Looking back on the year in youth sports -and ahead

As the hours tick down on 2008, I wanted to thank those of you following the blog for your suggestions, interest, input. Thanks also to print and cyber media that have been generous in citing various posts or linking to the blog. These outlets include: BusinessWeek.com, ESPN.com, sportsbusinessjournal.com, Goodhousekeeping.com, Awfulannouncing.com, Beaconbroadside.com, Baltimoresun.com, Courier-journal.com, Dallaschild.com, Trackmom.com, sportsmediasociety.blogspot.com, womenshoopsblog.blogspot.com, title-ix.blogspot.com.

A large thank you goes to my sons Ben, 20, and Eli, 18, for their support. Ben for encouraging me to step up posts to the blog, which went from one every six months to three (and sometimes five a week) in July. Eli for his fantastic technical assistance. If it's on the blog and required even a modicum of technical know-how, chances are Eli is responsible.

2009 should be interesting, with the release of my book in April, a book publicity tour and various writing and reporting assignments on youth sports issues. I hope you'll continue reading and contributing.

Here's a good way to close the year - with Doug Abrams's look back at encouraging youth sports stories from 2008.

Happy New Year, everyone.

The wisdom of Kelsey Twist and Wayne Gretzky

Former athletes - especially those who've played at the highest level - often are the best advocates for a saner, kid-centric approach to youth sports. When Wayne Gretzky advises parents to back off, let their children play for fun - as he did recently - adults tend to listen. Other pro athletes I have spoken with over the years - golfer Billy Andrade, baseball players Tommy John, Jim Poole, among them - have been equally outspoken.

Kelsey Twist played varsity lacrosse at Stanford, graduating a few years ago as one of the top players in school history. Now she teaches and coaches at a private school in Baltimore.

This op-ed written by Twist for the Baltimore Sun is an eloquent and disturbing statement of what has changed about youth sports - and the price of that change for young players.

Kelsey writes:

"While coaching, I often stop to consider my high school career at Roland Park Country School. I mostly remember face paint, spirit parades to Bryn Mawr, and tossing the ball around after practice until we couldn't see it any longer.

I do not remember stress fractures, personal trainers, lacrosse tournaments during basketball season, hiring a recruiting specialist to help me get into college, or paying outrageous dues to play on a club team.

I am left to ask: What happened to high school sports in the six years I've been gone? When did being a high school athlete become a job instead of a pastime?"

And Twist is writing about what, until recently, had been a regional and, in some respects, minor sport - lacrosse. Multiply by 10 and you are approaching the pressure on top high school basketball and football athletes.

Not enough time, too many kids' activities

Dawn McMullan poses this million-dollar question in this month's Dallas Child: "Should you unschedule your overscheduled child?" An entertaining read told from the perspective of the author who's clearly wrestling with the activity creep overtaking the lives of her own sons, 8-year-old Sawyer and Noah. age 11.

She writes of being "taken aback when my calendar looks like this:
Monday: 4-9pm, rock climbing for Noah.
Tuesday: 5-8pm, rock climbing for Noah.
Wednesday: 5-6pm, guitar lessons for both boys; 6-8pm, football practice for Noah; 6-7:30pm, baseball practice for Sawyer.
Thursday: 5-8pm, rock climbing for Noah.
Friday: Third-grade lock-in at church.
Saturday: 10am-1pm, rock climbing for Noah; noon, Noah’s football game (conflict!).
Sunday: 1:30-3:30pm, football practice for Noah; 3:40pm, Sawyer’s baseball game; 6:45pm, cotillion."

Been there. Except for rock climbing lessons and one or two others on Dawn's list - done that.

I am quoted on the growing divide between what kids need/want from their youth sports experience - fun, making friends, improving at their sport - and what adults increasingly are focused on; winning, championships, advancing, college scholarships, building a youth sports resume, whatever that means.

Thanks to Dawn for mentioning the Youth Sports Parents blog and Until It Hurts in her piece.

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The accelerated program

My friend, Bob Bigelow, predicts that the age of entry for youth sports will continue to drop until some league unveils a new division for...."padded pregnant women." He calls this new concept "pre-natal soccer." Amusing stuff. And, maybe, not so far-fetched.

While I continue my search for in utero sports leagues, I offer these close examples.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, Peaceful Kwanzaa, everyone.

Exhibit A: Soccer in diapers

Exhibit B: Soccer for children not yet able to walk, stand or crawl.

