.

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Not envious or incapable. Kids were good high school athletes who mainly played football and ran track after they got older, so travel sports became unnecessary. We did a bit of travel sports when they were younger but it did not fit our family's goals. We had an excellent little league in our area that included a development program to address the shortcomings you mention.

It was mainly the baseball parents who prompted my post above. I'm glad your situation was different. What I said above was indeed applicable to many families I have known. Note the qualifiers in my post.

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Well, if you live in a state like California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, etc and your kid wants to play high school baseball guess what? They better be playing travel ball or they have no chance. That is what the vast majority of travel ball parents do it for here in SoCal which is far and away the #1 talent area for baseball. And that doesn't mean you have to spend 10k a year and travel all over the country. There are plenty of 200 a month teams that play occasional local/regional tournaments.

Kids don't get cut in football, so that is a poor comparison.

Scotty Appleton said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Don't get me started on what a poor investment I believe travel sports are for many people. If you think little Kaden is going D1 and neither you nor your wife did so, you're probably better off having family time on the weekends, putting the travel-ball money into a college fund, letting Kaden play in the local little league and on school teams when he's older, and not forcing younger siblings to tag along to another family weekend at a crappy Hampton Inn.

It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

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Yes you're wrong and your post makes you sound envious of people with money and/or athletic kids. Nobody we played ball with was doing it for the scholarship although a couple of our teammates did get partials. We did it because the kids loved playing and it was a great way to spend time together. Also, your kid isn't making the school team if he's just playing Little League so you'd miss out on that.

BTW Little League is a bigger time boof than tournament ball because it is one game every weekend and usually practice on Sundays. Travel ball was typically every other weekend so we'd get to have our adventures on the off weekends. The money we spent would hardy put a dent into a college degree.

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Not envious or incapable. Kids were good high school athletes who mainly played football and ran track after they got older, so travel sports became unnecessary. We did a bit of travel sports when they were younger but it did not fit our family's goals. We had an excellent little league in our area that included a development program to address the shortcomings you mention.

It was mainly the baseball parents who prompted my post above. I'm glad your situation was different. What I said above was indeed applicable to many families I have known. Note the qualifiers in my post.

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Well, if you live in a state like California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, etc and your kid wants to play high school baseball guess what? They better be playing travel ball or they have no chance. That is what the vast majority of travel ball parents do it for here in SoCal which is far and away the #1 talent area for baseball. And that doesn't mean you have to spend 10k a year and travel all over the country. There are plenty of 200 a month teams that play occasional local/regional tournaments.

Kids don't get cut in football, so that is a poor comparison.

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It was implicit in the original post, but I'll make it explicit. I'm not saying all travel sports are a waste of time and money. I also recognize that there is a skills arm race in some sports like baseball. I was referring to the people who think it is a viable path to a college scholarship, particularly in baseball where a half scholarship is about the best you can hope for, especially if the kid is not a genetic freak with genetic freak parents. I've known parents who talk about it being an investment to get their kid a "free" college education. In these cases, it often seems more like an ego trip for a dad who is trying to relive his youth.

Once people realize that vast majority of kids are the proverbial "tackling dummy" for the kids who have real potential, then the picture becomes more obvious about their kids prospects in sports. Sports are great for kids in so many ways but the travel sports industrial complex has tainted youth sports in many ways.

Ferg said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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Silly Protestants-

Saturday mass counts

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Saturday Evening Mass Counts starting 4PM Mass and after.

Those are called Vigil masses. (Just like Christmas Eve Masses)

Also, Catholic Churches have multiple masses on Sunday morning, some at 730 or earlier.

I played hoops for a Catholic High School, and we had Sunday afternoon and evening games and that was a half century ago.

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This thread is a huge nothing burger. Catholics have many opportunities to attend mass. For the shut-ins their is home ministries (communion) and Sunday mass broadcast on-air.

Take some time to learn someone else's religion, it keeps you making a fool out of yourself.

I did this when my son was involved in select soccer. I look back at that time and really regret that now.

The parents are choosing this.

Stop blaming sports

Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Scotty Appleton said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Don't get me started on what a poor investment I believe travel sports are for many people. If you think little Kaden is going D1 and neither you nor your wife did so, you're probably better off having family time on the weekends, putting the travel-ball money into a college fund, letting Kaden play in the local little league and on school teams when he's older, and not forcing younger siblings to tag along to another family weekend at a crappy Hampton Inn.

It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

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Yes you're wrong and your post makes you sound envious of people with money and/or athletic kids. Nobody we played ball with was doing it for the scholarship although a couple of our teammates did get partials. We did it because the kids loved playing and it was a great way to spend time together. Also, your kid isn't making the school team if he's just playing Little League so you'd miss out on that.

