Game Time Basketball is an organization advertising to offer select basketball opportunities to youth but I believe them to be a rip-off instead.
They advertise at a price around $400 per summer. Upon joining we found out that there was an additional $25 charge per tournament. In addition they charge parents and family $10/adult/day and $5/youth/day to watch their own children play. They tie up many public venues and really should not charge at all for them. Additionally, charging family to watch their own youth is a vary unfair way to distribute costs to players.
If there needs to be an extra charge it should be per player, not per family member. No one watches these games for recreation, but rather just to be a good family member. Why punish supportive families in favor of non-supportive families? Anyway, we could stomach all of this deception and really, extortion, if the youth got good, quality, fair playing time.
Now then, our team had 15 players for a sport where only 5 can be on the court at one time. Team player count above 8 (or 10 at most) is about money and not about player development. This is just common sense. These are select teams wherein parents pay for their child to play to become better, etc., but certainly to "Play"! In our case, we are trying to give our child (who "started" on his 7th grade team) the skills and experience to have a shot at maintaining his "starting" position on the 8th grade team.
Then at games, the play time per youth is very unfairly distributed. In some cases one or more players did not play at all for an entire game and their lack of playing time was not made up for in later games.
In other words, I believe Game Time Basketball is a rip-off for players, parents and family. I believe, they are about exploiting public and private resources for profit with little regard for participant value and player growth. And, what's up with charging families to watch there own children play? That's a lot like a "protection fee" offered by an organized crime gang.
On a side note, Game Time Basketball seems to focus on individualism vs. teamwork in a sport wherein teamwork is essential as evidenced by all great teams. We found this "street ball" to be disappointing at best.
When approached after our child did not play one entire game (our son was not the only one), the coach blew up, pulled all parents together and announced that this was a "dictatorship" and he was tired of being questioned about such things. When I told him off and began to leave, he began a rant on the money not being timely, etc. (this was not true). The coach said I should make my child better. My child is good (he works hard, has a great attitude, is the best team player on the team, plays great defense, handles the ball very well, is a pretty good shot, and was selected by Game Time Basketball) and I told the coach that making my child better was "his job" (that's what we are paying them for!). The coach went even crazier when I told him that.
The name of this coach is Pat Madison. Madison got up in my face and even threatened me when I told him to F#&@ himself and again after I told him he was a P#$&y and suggested that he may better just forget me and continue to neglect children wherein he seems to have a strength. Madison eventually had to be subdued by the policeman on duty.
When our child's mother contacted the director, Eddie Clemons, he sided with Madison. Clemons got angry and eventually hung up when asked to refund our money. Eddie Clemons said there was no guarantee that playing time would be fair, that I should not have called his self-obsessed, easily angered coach the P-word and that we were removed from the roster.
Game Time Basketball impeded our son's effort to advance himself by taking our money, putting our son on the team when they were not going to give him his fair share of playing time, insulting him and betraying his spirit by not playing him at all in a game, and then finally booting us off the team without even refunding any of our money. At worst, our son could have played with another team had Game Time Basketball, Clemons, and Madison been honest, etc.
I believe Eddie Clemons and Game Time Basketball to be all about money and generally a rip-off for players, parents and families. I believe Game Time Basketball to represent themselves as being all about youth but then performing in a way that is all about themselves and money. I believe they are a disgrace to all sports and athletics.