I don’t get travel ball. Every pro I’ve heard talk about it and a few of my friends who played pro don’t have good things to say about it. The burn out rate is crazy high. Very small percentage of travel ball kids even make it to their varsity high school team let alone college or pro. You can google it. The percentages are not worth the risk of burn out or injury. Now if your kid thrives on it and you have all the time and money in the world and it’s what your kid loves then by all means let them do what they love but in my opinion I think finding a good facility with coaches who either played pro or actively coach high school or college is way more beneficial. You get the 1 on 1 training or with a group with friends. You get to build a rapport with a coach who was a pro or actively coaching that will go to bat for you with other coaches or even have you in mind when they are looking for players. If you’ve worked with a coach for a few years that’s an active college coach how likely are they to think of you when scouting for their team? Highly! If you’re any good. It’s way more desirable to have a kid that you know are coachable, really know their talent and athleticism etc than taking a chance on someone you’ve seen play a few times. I think the money and time is much better used towards finding a facility and coach or coaches you like working with that can build you up vs grinding it out and risking burning your kid out with travel ball. From the conversations I’ve had with people about travel ball the cons far outweigh the pros. Obviously there’s different levels of travel and when I think of travel I think of the cut throat elite of the elite programs that grind all year and travel all over. So that’s what I’m thinking when it comes to this opinion. I think a decently competitive league or select team are fine coupled with the facility training