Some parents were like that after the marking seeping into third brains, fellow parents, and the occasional kid with low self esteem. Yet I didn't know of any kids who cared about the crappy, artifical demand that got them to start caring once their friends acquired a fake bunch of worthless plastic "trophies," which help fuel the cycle of more parents having to pay extra in league fees so that they were paying extra in league fees to cover the added expense so that the trophy fees (that were essentially mandatory by being part of the league in the first place, which parents were just OK with the practice since it was only a negligible cost increase, and they don't want their kids to feel left out as the only kid on their team that didn't get a "trophy.") I got rid of my collection of 15ish participation trophies despite being MVP most seasons as a lightning fast left-handed/left-footed left-forward/striker sometime around when I turned 20 and was really not wanting to carry around an extra box of worthless figures. B s There so little money in little league that I wouldn't be surprised if the coaches or administrators profited a little off sales as motivation. The fields already had ads for Pepsi and stuff.