Had a Z6 a couple years ago and hated it due to the "blackout" in the viewfinder when shooting high speed continuous.

Have a D780 and D3s........still looking for a deal on a D500 or D5 but so far no luck.    Stumbled into a Z6ll and giving it some thought,.but assuming for high school sports I'll be disappointed.

You will likely never find as good a deal on a D500 as you can right now buying a refurb direct from Nikon - $1151 refurb with free shipping!

I am still using mine for sports. It has done lots of Taekwondo and kids basketball (indoor, poorly lit gyms), and both flag and tackle football. It has lots of clicks both day and night. I am far from a professional, but this thing has been making me look good for about 6 years!

-shooter

I would like to find a good used D500, but am amazed an 8 year camera is STILL going for around $1200????!!!     Thing must be THAT good!!!

One of the reasons it will hold on for awhile is that people who have been shooting f mount lenses for decades are running out of ways to use them in modern cameras. If I go to a z-mount camera with a converter I lose a ton of functionality in my oldest lenses (non-AF-S), and a few of my newest (two DX lenses). That kind of means starting over, and at that point I am not 100% sure it would be with a Nikon…

All that said, I have a “refurb” ZF in my cart with a 40 f2.8 - but haven’t been able to make myself pull the trigger. My D500 has performed really well on travel and sports photography both. If you look at the feature to feature comparisons, we are just now getting to the point where a big upgrade over the D500 is no longer $3-5k for the body.

-shooter