10yo says he would rather play a baseball video game than watch a real one

My child at one time said he didn't want to WATCH baseball - he wanted to PLAY it. Video games are interactive; they learned about MLB teams and college teams, logos, names of players, etc.  I just chalked it up to "the Monopoly of the day", since that is what I played as a child....endlessly.  The only video games at our house are sports related.  It could be worse.  (On another note, there may be something in the hand-eye coordination that boys seem to like in video games.)

 

But we were also parents that started to take our children to pro and college games when they were young.  It was a great way to see the country and take in a game.  We planned vacations around the city team  I  we wanted to see.  We were also lucky that we had free college games and AAA/AA teams locally.  Going to see a pro team was a splurge. 

 

The Red Sox are on to something and I hope the other teams follow suit.  Love their lower price for students!  

 

I echo his statement,when I was younger I hated to watch a game(mlb) until playoff's, would have rather played it from sun up to sun down,now, not too bad, especially if one of my boys are playing!

If I think of the players on my 14U Travel team, I'd say about 3 actually watch baseball. Another 3 probably catch an inning or two. The others? I doubt they ever watch. I chalk it up to the generation. 

 

How many kids still collect baseball cards? Mine do.

 

I've told this story before, but it's relevant so I'll tell it again. A few years ago my son and I were watching tan Arkansas-LSU football game. This was a few years ago when it basically meant the winner would probably end up in the NC game vs. 'Bama. I look over and he's gone. I find him in his room watching the same matchup on his X-Box. Not playing the game, mind you, but letting the computer play the game while he watched. That was his preference. To be honest, the outcome was better on the Xbox.

So glad to see this thread, I was really beginning to wonder about my 12 year old.  He loves baseball, will be in the yard for hours a day hitting, pitching, playing modified rules with his 5 year old sister just to be able to play....and he has ZERO interest in watching it on TV.  Yet in between games at a tournament he begs not to leave to go eat so he can watch the other teams play, will play baseball on his X-box...but not once has he announced "Hey the Braves are playing tonight so I need to hurry up and eat so I can go watch"...not even the LL world series interested him.  Very weird.

My 2015 actually loves watching hockey, which is one of the sports he never played. Reading this thread also reminds me of a quote from a White Sox training camp my son attended as a youth a while back. The camp director running the camp wanted to encourage kids to get away from the computer simulation games indoors and get outside and work on their skills. He concluded by saying, "Don't go home and try to BEAT Frank Thomas, go home and try to BE Frank Thomas."

A few years back I was on my HS son (at the time, now a Soph in college) about his xbox playing.  If he wasn't at practice or a game he was down in the basement playing xbox.  He basically told me that that was the way everyone hung out.  All his friends were online playing and they were talking across the headsets.  I started asking around and it turns out he was right, all his friends were online and instead of getting together in person they got together online.

 

As he told me' "during football season we practice M-Th until almost 7pm.  I come home eat, do homework, goto bed and repeat in the morning.  On Fridays we don't get out of our game until after 10pm at night.  On Saturdays we are back at the school by 7:30am for film and then to watch the B or JV games (depending on level).  We finally get to leave the school around noon.  I've been hanging out with my friends all week.  We are all exhausted by this point and just want to chill.  The only time we have to chill is Saturday afternoon and evening.  Instead of getting together at someones house its better for us to put on the headsets and screw around online.  We do a little of this on Sunday as well, but I usually do my homework on Sunday and try to get ahead for the week."

 

After hearing that and then talking to the parents of the other kids I realized that the way kids hangout has changed since I was young.

All of the above sounds like my son.  Although now they seem to get together to play the games.  They love to play MLB, FIFA, etc.  I think its great, and when they spend time at our house, we know they aren't getting into trouble.

I agree the hanging out online is new generation thing (mostly because it's the first generation to have it lol) but not watching sports on TV isn't. Some people like to play sports, some like to watch them, and some like both. Ofcoarse some also don't like either. I started playing baseball at 5, football at 7 and basketball in 6th grade. I played all three through HS and football and baseball through college. However the first sporting event I ever watched on TV was a Super Bowl when I was 25. Even now I coach football, baseball, softball, and soccer and I bet I don't watch 10 sporting events a year. Although I do watch every televised moment of the Olympics so maybe that makes up for it hahahaha.

when I was a youngster we never liked watching anything we could do.i can understand it with today's kids. Baseball is a slow game to watch,still tons of things to look out for watching a game.but not so much for kids.i'd rather see them playing outside that isn't done enough today.

Sometimes we just need validation. Check this out, from early last summer:

JP (who I miss, since he's in Jupiter with Mom, and I'm home on HSBW) shows me every spectacular OF play, and HR hit each day ... on his iPhone. But he has never really loved just watching others play baseball. Attend an MLB game? Yes, absolutely. But on TV? Not so much. Just curious how others' sons are in this area.

 

Most responses helped me breathe better. But then there was sultan of swat: If my son could figure out how to watch MLB while sleeping, he would do it.

My son and I are huge RedSox fans.  they had a big series with the Yanks a couple of years ago and I came home late from work one night.  I see the kid in the basement with a game on and hear the announcers talking and ask who is winning.  He says 'we are 15-3.'  I say 'wow we are killing the ball tonight.'  He says 'yeah Pujols has 3 dingers.'  I say 'awesome...wait...what?'  He explains how he made a big trade with the Cards and so forth.

 

I asked him why he wasn't watching the actual game and he said he did for about 2 hours and it was still in the 4th inning so he got bored.  He is 16 now and would still rather play the game in the basement than watch it on tv until about the 8th inning. 

Regarding the article that started this thread, it's puzzling that the Red Sox aren't looking at ways to get more kids to play the game as well. Are there any kids who like to watch baseball who haven't played it? 

 

My 21-year-old is playing college ball so he likes to watch those games on TV, but he'd rather play MLB than watch it.