Destruction of Young Athletes

[Brian Grasso]

Boy... It's been a while!

Just a little light reading for you all!


Over the past several months, I have been overwhelmed at the positive support I’ve received for creating the IYCA. Far more than just a mere certification provider, I, along with my fellow Board of Director members, have always viewed the IYCA as an organization that will become a watchdog of sorts for the youth sporting industry.

Already we are gaining interest from major university’s in the United States and Canada as a potential curriculum provider. We have also been contacted by hospitals, individual physicians and international sporting organizations all of which seek to either aid in making our cause as impacting as possible or wish to utilize our services within their own associations.

With all of the upbeat and optimistic feeling pertaining to our goals of positively influencing the youth sporting world, I was literally floored when I read an article recently about fifth grade basketball players being ranked by independent company’s on a national level – Kids as young as 10 and 11 years old are being categorized and compared to each other on a national scale. More over, shoe company’s (the article lists Adidas as one of them), are hosting invitation-only national tournaments for kids in the fifth, sixth and seventh grade. These camps include sales copy indicating that ‘top college coaches in attendance’... To see 10 year old kids???

I find this to be culpable and dangerous. Where has the innocence and joy of youth sports gone?

Terry Orlick in his wonderful book ‘ Embracing Your Potential’, outlines key ingredients of childhood that many adults forget about due to the chaotic nature of our lives.

Vision -

The things you saw as a youngster influenced you a great deal. As you saw others walk, you learned from them and started to walk as well. You saw, were influenced and aspired to do or become.

Ten year old children may aspire to become elite basketball players, but what if they fall short? What if they get injured or do not develop in the manner that was predicted for them? The world is full of athletes who were considered gifted, elite or even champions as youngsters but never ‘made it’ to the level of superstardom. If you are being invited to national camps, offered shoe endorsements and scouted by ‘top college coaches’ at ten years old, what else are you able to vision for your future?

Absorption -

As a young child playing sports, you are consumed by the sheer pleasure of participation. According to Terry Orlick, ‘your focus was simple and uncomplicated. Your mind was free if distractions and worry. You were totally connected and unconcerned by the thoughts of evaluations of others’.

When I read this, I myself experience wonderful memories of playing football in a park near my childhood home. I can picture sunny days, warm temperatures and feelings of being wonderfully free. The ten year olds going to these camps have no such luxury. Basketball to them is stressful. They are being compared and contrasted to other hopeful stars and their performances on this one day will soon be published in a ranking magazine.

Joyfulness -

Children at play are joyful and relaxed. Enough said.

Purity -

Children are naturally simple and spontaneous. Terry Orlick suggests that ‘you lived without pretense, having no need to be anything other than what you were at the moment’... unless of course you were being graded and ranked by college coaches and recruiters which likely leads you to want to strive to be as good or better than you really are.

What kind of messages are we sending these children?

- Brian Grasso
www.DevelopingAthletics.com

[ODBSGIRL]

Thank you Brian. We are stuggling with this issue even at the 8 and under level of girl's softball. There are tournament teams that even at this young age are training year-round, are playing on tournament teams that travel all over and the coaches and parents allow, no encourage, no DEMAND, unsportsman like conduct from each other and their kids. It's appalling. What kind of pressure does this put on them? How much joy can there be in playing when there is so much pressure to win at any cost? I tell my daughter that there is no shame in losing as long as you play your best, don't give up, and you learn from playing teams that are better than you are ( and that means learning how NOT to act, not just how to play better )There's the message I want to send my child.

[Kevin T.]

I played only rec sports growing up. A couple seasons of basketball, Little League and rec soccer. I saw my other friends play traveling and yeah, i knew i could compete at that level and probably be better than some of them in any of the sports. But, even though i was mad at my parents for not letting me at the time, looking back on it now, its the best thing they could've done for me. It also helps i think that my parents weren't athletes and never coached any of my teams. Yea, they've come to almost every game and offered positive encouragement, but, them both being music people, they never pressured me or tried to live out their dreams through me.

I look at some kids my age. One kid screwed up his knees back in middle school and can't run normal. The others are the ones dropping like flies with injuries. The only things i've have problems with are sprained and twisted ankles here and there, some weird knee things, and now the other day, i strained my hip flexor. Other than that, i've been fine. Nothing that i couldn't play through.

I find it ridiculous thought, that now, in my town, even the rec league is getting ugly. The league isn't allowing teenagers to umpire the major division games (5&6 grades) because it's gotten that bad. I have to say that i've been blessed. Got in with a really good class in all 3 of my schools, played with a good group of kids growing up, gotten the good teachers, gotten outta schools as they start to go a little downhill, etc. I find it shocking that noone in the area realizes that we don't live in a big recruiting area for colleges. I think the last kid who made it pro in football around here was the guy who made the tackle that hurt Bo Jackson. That guy went to HS with my dad! That's over 20 years now. Around me, there's only a couple schools, all parochial or private, that produce the athletes that get scholarships. The Delbartons, Don Boscos, St. Josephs, etc. I find it hard to believe that, even though the coaches remind the players constantly of it, the parents are too stubborn to realize that their kid isnt playing against good enough kids to prove they've got anything to colleges