[not that commenter] I can't beleive how damaging those participation trophies were to my childhood. There I was, 6 years old, standing at the counter of the plastic trophy store, waiting for my order, baseball cap bill resting on the counter because I was 3ft 2in at the time. My team wasn't great, but they worked hard by showing up sometimes. Today was the last game of the playoffs, as we were getting ready to spar against the worst team in the league to see who would rank 16th out of the 17 town teams. "Springfield Farm League 1997" the trophy plaque read, as the clerk placed one as a sample on the counter next to the box, wondering if there was anyone else in the store anymore. I thought, "I will cherish this trinket for life, I will remember it forever, a little piece of memorabilia to sit on my parent's CD shelf for a few years before being "packed away" one last time. And years later, I will cry, because that trophy gave me so much promise, so much hope; if only I worked a little harder, and been placed on a better team, and actually cared in high school, and had been born to richer parents, and been able to attend baseball training camps, and had the right timing to be noticed by recruiters, I could have made it - I could have been on the farm league of the Houston Astros. But that plastic trophy ruined it for me, it made me think I could just coast. I never should have placed that order for my team, I never would have gotten hooked on casual involvement in hobbies, I never would have been always trying to scratch that itch of fleeting excitement for trivial matters. I got my whole team addicted to believing everything should just be fun and OK, that not everything should be a demoralizing struggle.

Wait a minute, the players didn't buy their trophies. Whose idea was that? Oh right, the people complaining did it.