Travel soccer plus little league
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Anonymous
It is almost impossible to play multiple sports without playing two overlapping or two in the same season anymore. So, when kids are in elementary school stop with the travel team commitment nonsense. Our jobs as parents is to expose our kids to many experiences and opportunities and what is unfair is sport leagues and clubs demanding nearly 100% of a kids time and commitment to a single sport at such a young age. |
Anonymous
You're not making sense. Take MSI rec soccer, age 7. One kid is a star. Natural talent, etc. Shows up to practice. Other kid AWFUL. Shows up to practice because forced by parents. During a game, star kid is a star, while other kid literally picks flowers and even scores once for the other team. Both are getting equal playing time, but the star is frustrated because the other kid is awful. Star plays other sports where teammates are better, so he prefers to play there. Rec team suffers. Is it about learning, or sports mentality, or fairness? You can't have it all. |
Anonymous
Says the parent of the non-athletic kid. Not everyone is cut out for sports. |
Anonymous
How does a Rec team at age 7 suffer? Not winning? Are scores even kept at that age? Does the play really change if one player it not playing? |
Anonymous
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As a parent, there is not one coach who will be able to tell me when/where practices will be before I sign up my child so i can deconflict schedules before i sign up. no club is willing to refund my money after they tell me when practices are going to be.
and every club/coach wants me to sign up my kids as soon as an offers made or registration opens so they can have a head count or enough kids. Once i can get a prorated refund, no reason required, then i’d fee better about this same season only 1 activity nonsense. |
Anonymous
not PP, but yeah the result will be different if the star is not there playing for a U8 rec team. Big time. same question here, does the practice suffer if one player is not there? Why some parents are so obsessed with other people's kids not going to practice for a Rec league? |
Anonymous
| U9 was DS's first travel soccer year. He didn't play little league in the fall, but he did in the spring (after getting a real feel for how much time travel soccer would eat). The little league coach who drafted him knew that travel soccer was going to trump baseball at every conflict. I think DS missed only one little league game, though, and I'm not sure he ultimately missed any practices (although he often was late). So, my experience is: It's doable, but it's a lot! |
Anonymous
Us too. Our son is in his second season of doing both, u11 soccer and rec baseball. He has been able to do both with no problem. That does mean he has a practice or game pretty much every night in the spring , but I don’t think we have ever gone a week without at least one rain out. He loves to be with both sets of teammates anyway. He wants to add travel baseball this year. I’m not going to worry about conflicts until he makes a travel baseball team, but his club is somewhat supportive of playing additional sports in the spring as long as he makes most games and at least one practice a week. |
Anonymous
Plenty of kids miss practices for family events and non-sports extracurriculars. It’s little kid sports, not the pros. |
Anonymous
Many of the stars at 7 or 8 (really in elementary) are not necessarily the stars in older elementary, middle school or high school. Some are, but not all or even many (when you are talking about 7 and 8 year olds). A lot of being a star at that young age is being physically bigger than the other kids. A lot is having parents who will say yes/drive/pay for everything. A lot of it might be peers who are just slow starters. One of our neighbor kids was a daisy picker when he was little, a day dreamer when he was 6 to 7, and the kid just playing because his friends were doing it in 3rd. In 4th, he grew a bit and everything clicked. He started hitting almost every at bat and made the all star team that year, a level above all the kids his age who were the top player at 5 to 9 years old. Fifth he improved even more. If he keeps going that way, the 8 year old bench warmer might end up being one of the high school players. |
Anonymous
I think it depends. We have some players on my son's U10 rec soccer team who miss tons of games and practices because baseball is their primary sport and they have other obligations. No one really cares because the rec team roster is pretty big, and there's a fair number of decent players. The coach just rotates these kids in with other weaker players when they show up. It doesn't hurt anything. |
Anonymous
| the main point is no matter what age or level if your on a team your making a commitment to your teammates and coaches. teach your kids to fulfill them.. if they don't like don't put them on the team again. if its just for fun take your kid to the park and play with them. but if your on a team you owe it to the team to not only show up but give your best effort. not saying you have to be the best but you should demand your child give his best. if not everyone suffers. team sports is about learning and competing at whatever level. hence the word sport. take your kids out to play for just fun it requires no commitment to others |
Anonymous
I think that you are missing the point that the sense of "team" at 8 years old is overstated and not necessary. You need a "team" to train how to play the sport but each kid is there for their own fundamental skill building not for team success or camaraderie. Psychologically most kids at that age are all in the developmental stage of "me and my ball" and the concept of "team" has very little meaning to the child. If you simply understand that at these ages all the kids need are a cohort of players where they can share the experience of learning the skills necessary to play as team later on. The only commitment a parent should have is to their kid and not a set of other kids. Other than making sure there are enough kids to play a game and run a proper training session the group of kids are secondary. You are placing cognitive/developmental attributes on children based on adult sensibilities. I stated earlier that I do not remember my elementary age teams. I remember the experience, but I do not associate the concept of team until my middle school years. In a couple of weeks your team will have no recollection of Timmy missing practices and just playing games. And it would be good if you forgot about it sooner than a couple of years. |
Anonymous
At age 7? 1st or 2nd graders on a rec team? Everyone should get at least the minimum playing time, even the daisy picker. But the key thing you are arguing about is bolded and underlined. If the star attends practice, he should play/start. That is not the dispute here. The dispute is whether the star who does not attend practice should be able to waltz in and start/get more playing time over the kids who are attending practice regularly. He should not, especially in baseball. He wasn't there to practice drills. He wasn't there to practice fielding with the team. There are a dozen kids on a little league roster, with 3 kids benched each inning. All of those 3 are not going to be daisy pickers. One might be a daisy picker, one might be a kid who gives it his all but at 7 or 8 is not a developed player, and one might be a solid player. If all of those three have attended all the practices, why should they be on the bench while the kid who has never attended practice get to start? He shouldn't. No matter how good he is. The average kid who has tried week in and out should be a starter while the kid who only pops in for games should be on the bench cheering snd supporting his teammates. |
Anonymous
| ^^^ Yaass |