BTW Little League is a bigger time boof than tournament ball because it is one game every weekend and usually practice on Sundays. Travel ball was typically every other weekend so we'd get to have our adventures on the off weekends. The money we spent would hardy put a dent into a college degree.

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Not envious or incapable. Kids were good high school athletes who mainly played football and ran track after they got older, so travel sports became unnecessary. We did a bit of travel sports when they were younger but it did not fit our family's goals. We had an excellent little league in our area that included a development program to address the shortcomings you mention.

It was mainly the baseball parents who prompted my post above. I'm glad your situation was different. What I said above was indeed applicable to many families I have known. Note the qualifiers in my post.

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Well, if you live in a state like California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, etc and your kid wants to play high school baseball guess what? They better be playing travel ball or they have no chance. That is what the vast majority of travel ball parents do it for here in SoCal which is far and away the #1 talent area for baseball. And that doesn't mean you have to spend 10k a year and travel all over the country. There are plenty of 200 a month teams that play occasional local/regional tournaments.

Kids don't get cut in football, so that is a poor comparison.

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It was implicit in the original post, but I'll make it explicit. I'm not saying all travel sports are a waste of time and money. I also recognize that there is a skills arm race in some sports like baseball. I was referring to the people who think it is a viable path to a college scholarship, particularly in baseball where a half scholarship is about the best you can hope for, especially if the kid is not a genetic freak with genetic freak parents. I've known parents who talk about it being an investment to get their kid a "free" college education. In these cases, it often seems more like an ego trip for a dad who is trying to relive his youth.

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I'm not pretending this doesn't exist, but 99% of families we played tourney ball aren't like this and posts like yours act like it's the norm. I was a Tennis junkie growing up and a poor with a single mom. I wish I had had the resources to play year round competitive Tennis. I wasn't trying to relive my youth through my kids, but was happy I could provide the means to do so. My older son started varsity his freshman year and still plays intermural ball at A&M. Younger son dropped baseball after his freshman year to focus on Football and Powerlifting. He didn't get burned out, his interest just shifted. It doesn't mean his time and dollars were wasted.

We struggled with tournaments in baseball, basketball and lacrosse when our kids were young. If we could we'd hit church before a game and just let them wear their unis, but Saturday 5pm church was also great for us.

Quote:

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is the higher level of commitment to youth sports than to faithful attendance with a body of believers a merely a symptom of weakened religious commitment?

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Seems obvious this is the answer.

Those that want to make church services make it work.

doubledog said:

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Ferg said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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Silly Protestants-

Saturday mass counts

---

Saturday Evening Mass Counts starting 4PM Mass and after.

Those are called Vigil masses. (Just like Christmas Eve Masses)

Also, Catholic Churches have multiple masses on Sunday morning, some at 730 or earlier.

I played hoops for a Catholic High School, and we had Sunday afternoon and evening games and that was a half century ago.

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This thread is a huge nothing burger. Catholics have many opportunities to attend mass. For the shut-ins their is home ministries (communion) and Sunday mass broadcast on-air.

Take some time to learn someone else's religion, it keeps you making a fool out of yourself.

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Catholics have masses at
Saturday 4, 5, 5:30, 6:30
Sunday, 6 am, 7:30, 8:00, 9:00, 9:30, 11, 11:30, 1:00, 5:00, 5:30, 6:30, 7:00

Now, not every town has every time slot available, but we played travel baseball with two kids for 7years. We didn't miss one single mass due to weekend baseball schedule.

You can got to mass and play travel ball. It's harder for sure but you can do it. It takes planning and research and probably more sleep. I get that it's harder, and traveling ti tournaments is hard enough so it's easy to blow it off and say you are tired.

But if anything is "undermining faith" it's the parents not putting forth the extra effort.

Muy said:

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We struggled with tournaments in baseball, basketball and lacrosse when our kids were young. If we could we'd hit church before a game and just let them wear their unis, but Saturday 5pm church was also great for us.

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Yes. Wearing uniform at mass was done almost every weekend.

MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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93MarineHorn said:

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Youth sports on Sundays was not something I remember growing up in Texas. But people nowadays go in much lower numbers. Personally, I wouldn't commit to an event in another state if I wasn't willing to participate fully. If your kid is a starter and misses significant playing time it will hurt the team and cause disruption to the normal game plan.

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Because it wasn't a thing. Once in a blue moon we had a soccer match in an out of tournament on a Sunday afternoon but that was usually due to some reason we couldn't squeeze it on Saturday.

I was shocked on a business trip a few years ago when the customer I was hosting was tracking his son's baseball game at 8am on Sunday on some app.

Crazy to me.

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crazy is you working at 8 am on a Sunday and judging others

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Wasn't really working. We were in Napa Valley on a "business trip".