Sensible sports advice from our pediatricians

The American Academy of Pediatrics is one of the best sources around for commentary and information on youth sports injuries. I've found the AAP's advice unfailingly sensible and accessible.

Case in point: "A Minute for Kids," a series of 60-second audio files - 18 in all - that take on important topics. I particularly liked reports on eye protection (42,000 eye injuries occur during sports play each year; half of those hurt are under 15) and adult conduct at youth sports events (Stop yelling, you're embarrassing your children).


Nothing revolutionary here. Still, because these words come from our kids' doctors they carry extra weight.

Chatting about sports on Marketplace

I was a guest on American Public Media's "Marketplace" yesterday. Host Tess Vigeland and I chatted about how the economic meltdown is affecting pro sports such as the Arena Football League and the WNBA. Check it out.

Recruiting stuff you couldn't make up

Josh Barr of the Washington Post has a wonderful piece (in a disturbing sort of way) on middle school football players and how some are selling themselves to top high school coaches. You couldn't make this stuff up.

Bill McGregor, football coach at DeMatha High School, a prep football power in suburban D.C., tells of speaking at a youth clinic and, days later, receiving DVDs from two seventh-graders interested in playing for DeMatha. McGregor laughs with the reporter as he recalls another kid, an eighth-grader, making a formal announcement that he's "committing" to play football for McGregor. As if he were a blue-chip high school senior committing to Oklahoma.

Barr writes: " "What are you committing to?" McGregor replied, retelling the story and chuckling at the thought that a middle schooler considered his future plans so noteworthy."

The Post story makes the point that public high schools refrain from recruiting middle school kids - openly, at least - because they can't. Such activity is banned by almost all state scholastic athletic associations. Private schools operate with far fewer controls. And so we have 12-year-olds showcasing their skills on DVD.

The behavior of the kids is curious and excessive, of course. But, as we know, this isn't a kid problem. It's a problem created (and perpetuated) by adults - coaches, athletic directors, parents, sanctimonious journalists.

Today's naive question: If we agree the system makes no sense - who's arguing this stuff is in the interest of adolescent boys? - why does it persist?

The college scholarship dream

Grooming a child to play college sports - and earn a full athletic scholarship - is a highly dubious proposition. Shall we review a few of the reasons? Kids who start in sports too early and train too hard are candidates for burnout and overuse injuries. The commitment in time and money - to pay for private lessons, travel squads, summer sports camps and the like - is startling. (See Monday's blog post). Even gifted athletes are prohibitive long shots to pay their way through college with their sports talent. Just one in 100 high school athletes succeeds.

These points and other good ones are made in an excellent three-part series in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The series started Monday with an installment on how elusive athletic scholarships truly have become - answer, very. I'm especially interested in the final installment in today's newspaper explaining the steps taken - and, often, money blown - by parents promoting their teen athletes to college coaches. I confess to having spent far more than was necessary or prudent on just this sort of thing. Anyone interested in a private screening of a professionally produced video: "My older son, the baseball catcher, blocking balls in the dirt"?

Here's a link to Part One. From this page, you'll be able to access the entire package of articles and charts.

Thanks to Lee Engfer, our Twin Cities eyes and ears, for passing along the articles.

Youth sports on an unlimited budget

My younger son is going to Florida for spring break with his 15 best buddies - the high school baseball team. They'll spend five days at Disney's Sports Complex in Orlando, queing up for Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, dining on chicken fingers and playing ball. The price tag will be upwards of $700. No complaint here. The kids will have a blast. And I've spent much more indulging my kids' - and my own - sports passions and gotten less in return.

The point is that, as we know, kids sports have become shockingly costly and, even in the dark days of recession, these expenses show no sign of moderating. I've written in this space about $250 kids baseball bats that I and many others are quick to pay for. Today, I'm posting a compendium of youth sports charges that appeared in an excellent piece in SmartMoney in 2006.

