
Youth baseball — long a widely accessible American pastime — has become overrun by $10,000-per-year, for-profit travel leagues. Zachary Crockett peers inside the dugout.
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Zachary Crockett
Growing up in the early 90s, RJ MacKenzie's life revolved around baseball, and in his hometown of Pomona, New York, it was all about Little League.
RJ MacKenzie
Little League was like the thing that's what we all look forward to. It was just the focal point of the community. That's where everybody went in the spring and you lived and died with whatever team you played on.
Zachary Crockett
For Mackenzie, Little League was pretty chill. Sometimes he pitched, sometimes he played first base or third base. Other times he just goofed off with his friends in the dugout. And for his parents, it was an affordable and convenient way to keep him busy. They'd drop him off at practice with the volunteer coach and pick him up a few hours later. Baseball became MacKenzie's lifelong passion. He went on to play in college and became a physical education teacher in a suburb outside of New York City. These days he's focused on the baseball career of his 13 year old son, Nick, trying to make the major Leagues. That's really what I want to do. And who do you want to play ball for?
RJ MacKenzie
The Yankees?
Zachary Crockett
It's very obvious, but Nick's youth baseball experience is very different from his dad's. I would say I probably play seven days a week and seven hours a day.
RJ MacKenzie
Yeah, on the weekends for him it could be seven, eight hours. And then during the week it's right after school. And then sometimes right after that is another game. It's like full go until mid August every single day. Nowadays it's kind of Little Leagues getting left in the dust and everybody's playing travel.
Zachary Crockett
These travel baseball teams don't just require more time. They cost thousands of dollars a year. And they're part of a broader shift toward for profit youth sports in America.
John Miller
If you're willing to pay the membership fees, they will happily take your kid. I know of owners of for profit travel baseball clubs making over $200,000 a year running essentially Little league baseball teams.
Zachary Crockett
For the Freakonomics radio network. This is the economics of everyday things. I'm Zachary Crockett. Today Little League. When professional baseball became popular in America in the late 1800s, there weren't any formalized youth leagues. If you were a kid who wanted to be the next Honus Wagner or Cy Young, your best bet was to get some friends together and go to a local sandlot. That changed after the First World War.
John Miller
The 20s had been this time of prosperity and allowed men the leisure time they needed or wanted to coach their kids. And that's when youth baseball really came into its own.
Zachary Crockett
That's John Miller. He's a self described baseball nut.
John Miller
I played in Little League, I played in college. I played men's league semi professionally. In my 20s I worked as a scout for the Baltimore Orioles. I've done all kinds of things in baseball.
Zachary Crockett
Miller is also a journalist who's written about the history of youth sports. He says that a number of youth baseball clubs were formed throughout the 1920s and 30s. But one of them eventually rose above the rest of the Little League was.
John Miller
Basically the one that won out.
Zachary Crockett
Little League was founded in 1939 in Williamsport, Pennsylvania by a lumberyard clerk named Carl Staats. He wanted to provide an affordable way for boys to get into baseball. The earliest teams were funded by sponsors like a local dairy farm and a pretzel company.
John Miller
Players who came of age in the 50s and 60s, almost all played Little League baseball. The classic structure in the old days was Little League, then high school and then college.
Zachary Crockett
Today there are a number of nonprofit baseball leagues for kids like Pony, Babe Ruth and American Legion. But Little League is the largest of the herd with around 2 million participants from the ages of 4 to 16. It has thousands of local chapters across every US state and in more than 80 other countries.
John Miller
The Little League charter is based on sportsmanship and volunteer coaches. Volunteer Umpires, participatory rules like, you have to play every player in every game.
Zachary Crockett
Because the teams and games are run by volunteers, local Little League chapters don't have much overhead. Uniforms, equipment and field maintenance usually cost in the low five figures. Leagues cover those costs through grants, fundraisers, and modest membership dues, usually $100 to $300 per kid per season. If a parent can't afford the dues, they get a free pass. The organization won't allow any player to be turned away for financial reasons.
John Miller
The ethos, I mean, it's very much that cost is not part of the equation. This is for everybody who wants to play baseball, and it's not going to cost you a lot of money.
Zachary Crockett
The Little League organization also has a secret weapon to help keep this ethos alive. The Little League World Series. Regional Little League teams in the US and in other countries around the world compete in a tournament that culminates in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. The event generates an estimated $40 million a year for the local economy, and ESPN pays Little League millions more for the broadcast rights. The success of Little League has helped turn youth baseball into a ubiquitous part of American culture. And that means competition.
