Let Kids Play!

The kids who showed up to my charity basketball clinic on Long Island barely spoke. They stood along the baseline in a gym that wasn’t theirs, arms crossed, waiting to be told what to do. Then we handed out shoes, real ones still in the box, and basketballs that actually held air. Twenty minutes later, a boy who wouldn’t tell me his name was calling for the ball on a fast break and talking trash when he got it.

That’s what a court, a ball, and a decent pair of shoes can do. Most kids like him will never get the chance, because youth sports in America now run on money, not talent.

The benefits of playing aren’t in dispute. Kids who play sports earn better grades, carry less stress, and build the confidence and teamwork that follow them into adulthood. But those benefits increasingly go to the families who can pay for them.

For generations, school teams were the great equalizer. Whatever your zip code, you could try out, make the roster, and get coached for free. That promise is breaking. Hamden cut all middle school sports and freshman basketball to close a $3.5 million budget hole. The middle school sports program cost about $47,000 a year. Enfield eliminated every middle school and ninth-grade team, and parents had to raise more than $162,000 on GoFundMe to bring them back.

While public schools cut, private money moves in. Youth sports is now a $40 billion industry, nearly double the NFL’s annual revenue. Private equity has noticed. KKR paid $4.5 billion for Varsity Brands, the company behind much of competitive cheer. When the school team disappears, the club team stops being an upgrade and becomes the only option. Most families can’t afford it.

The average sports family spent $1,016 on one child’s main sport in 2024, a 46 percent jump since 2019. That’s one kid, one sport, before travel tournaments and private lessons push the bill higher. Basketball is the worst offender: families’ spending on the sport more than doubled between 2019 and 2024, the fastest increase of any sport Aspen tracked.

The result is predictable. In 2011, 64 percent of high school boys played on at least one team. By 2023, that had fallen to 56 percent, and cost is one of the reasons.

The money doesn’t just decide who plays. It decides who gets good. When Sports Illustrated’s MMQB profiled the 15 quarterbacks taken in the 2016 NFL Draft, it found that 13 grew up in homes valued near or above their state’s median, and seven in homes worth more than double it. On average, they started playing quarterback at age 9. Elite talent is starting to look a lot like elite income.

This is fixable, and some places are already trying. In Philadelphia, the Parks & Recreation Department and the Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative launched the Philly Youth Sports Fund, which gives grassroots youth sports groups grants of $500 to $5,000. Connecticut could do better than leaving towns like Hamden to choose between a teacher and a team. Club sports aren’t the enemy. The problem is letting school sports wither until the club team is the only door left open.

I think about that boy from the clinic. He was good, quick off the dribble, with a real feel for the game. Whether he ever plays organized ball shouldn’t depend on whether his family can write a four-figure check. Talent should decide who gets to play. Right now, the bank account does.

Nate Grossman is a high school senior and founder of Shoot Your Shot, a nonprofit that supports underserved youth in pursuing their athletic dreams. He aims to pursue a career at the intersection of athletics, economics, and philanthropy.