On Friday I was listening in on an umpire talk with an area youth softball coach, and what I heard stunned me. We have a local team in our area that has purchased the naming rights to a softball organization in another state. This local team is using the name and paying a fee for the rights to that name because they feel the team name will attract more college coaches to the team. And apparently, this is a happening more and more.
So not only are the price tags ridiculous to even participate on many of these youth softball teams, part of that price tag is to cover naming rights fees.
Are you freaking kidding me? I hope that parents of the youth girls that are participating on this team have a written guarantee from the coaching staff that their daughters will earn a college scholarship. And in the event that their daughters do not earn a scholarship, the coaching staff will write a check to the family in lieu of no scholarship earned.
As a softball umpire, the world of youth softball spiraling out of control is an increase in income opportunity. There are tournaments every weekend, and even in midwest winters, umpires don't have to go too far to even umpire indoor events. And at $35-$40 per game that often has time limits of no more than 75 minutes, that's a lot of high wage income opportunity.
My youngest son is going to graduate from high school in a month. I fear the direction of youth sports for his children. I hope some common sense comes back to the adults that are fueling this wildfire of youth sports insanity. For the meantime, I guess it's more money for umpires, event facility owners, concession stands, equipment manufacturers, hotel chains, and the adults turning a profit by managing these organizations.
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