John Miller
So the impetus to have private baseball clubs, or what's euphemistically called travel baseball clubs, it really started in the 1990s and it came out of Little League. The Little League World Series was so popular and so successful that that it became this cultural icon. People would watch the Little League World Series and they would dream of playing in this tournament. And all over the country you had very ambitious coaches, baseball dads who would gear up every summer and try to advance to go to Williamsport. And then they would get knocked out in mid June or early July and have another two months of summer with nothing, no baseball to play. And so private operators started organizing tournaments and charging 2, 3, $4,000 a season and then hiring professional coaches. And that became a consumer product that a lot of families, especially in the suburbs, wanted.
Zachary Crockett
That includes families like the McKenzies. RJ first realized that his son Nick had talent. At around nine years old, he was throwing the ball harder and batting better than the other kids in Little League. So RJ started shopping around for a travel baseball league. And In Orange County, New York, where the McKenzie's live, there was no shortage of teams to choose from.
RJ MacKenzie
Within an hour of my house, I would probably say there's 20, 30 teams that you can play on.
Zachary Crockett
Nick is now 13 and plays on two different travel baseball teams, the OC Smash and OC regulators. He also still plays in his local little league and on a middle school team made up of the best seventh and eighth graders in the area. RJ and his wife both work full time as teachers, and getting their 5 foot 6, 105 pound slugger to all those games requires some logistical jujitsu.
RJ MacKenzie
Yeah, it's busy. It's an everyday job on top of your regular job. Can we get him to this practice? If we can't get him, then his grandparents pick up the slack, they'll take him. And then it's calling the coach from one team and another team and trying to hopefully, you know, can we move this practice? He can't make this one. He can make this one. So it's difficult.
Zachary Crockett
It's also a big financial sacrifice. Little league only charges a registration fee of a few hundred dollars per season. But travel baseball is a different story.
RJ MacKenzie
Sometimes it could be as cheap as like $1,000 up to, you know, some of these ones or five, $6,000 just to register with the team.
Zachary Crockett
Registration fees usually wrap in the cost of uniforms, coaching and practice facilities. And at the higher end, teams might also cover the entry fees for tournaments, which can be hundreds of dollars each, but they don't tend to cover the cost of all the travel. To get to those tournaments, you start.
RJ MacKenzie
Adding in, you know, we're a family of four, so all four of us are going to the hotels for the weekend. You're feeding four people, you know, Friday, Sunday, gas mileage, wear and tear on your car. I mean, you're probably looking for like an average travel team, probably somewhere in that eight to $10,000 range per season. I have some friends that are, you know, they're up around the 15 to $20,000 range.
Zachary Crockett
On top of that, you've got the cost of equipment, cleats, a helmet, a travel bag, a good glove, and some very pricey bats.
RJ MacKenzie
You're talking, you know, some of these good bats are $400. Most of these kids are swinging the bats for one year and then getting a new one.
Zachary Crockett
Do you buy new bats every year?
RJ MacKenzie
I hate to say, but yeah, he'll get like two, three bats a year.
Zachary Crockett
And then McKenzie still has to pay to watch Nick play. His tournament games often take place at privately owned sports complexes that charge $5 or $10 to get in.
RJ MacKenzie
Yeah, it's become a business now. I would definitely say there's a lot of profit to be made.
Zachary Crockett
John Miller coached a for profit team himself a few years ago in Pittsburgh. He's run the math on travel, baseball leagues, and he says they're making a killing.
John Miller
I mean, if you run 20 teams and you charge $5,000 a season for 12 kids per team, that's $1.2 million in revenue. The coaches are paid basically minimum wage. I was paid $3,000 for a season, so 1.2 million, minus 60,000 to pay all the coaches and then minus your cost for balls and for entering these tournaments and for facilities to practice in. And it's not hard to see how you can have profit margins of over 30 or 40%.
Zachary Crockett
One estimate values the for profit youth sports industry at around 28 billion billion, up from 3.5 billion just a decade ago. The growth is largely fueled by private equity firms who are pumping hundreds of millions of dollars into sports complexes and travel clubs. There are companies like Perfect Game, which host baseball tournaments with entry fees that can top $2,000. But these costs don't seem to be driving parents away. In fact, a 2019 survey by the Harris Poll found that one in three parents take fewer vacations to fund their kids sports. One in five has considered taking on a second job or delaying retirement. Between 2021 and 2022 alone, the share of American kids playing travel sports doubled to 29%. And that's a problem for the organization that started it all.
