"Back in the day" we used to hear stories about those parents who would attempt to relive their glory days through their kids. Looking back at these, we can laugh and shake our heads at how silly that was compared to the difficulties faced by young athletes today.
Every parent wants their kid to go to college, but with steadily hiking tuition rates who can afford it? The answer drifting in the minds of most parents is "scholarship," but how realistic is this? The US Department of Education reports that there are an estimated 6.9 million high school athletes, but those coveted Division I NCAA athletic scholarships can't go to everyone. The pressure is on.
Earlier and earlier we are forcing kids to specialize in one sport, so that they can be the next Tiger Woods, the next LeBraun James. Children as young as elementary school are playing on multiple travel teams that emphasize high level competition. Playing for your high school team isn't enough for the recruiters any more, you have to play AAU or Futures or JO to get noticed. And to what end? Athletic injuries are on the rise, and the population needing surgery or rehab for ACL tears, labral injuries, meniscal tears, ankle sprains, spondy's, and even concussions and post concussive syndrome continues to get younger all the time. Why does your ten year old need to throw a breaking pitch? He doesn't, is the simple answer.
Specialization is not the only pressure taking the fun out of athletics these days either. Often we hear people talk about how crazy soccer moms are, but this is becoming much more than just a soccer-centric problem. Adults put an enormous amount of pressure on children to succeed in athletics, to the point where it can be emotionally traumatizing. An overzealous parent will only get worse over time. We watch TV shows like "Toddlers in Tiaras" and "Dance Moms" and laugh and think to ourselves "That is horrifying, I would never do that to my kid," but when Friday night rolls around and your son steps onto the football field, it isn't the other students screaming bloody murder at the coach when he isn't in the game for what you think is a sufficient amount of time.
Looking at sports chats, newspaper articles, and local sports blogs, I am beginning to realize that individual parents are not fully the cause of the problem. As a society, we are beginning to raise the young athlete to untouchable standards. Talented youngsters can easily become gods in small towns. This raise in status can really increase the pressure on a young athlete to impossible heights. An athlete who is stressed can stop doing well in school, stop performing well in sports, and even get injured more easily.
We as adults need to step back and stop ourselves. It is not fair to think that we can hold a 16 year old to the same standards as we do a quarterback in the NFL or a star MLB pitcher. While they might be good athletes, they are not mature adults. Newspaper and magazine articles glorifying or putting down high school athletes, blogs demoralizing whole teams, and even things as simple as parents trash talking kids on message boards are just too much. We need to get back into the role of adults and function as we are supposed to - in a way that shows our kids we love and support them but in the end don't care if they win or lose, as long as they have a good time. Sure, she might seem mature, but your varsity basketball player is still a kid and deserves to have all the time she can to be a kid and just have fun.
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