It’s easy to become obsessive about sports and specifically youth sports if you’re a parent of a successful athlete, ergo this site…
My perspective is baseball and swimming, and swimming doesn’t grab hold of the athletes and parents anything like baseball. Maybe swimming is more definable, your times define your college options. Or maybe it’s because there’s no pro job possibility at the end of the amateur run. There’s always politics, but in swimming I never saw a group of dads standing away from the other parents critiquing the coach or lamenting why that kid is swimming that event (LOL). Swimming is also a long wait to watch your kid compete for a few minutes…
Whatever the reason, baseball is different; athletes, parents and coaches seem to get sucked into baseball vortex – heaven forbid you’re the former athlete, parent, and coach trifecta! Even former pro players are not vortex immune: In Tomball Texas you could go to Charlie Hayes’ Big-League Academy and watch Charlie, Jessie Barfield, and Mike Jackson work lessons in adjoining tunnels (better have thick skin, because they didn’t mince words). Something like 45+ years of MLB experience between them, pretty sure they’d be doing something else if it weren’t profitable. However, all three are members of the former athlete, parent, and coach trifecta, so maybe the pull to stay in the game is too strong… Whatever the case, Charlie’s son Ke’Bryan is with the Pirates and inked a $70M contract at 25 years old, so I’m sure there are no regrets.
Hayes’ facility aside, I know 4 dads, all former college players, of talented baseball players that put teams together for their sons (501c non-profits). All 4 morphed into organizations, with 2 still in existence 8 years after their sons finished HS (THZ (The Hitting Zone) and CSR (Cotton Sports Ranch). Are they profitable? No clue...
However, in Texas with the sheer number of organizations; Banditos, D-BAT, Stix, Mizuno, Hunter Pence, Rawlings, DeMarini, Kyle Chapman, Houston Heat are just a few I can remember, somebody must be turning a profit.