Slightly OT: Playing multiple sports

Slightly OT: Playing multiple sports
by elcortez01 (2019-06-18 07:08:12)

In reply to: How does a kid make his county travel soccer team but decide posted by Steelhop

Since a common theme in this thread is sports forcing kids to specialize at a young age I thought I'd share something I found interesting.

I never played hockey until I was 37 years old at which time my then 5 year old son started playing. Both of my kids, G10 and now G8, have always played multiple sports (baseball, soccer, basketball) but hockey was new to us all. After the first year of my son's hockey I decided to get a little more involved and volunteer as a coach. What I have experienced thus far through USA Hockey has been very impressive.

USA Hockey is basically the governing body for all youth hockey. They require all coaches to be certified to varying degrees. Through this certification process one of the themes that was stressed over and over was the emphasis on kids playing multiple sports. They flat out don't want their players specializing (at least at the youngest of ages) in hockey only. In fact I remember a college coach in one of the training videos (I forget which coach and the exact quote) saying that he wouldn't even look at recruiting a player unless they lettered/played at least one other sport at a high level.

I found that approach not only very sensical, but also very refreshing. Not that it doesn't exist in other sports, but I've never seen another sport with such an organized top down mentality of cross training.

Many sports you need to start building skill and fundamentals at a young age to be uber successful. Others, like football, you can pick up much later in life and still make it to the highest levels. The point is, let kids be kids and know that cross training will be beneficial in the long run. If your kid doesn't have the natural ability and 99% of us don't, then no amount of overtraining is going to get them that scholarship or paycheck.

It's the individual coaches & clubs that suck on this issue

Every coach in the world agrees that a player should be a multi-sport athlete.

IN THEORY

When it comes to their sport and their season, many generally don't put that concept into play.

At my soccer club, we encourage and allow multi-sport athletes. We have boys who play lacrosse, ice hockey, and tennis. We are a "soccer second" kind of team despite the fact that we are pretty good (and would possibly be great if we implemented a policy of intolerance to other sports).

Our left midfielder plays hockey for a club here in Chicagoland (he's fifteen years old, so we aren't talking about U8 hockey) and he's not allowed to miss a practice or a game without losing playing time. So maybe hockey is organized higher up to allow for multi-sport, but it is not at the local level.

This was doubly true for high school sports. Practice five days a week at varying times so you can't plan anything. My son's lacrosse coach said "absences from practice are unexcused if the result of homework or a test:" and, of course, unexcused absences cost you playing time. This is after getting up at 6:30 for 1.5 hours of "off-season" not mandatory (but surely mandatory) high school soccer practice, a full day of school, two hours before dinner and a lacrosse practice that goes from 6-8pm - and we go to a school where it takes about 25 minutes to get to and from. Hey, don't worry about it - manage your time better!

I get that in-season its nearly impossible to

Compete in 2 sports.

But I'd have big problem if a coach "punished" my kid for missing off season workouts while they were in a competitive season for another sport.

that's just it

they never say the kid will be punished. They just strongly imply it.