As youth sports business explodes, equity issues increase too | An Uneven Playing Field

The business of youth sports is exploding at an unimaginable rate. But it’s not just financial sacrifices families are making to help their young athletes reach the next level. And industry experts warn that’s creating an uneven playing field for some kids.

One of the most extreme examples of youth sports spiraling out of control came in April during a 10 and under baseball game in Abilene, Texas, when a little league baseball coach became unhinged after he’s thrown out of the game for arguing balls and strikes, and assaults the umpire shoving him to the ground.

In the now-viral video of the incident, you can see the 10-year-old players standing in stunned silence as the umpire lays motionless on the field. The coach, whose name was not released by the league, was permanently banned by tournament organizers.

Jon Solomon, editorial director for Aspen Institute’s Sports and Society Program, believes in today’s world of youth sports the business of winning and losing has surpassed character development and camaraderie.

“It’s been a long time coming,” Solomon said. “A lot of it is the chase for the college athletic scholarship.”

Driven by the runaway travel sports industry, in which families pay thousands of dollars a year in team fees and travel costs to compete in national tournaments and events, youth sports have become an estimated 19.2 billion dollar a year business in the United States according to the research firm “Research and Markets,” surpassing the 15 billion dollar a year NFL industry and outpacing the 18-billion-dollar yearly operating budget for 2022 of Washington, DC Government.

By 2026, youth sports revenues are estimated to reach an unfathomable $77.6 billion dollars a year.

“So, the travel sports world has, in many ways hurt the local rec leagues quite a bit,” Solomon said. “It has taken away a lot of coaches, it's taken away a lot of volunteers to run leagues. It's taken away the finances, the money, some of the facility space as well, just to be able to play at those leaks. Sometimes they're rented by the travel sports teams. So, a lot of families are getting left behind.”