I can’t ending wait to be done with travel sports

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I personally get a kick out of parents strutting around because their kid got recruited to play D1 at some no name place with a 97%age acceptance rate and a 10% graduation rate. 4 yrs of D1 ball followed by a career in bar tending.

I see people claim this all the time on these boards, but I’ve almost never seen this in real life. I think it’s a bit of a hate fantasy more than anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like PP, we have really great coaches and really great team parents but I still hate it. We were late-comers to travel sports -- did rec through middle school and I was generally opposed to the whole idea of travel sports. But my kid really wanted to play in HS, seems to really love it, and apparently you can't play on the varsity HS team unless you do travel in the off-seasons (of which there are 2-3, not just one off-season!).

Actually one of the most toxic people we encountered was the rec commissioner!

But the cycle of tournaments and practices that are not conveniently located and everything else is just beyond exhausting. But my kid has struggled with depression so I can't really make them quit something that is giving them joy/direction and keeping them off the internet crazy sites. Sigh.

This is us, but the worst is what they do to student athletes pulling them in different directions with the Club travel coach and high school coach vying for 109% loyalty or taking punitive action. We made the mistake of leaving a team where the coach/club were very understanding of kids during high school season and didn’t bench them for missing a practice to play in a high school game. A few kids on my child’s team missed 2 practices per week during high school season and the coach did not hold game play time against them. Now we are in a situation with my kid breaking his back to please 2 coaches at once and the Club coach being a complete d@ck about the ones playing high school—even though kids still make it to more practices than sons of the kids not even playing high school this season.

Since you have to play $3500 for August-June there isn’t an option of not playing Fall season and if you drop Club than the high school doesn’t want you.

It is such a disappointment to see adults do this to kids. I kick myself for not knowing the new club would be like this.

Yes! What also is awful is the way Club coaches expect 100% loyalty and show absolutely zero in return. They threaten the players that if they look around or attend any other tryouts or practice sessions "that it will get back to them'..ooohhh scary. But, they will offer zero transparency to the players and offer no clue if they will keep them on next year's roster. If a new shiny object shows up late in the game at the last tryout, they have zero qualms about cutting a player with zero prior notice...and yet they threatened and harassed the players 'not to shop around' so now that kid is left with no options as other rosters are full. Adults behaving badly, INDEED. Parents are shelling out thousands of dollars a year to the team, but are expected to shop around less than they would for a bargain on a tube of toothpaste. If a Club is good and fair and confident, they should welcome healthy competition and 'looking around' so that they get a kid fully committed and who knows it is where they want to be.

The business of travel sports is about a Club's $$$ and has very little to do with the kids and their development as players and people. I have seen such bad behavior by people that are supposed to be role models and to impressionable young kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like PP, we have really great coaches and really great team parents but I still hate it. We were late-comers to travel sports -- did rec through middle school and I was generally opposed to the whole idea of travel sports. But my kid really wanted to play in HS, seems to really love it, and apparently you can't play on the varsity HS team unless you do travel in the off-seasons (of which there are 2-3, not just one off-season!).

Actually one of the most toxic people we encountered was the rec commissioner!

But the cycle of tournaments and practices that are not conveniently located and everything else is just beyond exhausting. But my kid has struggled with depression so I can't really make them quit something that is giving them joy/direction and keeping them off the internet crazy sites. Sigh.

This is us, but the worst is what they do to student athletes pulling them in different directions with the Club travel coach and high school coach vying for 109% loyalty or taking punitive action. We made the mistake of leaving a team where the coach/club were very understanding of kids during high school season and didn’t bench them for missing a practice to play in a high school game. A few kids on my child’s team missed 2 practices per week during high school season and the coach did not hold game play time against them. Now we are in a situation with my kid breaking his back to please 2 coaches at once and the Club coach being a complete d@ck about the ones playing high school—even though kids still make it to more practices than sons of the kids not even playing high school this season.

Since you have to play $3500 for August-June there isn’t an option of not playing Fall season and if you drop Club than the high school doesn’t want you.

It is such a disappointment to see adults do this to kids. I kick myself for not knowing the new club would be like this.

Yes! What also is awful is the way Club coaches expect 100% loyalty and show absolutely zero in return. They threaten the players that if they look around or attend any other tryouts or practice sessions "that it will get back to them'..ooohhh scary. But, they will offer zero transparency to the players and offer no clue if they will keep them on next year's roster. If a new shiny object shows up late in the game at the last tryout, they have zero qualms about cutting a player with zero prior notice...and yet they threatened and harassed the players 'not to shop around' so now that kid is left with no options as other rosters are full. Adults behaving badly, INDEED. Parents are shelling out thousands of dollars a year to the team, but are expected to shop around less than they would for a bargain on a tube of toothpaste. If a Club is good and fair and confident, they should welcome healthy competition and 'looking around' so that they get a kid fully committed and who knows it is where they want to be.

The business of travel sports is about a Club's $$$ and has very little to do with the kids and their development as players and people. I have seen such bad behavior by people that are supposed to be role models and to impressionable young kids.

We had a similar club/high school thing happen to our child as well, who also had been busting butt to please both coaches. What was the worst, was the Club coach made zero mention of punitive action for kids playing high school. Zero mention of for the first month or so and then at the first game benched every single kid that was playing high school (even though they had been attending Club practices) with zero warning. And, this wasn't a Club that had a ban on playing high school, e.g., not MLS Next.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be weary of the team managers. They are always self serving back stabbers.

