After all of the bad press about youth travel ball I would just like to take the time to say that I have had an absolutely fantastic time with TB 95% of the time. Sure their have been PITH times. But I wouldn't change any of it if it took away the time spent with my family watching, traveling to, and enjoying youth baseball.
The majority of the coaches and families that we have interacted with over the last 5 years are priceless and we have gained many new life long friends.
Is it painful at times? Yes. Would I trade it for a non baseball life? Never.
Not trying to start a fight with this, just saying that I feel priviledged and fortunate to be part of the travel baseball family. I know, when my kids are out of the house, I will continue volunteering for somebodies team or league.

I would have to agree with this 100%. Have there been some trying times? Yes. Have there been tough, stressful times? Absolutely. But, the good has far out weighed the bad. My son has been playing and I have been helping coach for the last 5 years and we have both grown closer and have had more close friends as a result.

I too will chime in and say that despite a couple of rough times, playing travel ball has been outstanding for our son and our family. It has been a family affair for the last 8 years and we have made great friends and played in tournaments all over the US. We did pay for our son to be on a travel team when he was 10-12 years old. After that we were lucky in that we never paid our coaches anything!! We were fortunate to have coaches that are retired MLB players whose son's played on the team. 11 of our players will be playing D1 baseball next year. Not only have they worked really hard but they had unconditional support from their families.

It can work out if you do your homework and know what you're getting into. Our son wanted to play year round travel ball from a young age and we supported him(he pushed us, we did'nt push him). It's not for every kid, he missed many birthday parties and social events because he was playing or practicing.

Travel/select ball can be fantastic and I would think there are a great many more stories on the positive side rather than the negative.

Keep in mind, however, that just as history is written by the victors....many posters here are still posting because their child has advanced through the different levels and succeeded. For the most part there are probably not a lot of posters here whose sons stopped playing at age 11.

I agree the positives far outweigh the negatives.
Sure it gets expensive,one son plays baseball the other football & both play basketball.
I just finished my 2nd & last term as a LL president,you can`t beat 30 games including TOC
& Allstars for 85$,but I really look forward to watching a game as a parent without some over-
bearing mom telling me how her son`s coach is
a rotten coach because jr. is not playing short.
I admit I am burned out and more than a little
sick of the so called rules to make LL safe.I
think it is great T-ball thru minors,but 13 y/o
players pitching from 46` is a joke.

ECTBDAD, sometimes it can be a thankless job.

Thanks for putting in the time to youth baseball.

If there is no movement from LL to move the mounds/bases back to a more competitive and safe distance, then local leagues will continue to lose serious players to travel teams

I'm tired of local LL league officials and coaches saying to parents -- "play all the travel ball you want, just have Joey come out and play the minimum games needed to qualify for all stars". This is the worst possible situation for said player and all the other players in the league.