Throughout my high school career I was involved in four sports, chorus, newspaper, yearbook, student council, student rotary, and probably some others that I am forgetting. I was lucky enough to have parents that came to 99.99% of my events. This often meant that they were have to give up things that they wanted to do in order to support me. I always loved seeing them in the crowd and knowing that they were there to watch and cheer me on. However, until recently, I did not realize exactly how much they really did give up to come to all my events. I understand that many youth today are not this lucky. Many simply get dropped off and picked up when the game is over. I know that there are many different reasons for this and no two situations are the same.
I am getting off topic....My parents never once told me that you HAVE to go out for (insert activity). They told me that I should try it and that if I didn't like it...I didn't have to go back out for it next year. The key? I was the one that got to make the decision- not my parents. Would I be devastated if my son did not want to play baseball one day? Honestly, yes, I probably would. But I would never even think about making him play just because I love the game of baseball. If it is not something that he wants to do, I would not want to force him to partake in it. (This is all assuming that I do not end up with triplet girls....).
It truly saddens me how many parents I see living out their "second sports life" through their children. In these parents' minds, they are doing nothing wrong- simply trying to each their child how to "be a winner". Well, it isn't working. Those kids are not having fun. They are either going to end up hating the sport/activity that they are being forced to play, or they are going to end up hating their parent. I have seen way too many parents yelling at their 7 year old son/daughter for making a mistake in a game or practice. I don't get it. Youth sports are supposed to be about learning and having fun. What happened to the days where you played the baseball game and went out and got an ice cream cone? Nobody knew what the score was...and, honestly, nobody cared. I had no idea what the scores were from my youth baseball games..and it didn't matter to my parents. All that mattered was that I was hustling, being a good teammate, and, heaven forbid, having fun.
There is this idea that you have to sport specialize and be pushed to the outer limits to be good at a sport these days. The truth is far from that. Why did I work so hard in baseball? Because I liked the game- it was fun for me to play. If that would have been taken away in youth baseball, I don't know if I would have wanted to play anymore. I ended up being an all-state pitcher and pitching four years of college baseball at two programs that were both ranked top 25 nationally while I was there. But what do I know? As I have been told my parents, (that never played college baseball...let alone high school baseball) I have no idea what it takes to me a good player.
These few stories that I have shared have come from four different towns that I have been in over the last five years. Sadly, almost all of them follow the same script. It truly saddens me to see the way that youth activities are headed in this country. Why can't parents just allow their son or daughter to do what they enjoy? I understand wanting what is best for your children- but is that really what they want? Or, are they living vicariously through their children, looking for another shot to win it all. I hope that the culture of youth sports has a mind shift....
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