The Little League World Series is underway, and I both love the Little League World Series and rarely watch it myself. I don’t know exactly why. It might have something to do with my 12-year-old self not dealing well with the pitch count rule introduced in 2007. Had I learned to prioritize economy, maybe Crystal Lake American Little League could have forced a winner-take-all Game 2 in the Illinois state championship that year. Alas. Jake Elliott is a Super Bowl champion, and I blog about the NIT.
I think the real reason I don’t watch the Little League World Series all that much is that I know the competition’s watered down. I don’t want to know this, but I do. It’s the dirty secret of youth baseball. In the mid-2000’s, the proliferation of travel ball for children reached a critical mass. Little League membership sunk. Why? It’s circular.
Travel ball is in some fashion selective. This makes families view travel ball as more competitive than their local Little League. That perception drives the best players out of Little League, which in turn makes the perception reality. With parents often coaches and better coaches often coaching better players, Little League loses its adult role models in the migration as well. When families leave Little League for travel ball, Little League becomes a worse experience for those who remain. The coaching is worse. The competition is worse. The next wave of players is either driven themselves to travel ball, continuing the cycle, or driven to quitting the sport. The travel ball tumor growing so large at the exact time Major League Baseball became a lot more boring (because of strikeouts, walks, and the best players getting hurt way more than they used to) made for a perfect storm. Baseball’s doing great globally, and it’s doing fine here in the U.S. But it’d be doing better if it wasn’t so pay-to-play at the youth levels, and it’d be doing better if the soul of the thing hadn’t been sucked out, leaving teams named things like “ZT National Prospects 12U,” which is a real example I just discovered that makes me want to tie someone at Perfect Game to an infield drag mat.
Sorry. I didn’t mean to get so bleak. Once we figure out a way to stop Instagram from ruining teenagers’ lives, we should really turn our attention to rehabilitating American youth sports. But I digress.
The other reason competition’s dropped in the Little League World Series? They expanded the thing. There are 20 regions now—ten international, ten from the U.S. In the glory days, back when Todd Frazier and Toms River won it all over Kashima in the title game, there were eight regions—four international, four American. You had to be good to make the Little League World Series back then. Every kid in the country was playing Little League, and only 50 or so made it to Williamsport. Kids watching at home knew they were getting the best of the best. In 2001, Little League expanded the event to include 16 teams, and it was fair and fine, but it watered it down. Now it’s up to 20? 20 is unnecessary. It was already lame to send two California teams to Regionals (give those kids a true state champion, dammit). Creating a Metro Region to lock in New York TV ratings was a bridge too far.
We talked two summers ago about how the Little League World Series gets too patronizing. We explained why people should treat these miniature competitors with more respect. This isn’t really that. This is me being sad that we’ve let Little League fall off. The extra teams are just another step in this staircase downwards.
It’s still special. It’s still fun. It’s still a great event, and it’s still a little mind-blowing that it exists. But it used to be even better. I wish more people realized what we’ve lost.
(I know they expanded to 20 teams a few years ago—that the format isn’t new. I told you I don’t watch it as much as I want to!)
Etc.
It’s been a minute, so we’re going to work backwards with these. George Mason, you’re up last.
- Front Office Sports reported today that Jody Owens, the DA who first brought charges in the Brett Favre welfare fraud case, is the subject of a federal investigation into bribery. Unfortunately for Favre, the bribery case is unrelated to the welfare fraud case. Maybe Favre should have ponied up? Also, the FBI reportedly raided Owens’s cigar business. I love that piece. It’s just like the movies. You’re not a southern DA allegedly involved in a bribery scandal until your cigar business gets raided.
- Ian O’Connor’s unauthorized Aaron Rodgers biography comes out next week. Two things: First, I love that we’ve all agreed to clarify it’s unauthorized. Honestly, it’s kind of respectful towards Rodgers. Most sports biographies are written to be sold to uncles who will give them to their eighth-grade nephews in the family gift exchange at Christmas. Aaron Rodgers is interesting enough to warrant a biography that’s not one extended puff piece for teenage football fans. Second, O’Connor’s smart for getting this out now. If there’s one thing to take away from the Haason Reddick holdout, it’s that this Jets season will make for one hell of a sequel.
- All this Jarren Duran discourse, and nobody is pointing out the most shocking thing from the ordeal: Usually at Fenway Park, the fan’s the one who uses a slur.
- I wish Caitlin Clark had been on Team USA for the Olympics, not because I think she was too good to be left off the team but because her reactions to France’s physicality in the gold medal game would have been something to behold. It would have looked like she was reenacting Saving Private Ryan.
- Moving to another Team USA, it’s nice to not have to worry about women’s soccer again. Societally, we didn’t react negatively enough to the failures to win gold in 2016 and 2021. No wonder we got rocked at the last World Cup. U.S. women’s soccer should win the Olympic gold medal at least once every four years. At least.
- The Tri Nations (they should have stuck with the name, that was their first problem) is underway, and South Africa and Argentina upset Australia and New Zealand in the opener. Which upset which? Not sure. Forgot that part. I do know the pairs rematch this weekend, still in the greater Australian area. (Is it Australia and Oceania or just Oceania? How should we refer to the greater ANZ kingdom?)
- I don’t know the full context, but the Oilers and/or the NHL evidently put out a documentary which features this, 41 seconds in the Edmonton locker room after Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. With the PA announcement of Connor McDavid’s Conn Smythe the only sound, it is the saddest sports video I’ve ever seen? It is also awesome. Few things make you care about sports more than seeing how much athletes care about sports.
- We’re still waiting for Rich Hill to land somewhere after his showcase bullpen on Friday. I hope there’s a bidding war. But I hope it’s a weird one. Like how bands put odd things on their concert riders. I hope Rich Hill is asking the Twins to pay him in antique Canadian coins.
- And, at last, George Mason. The Patriots tried to go to the Bahamas. They packed their bags. The trip didn’t happen? My impression is that the VII Group, one of those organizations that plans international tours for college basketball programs, is the one that got scammed. George Mason paid the VII Group to plan the trip, and the VII Group paid someone to book the flights, and that someone took the money and ran. That’s all just an impression. Anyway, what’s interesting here is that George Mason is paying someone to pay someone else to plan part of the trip? How hard is it to buy flights for a college basketball tour? Feels like there’s an opportunity here to skip the middleman.
It is sad…Little League, I mean. ☹️