I'm baffled as to why the Little League gets so much coverage on ESPN, it must be due to the name recognition.
The truly good players at the 12 year old level all play USSSA baseball ("real" baseball)
For those of you commenting that "fundamentals are lacking", yes, the good players don't play Little League.
For one, there is no dropped third strike, so this encourages pitchers to throw breaking balls on two strike counts (and the coaches encourage breaking balls at this level)
Also there is no leading off, and thus there is no balks. The diamond is also significantly smaller; it is roughly the same size as what USSSA 10 year olds play on.
What it amounts to is many parents are funneling their kids into select ball where the kids can start playing "real" baseball (dropped third strike, leading off, balks, infield fly, etc) at age 9 instead of age 13...