John Miller
You need the best players who can kind of lead the game to make it functional. And, and if you lose them, the little leagues will fall apart.
Zachary Crockett
That's coming up.
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Zachary Crockett
Economics of everyday things is sponsored by Shopify. As a small business owner, you know that sometimes it can be super overwhelming. Every day seems to introduce a new decision that needs an answer. Finding the right tool that not only helps you out but simplifies everything can be such a game changer for millions of businesses. That tool is Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10% of all e commerce in the US from household names to brands just getting started. With hundreds of ready to use templates and AI tools, Shopify helps you build a beautiful online store and create content that matches your brand's style. And best yet, Shopify is your commerce expert with world class expertise in everything from managing inventory to international shipping, to processing returns and beyond. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com everydaythings go to shopify.com everydaythings shopify.com everydaythings John Miller says that for top youth baseball travel teams, recruiting the best players can get intense.
John Miller
I coached four years in this private club in Pittsburgh and after the second year my best player got recruited by another club that was bigger and had more resources. And the kid was 11 and the coach who was 50 years old was texting this 11 year old with recruiting pitches.
Zachary Crockett
So this is something that happens in private baseball like 11 year old kids just getting recruited like free agents all the time. And the parents, they shop around too.
John Miller
Many parents are obsessed with finding the right travel baseball club for their kid and will shop for a travel baseball club the same way they shop for a car or a nice house. Some of these private clubs have ridiculous names that try to appeal to people's sense of kind of like testosterone fueled ambition. You know, I've seen hardcore elite, that word pops up all the time. These sort of flashy brands, flashy colors they try to create to draw in more parents and families.
Zachary Crockett
For the really elite players, the training can get pretty hardcore.
John Miller
They have velocity camps now where you can send a baseball player just to improve their velocity pitching. So you do a lot of like weighted ball training and special drills and you end up throwing 100 miles an hour and probably blowing out your elbow. I mean that's kind of what the youth baseball landscape looks like now.
Zachary Crockett
But travel baseball is no longer just for highly skilled kids.
John Miller
Most clubs are not that discriminating. They will happily take your money. I went to a tournament last weekend and I was kind of shocked in how average, low the level was.
Zachary Crockett
Experts say that this trend is playing out across other youth sports too.
Linda Flanagan
My name is Linda Flanagan and I'm the author of Take Back the How Money and Mania Are Ruining Kids Sports and why it matters.
Zachary Crockett
Flanagan has researched the commercialization of youth sports and its impact on kids and their families.
Linda Flanagan
When I was growing up, which was quite a while ago, sports were something parents signed their kids up for to get some exercise to keep them busy. They were local, focused on fun, low cost, you know, basically recreational. Now that youth sports focus on the commercial interests of adults rather than the human interests of the child, Flanagan says.
Zachary Crockett
There'S a reason parents of average athletes are spending thousands of dollars on for profit sports leagues.
Linda Flanagan
What's happened is that now college recruiting takes place almost entirely through these pay to play clubs and private tournaments because they can see more kids that way. So it does in fact help them get into college. It helps them get recruited by college coaches.
Zachary Crockett
On its website, Perfect Game markets its tournaments as the largest amateur baseball scouting service in the world. Scouts from nearly all NCAA Division 1 teams and all 30 Major League Baseball clubs go to check out the players. Flanagan says that parents worry that their kids will get left behind if they don't compete at the highest level.
Linda Flanagan
Look, we're capitalist competitive society and youth sports parents are probably more naturally competitive than other parents. And it feels like, well, you want to give your child an edge. It's all about keeping them one step ahead of their peers. It's that brutality cascade where if everyone else is doing this and you're the dummy who didn't, then your child is left with nothing.
Zachary Crockett
Many kids who play travel baseball tend to stay in Little League at least until they're 12 for a chance to play in the Little League World Series. But RJ MacKenzie says the talented kids who stay aren't fully invested.
RJ MacKenzie
Once they start getting into like 13, 14, 15, then the kids really drop off. But up to 12, you'll still see a lot of the talent stay, but they're not participating in every game. They're not living and dying with every Little League game like it used to be.
Zachary Crockett
Miller says this disengagement is affecting the quality of play in Little League.
John Miller
Baseball doesn't function at all if you take away the top third of the talent. If you don't have the strike throwers and the kids who make the basic plays, the game just falls apart. Balls go to the backstop, there's walkathons.
Zachary Crockett
It's very boring, which means the remaining parents start to pull their kids out.
