Why Baseball for 6-Year-Olds Is Breaking the Bank
The second baseman stood 3-foot-6. The shortstop weighed 44 pounds.
At a club baseball tournament east of Los Angeles this summer, the 6-year-olds on teams from as far away as Arizona were too young to pitch the ball themselves, but their parents were spending thousands on baseball.
There were club dues, tournament fees, hotels, transportation, uniforms and equipment. An app offering “advanced statistics” and video of at-bats was $191 a year. Even watching from the stands has a price—this tournament had a $60-a-head pass for spectators. Spending $10,000 a year is common.
“Nowadays…in order to get certain opportunities, you have to pay money,” said Carlos Avila, the national director of ZT Athletics, a private-equity backed company with three 6-and-under teams in the tournament. “People are trying to get ahead of the curve.”
America’s national pastime, played by generations of children up and down the economic spectrum, is increasingly a sport for rich kids. Many adults remember Little League and rec programs, dad coaches and the snack shack. Youth baseball is now an intense and costly year-round endeavor dominated by for-profit enterprises.