Spoiled Sports?
Few kids have the DNA of an Eli Manning or a Patrick Ewing Jr. But many parents hope their young athletes can compete on an elite level with papering like this.
PRESEASON CONDITIONING
Average cost: $600 - $750
Maybe Junior scarfed too many Big Macs during the off-season. Or he's lacking in lateral quickness. At Sedona Private Fitness in Cedar Grove, N.J., gym owner Joe Hughes offers a 10-session "scholastic athlete" training program to help your child "peak" at the right time. Of course, says Hughes, "despite not having a personal trainer, I turned out just fine."
HOCKEY GEAR
Average cost: $1,500 - $3,000
Most kids just need comfortable equipment that will protect against injury. Got an elite player? Get ready to invest in high-end gear like ultralight $640 Easton Stealth S15 composite skates, a $170 Nike Bauer helmet complete with "ergo translucent ear covers," custom-molded body pads, and the piece de resistance — a $360 composite hockey stick.
TRAVEL TEAM
Average cost: $1,000 - $3,000
If your budding all-star needs more competitive play than she can get locally, the travel-team tab typically buys access to nicer playing facilities, more-experienced coaching and maybe a fancy uniform. But logging the miles won't guarantee that your child will get her minutes. Unlike rec leagues, most travel squads don't give their members equal playing time.
OVERSEAS ATHLETIC CAMP
Average cost: $2,500 - $4,200
City-hopping with the travel team not enough? Coast to Coast Amateur Athletics organizes camps in Europe, Puerto Rico and Australia. But its Baseball Director Chip Stahl says learning abroad won't necessarily make your kid a world-class talent: "There really aren't any advantages to playing outside the States." But hey, it can be a terrific cultural experience.
HIGH-END BASEBALL BAT
Average cost: $300 - $400
The latest bats cost more because they're fashioned from new alloys and composites that aren't yet in mass production. "We have to do battle with the aerospace industry to get the materials to make those bats," says Louisville Slugger spokesperson Rick Redman. The performance difference from last year's (less-expensive) hot new material? Probably negligible."

I am a hopelessly easy mark when it comes to spending on my kids sports endeavors. (I recently counted eight bat bags in the garage). What about you? Can you think of a time when you drew the line on a youth sports expense? Passed up the travel team trip to Palm Springs? Turned thumbs down on the $120 official team duffel bag? Send in your answers and I will forward the names of the most fiscally prudent to the Obama transition team as candidates for high posts in the Treasury Department.

Gene testing for kid athletes

This recent article on ScientificAmerican.com addresses one aspect of the recent hubbub over gene testing for kid athletes: whether the $149 cheek-swab service offered by a Colorado lab actually produces useful information about a child's sports talent: a qualified maybe, according to Stephen Roth, the University of Maryland sports scientist interviewed for the article.

Not addressed - doubtless because it's less a question of science than human nature - is why. Why seek out the test?

What do you do with the information once you have it? Tell a kid who loves field hockey, has friends who love field hockey, has a wonderful field hockey coach, that she ought to be a softball catcher? That it's a gene thing?

Yank a kid out of a rec soccer league where she's perfectly happy, surrounded by her perfectly happy buddies, and put her in a new, more competitive program so that she can develop to her full genetic potential?

Parents make life decisions for their kids all day every day. As they should. Where they'll attend school. Whether green vegetables must be eaten with dinner. There's no rule that compels us to have a voice in those parts of our children's lives in which they are perfectly able to decide for themselves, however. We don't know any better than they do which sports they'll enjoy more, develop a passion for. Which is really the point of playing sports in the first place, especially when you're a kid, isn't it? A genetic test is worthless in helping make such assessments.

I applaud the scientists/entrepreneurs behind the novel gene-testing lab for their business acumen. Nice going. You've tapped into a goldmine. Every six years, you'll have millions more parents lining up for your service.

Maybe these anxious, ambitious moms and dads even will get something of value for their $149. Frankly, I doubt it.

Bob Bigelow on kids and sports

Bob Bigelow is a favorite in this space. He's part philosopher, part entertainer and full-time youth sports advocate. I met Bob in the 1970s when we were undergrads at the University of Pennsylvania. I was a reporter for the student paper. Bob was the 6-foot-7 star player on the Penn basketball team. Bob was a first-round pick in the NBA draft and went on to play four seasons in the league. For the last 15 years, he has been speaking and writing about the disconnect between what parents want from kids' sports and what children truly need. Often, the message is disarmingly simple. Like the title of Bob's book, "Just Let the Kids Play," Or one of his oft-repeated pearls: "Adults want to win. Kids just want to play."

Here's Bob - in 2 minutes, 22 seconds - speaking about one of his favorite topics: the absurdity of judging the athletic potential of a pre-pubescent child.

Life lessons from Chuck E. Cheese and Opie Taylor

Two items that are off the point, but not really.

