This is a chicken and egg discussion. Do kids not play ball together because parents got involved. Or did parents get involved because the kids donāt play together?Baseball/softball and basketball are the two sports which are the most difficult to be good at IMO (I guess golf too but I am talking about sports sane people play..) and playing a sport you are good at is a lot more fun .. I didnāt play football growing up outside of with my friends but I am pretty sure I could have tried out for my HS team and been the starting wide receiver..
The difference between the two is it is lot easier to develop your skills to become good in basketball without parental involvement. Yeah you can do tee work, wall ball, throw into a net etc. in softball but in terms of development they are not equal to what you can do in basketball by yourself.
Kids donāt play baseball/softball with their friends anymore so the onus is placed on parents to play catch, throw front toss, hit grounders, take the kid to lessons (they do have skill lessons in basketball which I think is a crock..) etc and in 2022 people have a lot going on ..itās tough. In the summer I probably spend 10 hours a week playing/working with my kids. Most of the time I enjoy it but my job is such that I can pretty much come and go as I please as long as I am in my class to lecture when I am supposed to. Many people donāt have that luxury.
When I was 8 we would walk to the local elementary school and hit balls in the playground or pitch up against the school wall with rubber balls. Now days if an 8 year old walked half a mile to meet friends to play ball people would call the police.