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so your fake business meeting took a man from his family and you mock him for watching his kids game- got it

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lol. I wasn't mocking him at all. I was expressing surprise that his son had a baseball game at 8am on a Sunday morning because that is not something that happened when I was growing up.

You know, the point of this thread.

YouBet said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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93MarineHorn said:

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Youth sports on Sundays was not something I remember growing up in Texas. But people nowadays go in much lower numbers. Personally, I wouldn't commit to an event in another state if I wasn't willing to participate fully. If your kid is a starter and misses significant playing time it will hurt the team and cause disruption to the normal game plan.

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Because it wasn't a thing. Once in a blue moon we had a soccer match in an out of tournament on a Sunday afternoon but that was usually due to some reason we couldn't squeeze it on Saturday.

I was shocked on a business trip a few years ago when the customer I was hosting was tracking his son's baseball game at 8am on Sunday on some app.

Crazy to me.

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crazy is you working at 8 am on a Sunday and judging others

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Wasn't really working. We were in Napa Valley on a "business trip".

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so your fake business meeting took a man from his family and you mock him for watching his kids game- got it

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lol. I wasn't mocking him at all. I was expressing surprise that his son had a baseball game at 8am on a Sunday morning because that is not something that happened when I was growing up.

You know, the point of this thread.

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More like you are trying to brag about being in Napa

If you want to go to church, go to church. If you want your kids to play sports, let them play sports. It's your choice, and it's very simple.

HoustonAg9999 said:

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YouBet said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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MookieBlaylock said:

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YouBet said:

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93MarineHorn said:

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Youth sports on Sundays was not something I remember growing up in Texas. But people nowadays go in much lower numbers. Personally, I wouldn't commit to an event in another state if I wasn't willing to participate fully. If your kid is a starter and misses significant playing time it will hurt the team and cause disruption to the normal game plan.

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Because it wasn't a thing. Once in a blue moon we had a soccer match in an out of tournament on a Sunday afternoon but that was usually due to some reason we couldn't squeeze it on Saturday.

I was shocked on a business trip a few years ago when the customer I was hosting was tracking his son's baseball game at 8am on Sunday on some app.

Crazy to me.

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crazy is you working at 8 am on a Sunday and judging others

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Wasn't really working. We were in Napa Valley on a "business trip".

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so your fake business meeting took a man from his family and you mock him for watching his kids game- got it

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lol. I wasn't mocking him at all. I was expressing surprise that his son had a baseball game at 8am on a Sunday morning because that is not something that happened when I was growing up.

You know, the point of this thread.

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More like you are trying to brag about being in Napa

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Are y'all women? If I was bragging about that, I would have mentioned it in my original post.

Scotty Appleton said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Don't get me started on what a poor investment I believe travel sports are for many people. If you think little Kaden is going D1 and neither you nor your wife did so, you're probably better off having family time on the weekends, putting the travel-ball money into a college fund, letting Kaden play in the local little league and on school teams when he's older, and not forcing younger siblings to tag along to another family weekend at a crappy Hampton Inn.

It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

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Yes you're wrong and your post makes you sound envious of people with money and/or athletic kids. Nobody we played ball with was doing it for the scholarship although a couple of our teammates did get partials. We did it because the kids loved playing and it was a great way to spend time together. Also, your kid isn't making the school team if he's just playing Little League so you'd miss out on that.

BTW Little League is a bigger time boof than tournament ball because it is one game every weekend and usually practice on Sundays. Travel ball was typically every other weekend so we'd get to have our adventures on the off weekends. The money we spent would hardy put a dent into a college degree.

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Not envious or incapable. Kids were good high school athletes who mainly played football and ran track after they got older, so travel sports became unnecessary. We did a bit of travel sports when they were younger but it did not fit our family's goals. We had an excellent little league in our area that included a development program to address the shortcomings you mention.

It was mainly the baseball parents who prompted my post above. I'm glad your situation was different. What I said above was indeed applicable to many families I have known. Note the qualifiers in my post.

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Well, if you live in a state like California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, etc and your kid wants to play high school baseball guess what? They better be playing travel ball or they have no chance. That is what the vast majority of travel ball parents do it for here in SoCal which is far and away the #1 talent area for baseball. And that doesn't mean you have to spend 10k a year and travel all over the country. There are plenty of 200 a month teams that play occasional local/regional tournaments.

Kids don't get cut in football, so that is a poor comparison.

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This is really sad. I saw this in the bigger HS. Basically, kids are being forced to specialize in certain sports if they want to have a chance to play unless you are an Uber athlete. And at a young age. It's not just church that gets crowded out, it's all the other sports and alot of extra curricular activities. It used to not be this way and it's really sad.

Was the man you took on the weekend trip to Napa at least divorced? Homewrecking is not a good look!