John Miller
So what's happened is as the best players have left to play, travel, the leagues remaining, the level goes down and the parents realize how boring it is. And so they go looking for a league that has your basic functional Baseball with strike throwers. And that's the private league or the private teams. And so they end up paying what I think it was like a baseball tax to go play baseball.
Zachary Crockett
According to The Aspen Institute, three of 10 parents say their kids community sports program has declined in membership, merged with another program, or closed altogether. In many cities and towns, it's becoming harder for parents to find a baseball league they can afford.
John Miller
I once googled the professions of all the parents on my team and it was like four things. It was like finance or financial planning, medical stuff or medical sales, legal stuff like lawyers or construction contracting. And it was like 99% white. I think in four years I had one black player. They're all blonde with mullets, and they have names like Jackson, Braden, Caden. You know, the danger is, as one former major league baseball catcher, Charlie Moore put it to me, it becomes a country club sport.
Zachary Crockett
Since the rise of for profit youth baseball in the 1990s, the percentage of black players in major league baseball has been chopped in half to around 8%. Across the board. Youth sports participation has gone up for higher income families.
Linda Flanagan
And then in lower income communities, there aren't the options there used to be. It's feast or famine.
Zachary Crockett
There are some efforts to fix these issues. Some of the for profit leagues, like Perfect Game, have their own initiatives to reduce the cost of tournament play. Major League baseball runs an organization called Reviving baseball in the inner cities, or RBI for short. It claims to cover the cost of league play and tournaments for underrepresented communities. And in many cities, there are subsidized programs that will take kids to the same tournaments the travel leagues go to for a fraction of the cost. Other communities have used public funding to revitalize existing sports leagues.
Linda Flanagan
States are now using more of their public dollars to underwrite youth sports organizations. We saw this in Illinois. They've appropriated $10.5 million to that end. The city of Philadelphia has done the same. Minneapolis, St. Paul, they used funding to eliminate all fees for youth sports for three years. And it saw a massive increase, like a 38% increase in numbers of participation of kids.
Zachary Crockett
Meanwhile, some of the parents who can afford travel baseball for their kids are wondering if the sports obsession has gone a little too far.
Linda Flanagan
My husband's an athlete. I was a coach for 19 years. But sports aren't that important. I mean, they should be like a part of life. They should be like the salt of life, not the food. And it has become the food for many families. Parents can only see that later, like, wow, you got a little carried away.
Zachary Crockett
But other parents like RJ MacKenzie are willing to stick it out to see what happens.
RJ MacKenzie
In the beginning, I'll be honest, there was little talent. I could see that he was athletic, but he wasn't a baseball player yet. As he progressed and got older, we started to really see the talent come out. I'm not going to say he's a great player yet, but he's a really good player for me. It's not about him getting a scholarship or anything like that. It's something that he shows value in and he puts in the work ethic and all that stuff. It's money well spent.
Zachary Crockett
For the economics of everyday things. I'm Zachary Crockett. This episode was produced by me and Sarah Lilly and mixed by Jeremy Johnston. We had help from Daniel Moritz Rapson. I have fond memories of picking daisies in the outfield when I was playing Little League.
Linda Flanagan
Imagine that now. You'd be screamed at.
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Summary of "Little League (Replay)" Episode of The Economics of Everyday Things
Released: May 19, 2025 | Host: Zachary Crockett | Produced by Freakonomics Network & Zachary Crockett
In the "Little League (Replay)" episode of The Economics of Everyday Things, host Zachary Crockett delves into the transformation of youth baseball from community-driven Little League programs to the burgeoning for-profit travel baseball industry. Through interviews with key figures like RJ MacKenzie, John Miller, and Linda Flanagan, the episode explores the economic, social, and cultural implications of this shift.
Zachary Crockett opens by painting a nostalgic picture of Little League's golden era. Established in 1939 by Carl Staats in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, Little League provided an accessible platform for children to engage in baseball within their communities. "Little League was like the thing that's what we all look forward to. It was just the focal point of the community," reminisces RJ MacKenzie (01:32).
John Miller, a baseball enthusiast and former scout for the Baltimore Orioles, adds historical depth: "Players who came of age in the 50s and 60s, almost all played Little League baseball. The classic structure in the old days was Little League, then high school and then college" (05:04).
The episode highlights a significant transformation beginning in the 1990s, where traditional Little League began to face competition from for-profit travel baseball clubs. "The impetus to have private baseball clubs, or what's euphemistically called travel baseball clubs, it really started in the 1990s and it came out of Little League" explains John Miller (07:08).
