parents & youth sports

My nephew started playing football when he was six years old and he is currently playing for the San Clemente Tritons on a pop warner league. Ever since he started playing, my brothers have been really tough on the kid. They’re the typical sports guys whom don’t like losing and always want to win. It’s heart breaking to see my nephew get scolded over the little mistakes he made in a game and not praised for trying his best. I’ve seen him at his all time low when he wasn’t having fun anymore and wanted to quit. But my brothers didn’t give up on him and he has improved tremendously over the past few years. I thought of my nephew when we had discussions in class about parents who become too prideful in the sport rather than letting their kid play and have fun. I have been to a few of his games where the adults become outraged over a small dispute and trash talk to each other across the field. It makes the game awkward and ruins the fun for both the kids and the audience.
A few weeks ago, I had a conversation with my brother about this trend seen in organized youth sports. From his observations, he noticed that teams in beach cities were not as good as the teams farther from beach cities. He concluded that families whom live in beach cities are those that have relaxed personalities and are more laid back with the children. He feels like these parents are not as tough on their kids on the field compared to the ones that are from the busy city. Teams from inland cities currently have better score records and are rougher on the field. Perhaps these are the children of parents in the working class that have built up anger from stressful jobs and live in a low income community. They release their anger in the sport and take it seriously for their gateway to be on top. These kids learn the behaviors from their parents and have no other choice than to make their them happy. Or my brother could just be bitter that his team isn’t having a good season and wants to find an excuse to blame it on something, hence he doesn't like losing. But he did bring up something interesting that caught my attention which involved the social trend in youth sports.


calmeroKIN332I