Item one:

The Wall Street Journal reported December 9 on an uptick in violence at a place not associated with flying fists - Chuck E. Cheese. Since January 2007, police have broken up 12 fights - all instigated by adults - at the kids' pizza joints. The worst and weirdest dispute: "An uninvited adult disrupted a child's birthday party. Seven officers arrived and found as many as 40 people knocking over chairs and yelling in front of the restaurant's music stage, where a robotic singing chicken and the chain's namesake mouse perform."

Security experts tell the Journal that such outbursts can be attributed to the "mama bear instinct."

"Stepping in when a parent perceives that a child is being threatened "is part of protective parenting," Frank Farley, a psychologist at Temple University and former president of the American Psychological Association tells the Journal. The paper also notes that these violent responses can be compared to "the dynamics of the animal kingdom, where beasts rush to protect their young when they sense a threat."

BTW: Chuck E. Cheese's marketing slogan: "Where a kid can be a kid."


Item Two:

Time Magazine invites readers to submit questions to director and former child actor Ron Howard in the December 15 issue. Second question for Opie on the Andy Griffith Show: Did growing up as a child star help when your own kids wanted to get into the same field?

Howard responds: "I wouldn't let any of them work as minors the way I had. What I told them was, "If you love the business, then pursue it. But it's going to be your decision as an adult, not something that I decide for you when you're a minor."

Lessons for us sports parents?

Can youth hockey be safer?

The Toledo Blade reported last week on devastating injuries to two youth hockey players - ages 14 and 18 - that occurred in high school games on the same day. Both players were checked by opposing players. Both fell to the ice. Both suffered serious paralysis.

The older player, Dustin Wells, initially had no feeling in his right leg. The injuries of the younger player, Kyle Cannon, were even more serious. He's hospitalized with a broken neck. A few days after the incident, he'd regained some feeling in his abdomen and arms, The Blade reported on December 6.

The injured players weren't the only lives affected. The player who skated into Kyle Cannon, causing him to fall hard on the ice, is being investigated by police after Kyle's father filed a complaint with the local police department. And Kyle's teammates met with counselors to help them deal with their grief - and to help get them back on the ice for a game four days later.

Whether these injuries were accidents or could have been avoided is for Toledo school officials to look into. However, this is a time when youth hockey officials nationally should be evaluating how to make the sport safer. The American Academy of Pediatrics offers the following data:

-Two hundred thousand children play youth hockey in the U.S.

-Among youth players, 9 to 15 years old, head and neck injuries accounted for 23 per cent of all hockey injuries, according to a study.

-Body checking made up 86 per cent of injuries that occur during games.

AAP's recommendations:

-Body checking should not be allowed in youth hockey for children age 15 years or younger.

-Youth hockey programs need to educate players, coaches, and parents about the importance of knowing and following the rules as well as the dangers of body checking another player from behind.

Michael Phelps, SI's Sportsman of the Year

One word for the Michael Phelps' profile in the current Sports Illustrated - the Sportsman of the Year issue: terrific.

SI's Alan Shipnuck goes deep inside Phelps' world, deeper than previous stories I have read. There are a number of good insights into childhood experiences that shaped the Phelps we know. Also, some interviews with Baltimore locals who remember a kid intensely driven (internally, if not parentally).

This is from the piece: "When Michael was 15, he told me he wanted to change the sport of swimming," says Cathy Lears Bennett, the instructor for Meadowbrook's swim school who taught a seven-year-old Phelps to swim. "It was like, 'Yeah, right, who told you to say that, kid?' But he always had a vision that swimming could become important to American fans."

I take exception to one throwaway line in Shipnuck's piece, as a member of Meadowbrook, the anything-but-glamorous fitness club in Baltimore where Phelps and dozens of other Olympic hopefuls train - and I stay, um, fit. It's the one in which the reporter describes the diverse clientele at Meadowbrook. "When Phelps resumes training next month, he will sometimes find himself in a lane next to kids in swim diapers or seniors trying to loosen up arthritic joints."

Watch whose joints you're dissing, bud.

Should Sundays be off days?

Here's my latest post for BusinessWeek's "Working Parents" blog. I'm writing about Balance4Success, the Minnesota-based non-profit that asks parents to declare Sundays as off-limits for organized youth sports.

Little League sponsorship continued

More on Little League Baseball and corporate sponsors.

I spoke today with Chris Downs, a Little League Baseball spokesman. Here's what I learned.

Little League sponsors DO have the right to picture real Little Leaguers playing in real Little League World Series games in their advertising.