These travel teams demand more time and financial resources, often costing families between $8,000 to $20,000 per season. RJ MacKenzie shares his personal experience: "Sometimes it could be as cheap as like $1,000 up to, you know, some of these ones or five, $6,000 just to register with the team" (09:32).
The transition to travel baseball has profound implications for families. Balancing multiple teams, extensive travel, and high costs places significant financial and logistical burdens on parents. "Getting their 5 foot 6, 105 pound slugger to all those games requires some logistical jujitsu" remarks RJ MacKenzie (09:00).
Moreover, the increased commercialization has led to diminished community engagement. As more families invest in high-cost travel teams, traditional Little League participation declines, affecting local communities' cohesion and support structures.
For-profit travel baseball has evolved into a lucrative industry, valued at approximately $28 billion, a stark rise from $3.5 billion a decade earlier. John Miller provides insight into the profitability: "If you run 20 teams and you charge $5,000 a season for 12 kids per team, that's $1.2 million in revenue... And it's not hard to see how you can have profit margins of over 30 or 40%" (11:22).
This profitability is further fueled by private equity investments and the proliferation of companies like Perfect Game, which host expensive tournaments attracting thousands in entry fees.
The commercialization of youth baseball has inadvertently contributed to reduced diversity within the sport. As highlighted by John Miller, teams often lack racial and economic diversity: "I think in four years I had one black player. They're all blonde with mullets... the danger is, as one former major league baseball catcher, Charlie Moore put it to me, it becomes a country club sport" (20:42).
Linda Flanagan emphasizes the societal impact: "States are now using more of their public dollars to underwrite youth sports organizations... and it saw a massive increase, like a 38% increase in numbers of participation of kids" (22:14), pointing towards efforts to make youth sports more inclusive.
In response to growing concerns, various initiatives aim to democratize access to youth baseball. Organizations like Major League Baseball's Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities (RBI) and subsidized local programs work to reduce costs and increase participation among underrepresented communities.
John Miller notes the urgency: "You need the best players who can kind of lead the game to make it functional. And, and if you lose them, the little leagues will fall apart" (12:51), underscoring the necessity of maintaining talent within community leagues.
The episode features RJ MacKenzie's personal journey, balancing his son's baseball aspirations with family and financial constraints. "I'm not going to say he's a great player yet, but he's a really good player for me. It's not about him getting a scholarship or anything like that. It's something that he shows value in and he puts in the work ethic and all that stuff. It's money well spent" (23:19).
Conversely, Linda Flanagan shares a cautious perspective: "They should be like a part of life. They should be like the salt of life, not the food. And it has become the food for many families" (22:54), reflecting concerns over the overemphasis on competitive youth sports.
"Little League (Replay)" paints a comprehensive picture of the current state and future trajectory of youth baseball. While for-profit travel teams offer advanced training and opportunities for college recruitment, they also pose challenges related to accessibility, diversity, and the loss of community spirit inherent in traditional Little League programs.
As efforts continue to balance commercialization with inclusivity, the episode leaves listeners contemplating the true value and future of youth sports in fostering both athletic talent and community bonds.
RJ MacKenzie (01:32): "Little League was like the thing that's what we all look forward to. It was just the focal point of the community."
John Miller (05:04): "Players who came of age in the 50s and 60s, almost all played Little League baseball. The classic structure in the old days was Little League, then high school and then college."
RJ MacKenzie (09:32): "Sometimes it could be as cheap as like $1,000 up to, you know, some of these ones or five, $6,000 just to register with the team."
John Miller (11:22): "If you run 20 teams and you charge $5,000 a season for 12 kids per team, that's $1.2 million in revenue... And it's not hard to see how you can have profit margins of over 30 or 40%."
Linda Flanagan (22:54): "They should be like a part of life. They should be like the salt of life, not the food. And it has become the food for many families."
RJ MacKenzie (23:19): "It's not about him getting a scholarship or anything like that. It's something that he shows value in and he puts in the work ethic and all that stuff. It's money well spent."
The "Little League (Replay)" episode offers a thought-provoking examination of how economic forces reshape beloved community institutions like youth baseball leagues. By intertwining personal narratives with broader economic analysis, Zachary Crockett effectively highlights the complex interplay between passion, profit, and social equity in today's youth sports landscape.
For more insights into the economics of everyday phenomena, listen to The Economics of Everyday Things on the Freakonomics Radio Network.