I have a lady who works for me that has a 7th grade daughter that plays club volleyball. She lives in Tyler and joined a club in Plano that practices 3 times a week. She drives 1.5 hours each way. 3 times a week. Thay also have out of town tournaments every other weekend with a few tournaments out of state in FL, LA, etc.. it's insane, but she feels like they have to do this for her daughter to get the development and coaching to make a D1 school. This is the kind of insanity travel sports has created. Some sports are worse than others.

Scotty Appleton said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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Its Texas Aggies, dammit said:

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Don't get me started on what a poor investment I believe travel sports are for many people. If you think little Kaden is going D1 and neither you nor your wife did so, you're probably better off having family time on the weekends, putting the travel-ball money into a college fund, letting Kaden play in the local little league and on school teams when he's older, and not forcing younger siblings to tag along to another family weekend at a crappy Hampton Inn.

It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

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Yes you're wrong and your post makes you sound envious of people with money and/or athletic kids. Nobody we played ball with was doing it for the scholarship although a couple of our teammates did get partials. We did it because the kids loved playing and it was a great way to spend time together. Also, your kid isn't making the school team if he's just playing Little League so you'd miss out on that.

BTW Little League is a bigger time boof than tournament ball because it is one game every weekend and usually practice on Sundays. Travel ball was typically every other weekend so we'd get to have our adventures on the off weekends. The money we spent would hardy put a dent into a college degree.

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Not envious or incapable. Kids were good high school athletes who mainly played football and ran track after they got older, so travel sports became unnecessary. We did a bit of travel sports when they were younger but it did not fit our family's goals. We had an excellent little league in our area that included a development program to address the shortcomings you mention.

It was mainly the baseball parents who prompted my post above. I'm glad your situation was different. What I said above was indeed applicable to many families I have known. Note the qualifiers in my post.

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Well, if you live in a state like California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, etc and your kid wants to play high school baseball guess what? They better be playing travel ball or they have no chance. That is what the vast majority of travel ball parents do it for here in SoCal which is far and away the #1 talent area for baseball. And that doesn't mean you have to spend 10k a year and travel all over the country. There are plenty of 200 a month teams that play occasional local/regional tournaments.

Kids don't get cut in football, so that is a poor comparison.

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I agree with this. If you want to play High School baseball you pretty much have to play some type of select baseball. Especially in 4A and up. In our High School program where my son plays with about 50 kids between a Sophomore, JV and Varsity only about 3 kids just played Little League. We are devout Orthodox Christians who before starting select baseball at 11U we hardly ever missed liturgy. We picked teams that did not play more than twice a month and if we had the infamous 8am Sunday game and we were eliminated. We headed straight to church.

That's awesome. I had no idea. Hockey is an awesome sport.

Science Denier said:

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Muy said:

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We struggled with tournaments in baseball, basketball and lacrosse when our kids were young. If we could we'd hit church before a game and just let them wear their unis, but Saturday 5pm church was also great for us.

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Yes. Wearing uniform at mass was done almost every weekend.

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Not sure if mocking but regardless, the main point is to show the kids that God is the priority. For young families today, there are also great options for streaming online both live or recorded sermons.

Bottom line is there is no reason we can't watch any service at any time.

One can never replace His house of Worship and the confession of sin, but in good disciple fashion one could USE the sports field as His house of Worship to speak His name. Write a prayer that involves the sky, the grass, the families, the country, the community, and the importance to put God at the top and in charge of it all.

Again, not that it replaces Worship but what a great way to spread God's word and be on time for your sporting events.

Muy said:

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Science Denier said:

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Muy said:

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We struggled with tournaments in baseball, basketball and lacrosse when our kids were young. If we could we'd hit church before a game and just let them wear their unis, but Saturday 5pm church was also great for us.

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Yes. Wearing uniform at mass was done almost every weekend.

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Not sure if mocking but regardless, the main point is to show the kids that God is the priority. For young families today, there are also great options for streaming online both live or recorded sermons.

Bottom line is there is no reason we can't watch any service at any time.

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Not mocking. Agreeing.

JB93 said:

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My wife and I had talks about this during our marriage before and with young kids. We promised we would never participate in all the select teams that play year round with tournaments every weekend. Our kids both play a varsity sport and are quite competitive...and they go and are involved in our church every Sunday.

My point is...it took us being intentional about church being more important than making sure little Johnny's skills kept up with his peers so he could make the team and/or be a star athlete.

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Same here. Y'all are great parents. Most kids doing those select teams year round gear burned out and the ones that do play in high school rarely go on to play in college.

The country of Norway has the most gold medals per capita and they say the main reason is they don't want kids specializing in a sport until at least 15 years old or around there. They have studies and have proven that specializing in one sport at an early age decreased the chance of long term success. They want kids to play different sports and work on a range of skills. Plus, they want kids to enjoy sports and not hate them.