" Affordability" of sports

Imagine how cheap sports would be if insurances were dropped in favour of “at your own risk” I’ve always maintained insurance is the devil for sports.

Comp kids sports it's the reason. It has killed and diluted the rec leagues. 

The high school kids I coach in hockey have up to $450 hockey sticks. Two weeks ago, in our first game they broke 6 sticks that night, average them out to $300 each and that is almost $2000 lost in one night.  Two years ago, one of the local high school teams had the bus broke into between games and lost $40,000 worth of sticks, each kid has at least two if not 3 sticks. 

Travel/private leagues are very expensive and definitely a contributing factor to the ballooning.

We've stuck to the local rec leagues of AYSO and Pop Warner for my kids, and it's been reasonable (other than my gripe about the time commitment required by football). I've also pushed them towards non-organized sports like MTB (ton of free trails around here) and golf (Youth on Course gets them $5 rounds at many courses), and I hope to add dirt bikes in the future.

As someone who has played hockey for a very long time, I know the pain. Buying brand new, high end sticks from Bauer, CCM, Warrior, etc. is just not a good financial investment. Perform great, break easy. Hockey is a great sport, but it continues to price itself out of the common person’s budget, even at entry level. Seems to be a problem across the board in every sport now. 

I laugh at the kids; my son watched the game that night and said my kids can't hit the broadside of a barn with those sticks.  Good thing they broke them he said. I tell them you can shoot but can't catch a pass for nothing.  The sticks have too much flex. $1000 skates and they break the blades quite often. Helmets without a mask $450, gloves $179, shinpads, breezers and more are $$$$

Youth sports are much more expensive than reported. It’s just most of it is subsidized. Think of the cost of fields, gymnasiums, bleachers, buses, maintenance, staff etc. whereas the cost of motocross is solely owned by the individual and track owners. 

I’m not suggesting to eliminate youth sports by any means, just noting the differences. 

I grew up playing travel hockey & when i was about 12  I could not find my synergy (premiere stick at the time) when i came out of the locker room. Told my dad someone took it. he says actually son i broke it in half & threw it under the bleachers. I had another game later that day & my dad goes if you score a hat trick i'll buy you a new synergy. I proceeded to score a hat trick with a $15 stick & my dad goes "what do you need a new stick for? That one works fine.” 😂

The stories only get worse from there haha

go to any major training track that preps kids for and has qualifiers for Loretta’s or any major national race and there are millions of dollars worth of trailers, toy haulers, busses, multiple motorcycles, surrons, side by sides, and golf carts sitting there, but most on here complain about the price of a factory/works edition 450! 

While it would be nice if there was some way for these sort of high-risk activities to have better laws to protect them from nuisance lawsuits, that's not the cause for increases in this article.

This article is about the push to participate in travel leagues and the costs associated with that, including for-profit training clinics and tournaments. 

And, like just about everything that gets ruined in this country, private equity is behind it. 

The youth sports industry, according to the Aspen Institute, generates about $40 billion in annual revenue, dwarfing other forms of entertainment. Last year, for example, the domestic movie box office grossed about $8.7 billion.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/09/business/youth-sports-private-equity…

That’s insane for a hockey stick. Back when I was playing in high school we got 2 free sticks a week. If you broke them the next one you paid for. You’re not scoring more goals with a $450 stick. Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito and many after them did okay with a lot cheaper stick. 

It is, no way around it though, as lawyers make sure any waiver like that, isn’t worth the paper it was made on.

Anyone bought a baseball bat lately? You know…those composite or Al. ones that the kids are all using…? 🤣

2 factors. 1- most every kid or parent or both thinks they are going pro in whatever sport, so the ends always justify the means. I will appear guilty on this point, but I’ve always known my kid wouldn’t go pro and that was never the goal. But bikes, gear, training, etc was still ridiculous. My reason for all of it was to take the risk of it all to as low as possible. The best gear money could buy for the crash, the training was never about making him the fastest, but for sure to be technically sound to mitigate mistakes that lead to injury. 2- Greed. We did Loretta’s last year and while it was the holy grail for him, I got first hand experience of what I had already known. The parents and kids are absolute cash cows for mx sports. Listening to Tim Cotter sell the experience at the opening ceremony was nothing short of comical.  We did it, got the memories, one and done. But these families feeding the beast every year traveling the country? God bless. 

There are a dozen high schools within 50 miles of me. Most with 500-600 kids. All have multi-million dollar artificial turf football fields, premium running tracks, tennis courts, olympic sized swimming pools, so yeah youth sports isn't cheap.

Supposedly the artificial turf fields are cheaper than grass in the long run. 

The prices of bikes in South Africa is killing motocross. Very few can afford a new bike and maintain it properly.

Our national motocross events are so thin on riders and it's getting worse. 

I love this sport and it's fricken sad to see it perishing here in SA.

You’re so rich and core for spending so much money

*you're

Easton Dub, Rawlings ICON, Hype Fire, Soldier Tank.... Thankfully my kids rec league only allows USA bats in anything under 10 3/4 years old. Rawlings making the 1 piece ICON for $200 was so nice! And my kid hits well with it! Spring both kids will be playing in the upper age group(son is getting too big and too strong to play with the other kids his age so for safety we are moving him up) and both kids will be using BBCOR.... Meant to mimic wood but the good bats are all so expensive! Just glad we aren't doing anything USSSA!

I live near a hockey academy and it's 50k a year to attend. They have kids from all over the world attending (Australia, Austria, Malaysia, South Korea, Japan, Germany, UK, US, Mexico, Russia, ...). There's no shortage of kids attending. 

Sports at any high level costs a lot of money. 

It costs a lot to send kids to a training facility, but at least the hockey kids are getting a great education. 

First Private Equity came for the hockey parents, and I said nothing for I was not canadian.

Then private Equity came for the baseball parents, and I said nothing for I could not swing a bat,

Then private Equity came for competitive soccer parents, and I said nothing for I was not a dork, 

Then private equity came for the powersports, and by then, I was alone, for nobody was left to speak for me.

I was going to say, there is an apparent trend that if you can't get the top of the line equipment, that you can't participate. Kids don't even want to look at "less than the best". They HAVE to have the latest and greatest. Pretty stark contrast to my youth, where I survived on used gear from the 80's (I was a 90's kid).

I've built both, and have heard that argument. Needlessly to say, the only real reason one school has artificial turf is because the other school has it, that's all. Especially for schools that have a hard time filling rosters.

With a reply like that, you must live here too. 

Bro got so butthurt, and for what 😂

bro this thread and the other one:

“I’m 6’2” 200 pounds and super ripped”

We got some real ballers here on vital mx. Blowing thousands at a time at the dealership. Idk bro I guess we’re just cheeks😂😂😂

If someone ships you “motorcycle parts” from Murica…do you have to pay fees/VAT/taxes/duty on that…?

I’m short, fat, old, slow…and I’ve got a coupl’a knees made with stuff from “the parts counter”…

But, I absolutely love this shit.

💪🏼