These caveats apply:

Only "official sponsors" have this right.

Only images that portray kids playing by the rules - e.g., catchers wearing mandatory throat guards - are allowed.

Only still photography of kid players is permitted. No video.

I asked Chris Downs for his assessment of the Wilson/DeMarini video posted here yesterday. "Based on the established parameters I am aware of, it certainly doesn't violate any rules," he told me.

I asked whether the parents/guardians of Little League World Series players are asked to sign a release, granting permission for these images to be used by corporate sponsors. Yes, Downs said.

Apologies to Wilson for inferring in yesterday's post that the video in question used players in an unauthorized way.

Bottom line: Sponsors have the legal right.

Question: Is it right?

Little League Baseball and the sponsorship game

Little League has been striking deals with corporate sponsors for a long time - more than 50 years. Some of the earliest were the most crassly commercial. At the 1948 Little League World Series (then called the LL National Tournament), half the kids wore "US Keds" across their chests. The other half, "US Royals." The image of young players as Madison Avenue billboards did not go over well. The next year, the sneaker names came off the jerseys.

These days, Little League Baseball has a deep bench of corporate sponsors, from Ace Hardware to Kellogg's Frosted Flakes to Wilson Sporting Goods. However, it does not allow real kids playing in real Little League games to be pictured in advertising.

Or so I thought.

This posted to Youtube last month. So far, 272 views (and one comment, presumably from an 11-year-old: "Cool.")

Carpools and recycling bins

If there's a thriving environmental movement in youth sports, it's a quiet one. I hadn't considered what a comprehensive green initiative for a rec council or travel league might look like until discovering this Top Ten list from Do It Green Minnesota.

Ten Things You can do to Green Up Your Youth Sports Experience

1. If practices and games aren’t too far away, consider alternatives to driving like walking, skating, biking, or set-up a carpool. Maybe someone on the team has a car or van that could accommodate a few teammates and families. Perhaps there is public transportation available like the bus or light-rail.

2. Make sure to utilize existing recycling bins for paper, cans, and bottles. If recycling bins do not exist where you are playing, ask permission to set up your own recycling center for practices and games. Bring the recycling home yourself if you have to! Or…

3. Institute a no plastic bottle challenge! Encourage your athletes to fill up their own reusable, washable bottle with water from home.

4. Find out who orders the team t-shirts and ask them to consider t-shirts made with something other than regular cotton and plastisol ink. Conventionally grown cotton is one of the most environmentally damaging crops on the planet. 25% of global pesticide use is in conventional cotton farming. Many printers are starting to offer friendlier material options like organic cotton or hemp and water based (permanent) inks. Visit www.pimn.org/environment/greatprinter.htm or www.doitgreen.org/greenpages.

5. Skip the team photo packages and opt to capture and share the memories with your digital camera. Stage your own team and individual poses, click away, and e-mail to your family and friends.

6. Work with your community or local recreational center to get funds for a compost bin. Make it a team-building project to build a compost bin from extra material in your garage. Field grass clippings, fruit scraps and peels, and some paper is just some of the waste that can be composted. Compost bins help turn organic waste into useable mulch for flowerbeds or planters.

7. Snacks and beverages can be a fun part of the post game ritual. Ditch the pre-wrapped, processed junk and encourage zero waste, healthy snacks like apples, orange slices or bananas (compost those peels), or bulk food trail-mix. Try shopping locally from a co-op or farmers market the weekend before the big game! For beverages, have a jug of ice water or 100% juice available and utilize reusable cups from home or water bottles.

8. Consider buying used equipment instead of new. Save some money at stores that sell perfectly good used equipment. You can also find some great deals online on web sites like craigslist.com.

9. Make sure your usable used sports equipment has a second life by donating or handing down to smaller young athletes in need.

10. Pass it on! Winning the GREEN game takes teamwork! Send this list onto some other parents or coaches. By incorporating a few easy green changes into our sports routines, we can help reduce our impact on the environment and inspire our young athletes to do so as well.

Footnote to No. 9. A few years back, the youth baseball league here launched a highly successful "Equipment Exchange." Families bring used gear - mostly outgrown and unwanted pants, shoes and gloves - to a collection point. Before Opening Day, the items are set out for families to pick whatever and as much as they want. It's a small, simple step. Yet it's environmentally responsible and, in our community, is making a difference for families slammed by the economic slump.

Have another green inspiration? Share here.