Serious. We have one that bad mouths the other player that plays his kid’s position to the coach. He has a direct line. Not the first club it’s happened.

You too? Yes we have one of those. And my kid plays the same position as his. It is a blast.

OP- my sympathies. I know you are just venting. Many of us in the same boat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be weary of the team managers. They are always self serving back stabbers.

Serious. We have one that bad mouths the other player that plays his kid’s position to the coach. He has a direct line. Not the first club it’s happened.

You too? Yes we have one of those. And my kid plays the same position as his. It is a blast.

OP- my sympathies. I know you are just venting. Many of us in the same boat.

What kind of adult acts this way? Just awful. AND WHAT COACH OR CLUB can't see through the other parent's motive?!?!!!

[Anonymous]

Eh. I am betting that you have a kid at a higher competitive level. I had two kids go through travel soccer, they were always on the second or third team out of five, and no chance of moving off it or playing in college. It was a fun enough experience in that capacity. I have heard that the top teams are cutthroat, but ours were ok.

[Anonymous]

we have had the opposite experience and I will be sad when it is over. My daughter has made great friends, there are parents we have become close too and overall it is great exercise and it is fun to see a group of girls excel and love a sport.

not every season has been magical but the friends and competition has been good. They have worked hard and it shows.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Eh. I am betting that you have a kid at a higher competitive level. I had two kids go through travel soccer, they were always on the second or third team out of five, and no chance of moving off it or playing in college. It was a fun enough experience in that capacity. I have heard that the top teams are cutthroat, but ours were ok.

Yes. I have one on a first/ecnl team and the other the team just below MlsNxt. I have found the second team to be the worst because every parent is angling to get their kid moved up. The environment on the ECNL is such that the parents aren't involved, don't socialize and don't attend practices. They are absolutely silent on the sidelines at games. But, I think in part it is also because they kids are now Juniors and the parents have been in this for 8 or 9 years by now and know the drill. You still get a bad apple here or there, but it is better. I also find some clubs are much, much worse about parental influence. Unfortunately, you often find that out too late--midway through first season and our stuck and just have to endure it. It does seem to get better by late high school, but that is also probably because the pro dreams and D1 scholarship pipe dreams start to dissipate some and then for boys, everyone catches up in physicality/size.

[Anonymous]

The best part of travel sports ---the parents who all think there kids are the best and when a new kid with not much "travel" experience comes in and takes their spot and is a very laid back kid with laid back parents and the other parents go ballistic.

[Anonymous]

Travel soccer was horrible for my daughter.

She quit and played several more years as the all star of the rec league, but now is playing other sports in high school and loving it.

[Anonymous]

Eh. I am betting that you have a kid at a higher competitive level. I had two kids go through travel soccer, they were always on the second or third team out of five, and no chance of moving off it or playing in college. It was a fun enough experience in that capacity. I have heard that the top teams are cutthroat, but ours were ok.


Yes. I have one on a first/ecnl team and the other the team just below MlsNxt. I have found the second team to be the worst because every parent is angling to get their kid moved up. The environment on the ECNL is such that the parents aren't involved, don't socialize and don't attend practices. They are absolutely silent on the sidelines at games. But, I think in part it is also because they kids are now Juniors and the parents have been in this for 8 or 9 years by now and know the drill. You still get a bad apple here or there, but it is better. I also find some clubs are much, much worse about parental influence. Unfortunately, you often find that out too late--midway through first season and our stuck and just have to endure it.

Maybe we were just lucky. Also, my child on the second team was female, my son was on the third team. I wonder if that may have affected the experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be weary of the team managers. They are always self serving back stabbers.

Serious. We have one that bad mouths the other player that plays his kid’s position to the coach. He has a direct line. Not the first club it’s happened.

You too? Yes we have one of those. And my kid plays the same position as his. It is a blast.

OP- my sympathies. I know you are just venting. Many of us in the same boat.

A parent bad mouthing other kids to sell his own is just sick. Sadly, we have been in that boat too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I personally get a kick out of parents strutting around because their kid got recruited to play D1 at some no name place with a 97%age acceptance rate and a 10% graduation rate. 4 yrs of D1 ball followed by a career in bar tending.

I see people claim this all the time on these boards, but I’ve almost never seen this in real life. I think it’s a bit of a hate fantasy more than anything.

Yup. Colleges athletes at all levels earn more than non-athletes. For D1 athletes the premium is about 4 percent. Interestingly, it would be higher except that a lot of athletes choose to become high school teachers. For non- teachers, the premium is much higher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be weary of the team managers. They are always self serving back stabbers.

Serious. We have one that bad mouths the other player that plays his kid’s position to the coach. He has a direct line. Not the first club it’s happened.

You too? Yes we have one of those. And my kid plays the same position as his. It is a blast.

OP- my sympathies. I know you are just venting. Many of us in the same boat.

A parent bad mouthing other kids to sell his own is just sick. Sadly, we have been in that boat too.

We had this. It was kinda hilarious because the mom who tried to do it knew nothing about the sport. My kid was the one she always tried to target, and he was a super coachable kid who was always doing exactly what the coach said, so she’d loudly say “what’s THAT kid doing?” in a mocking tone, and the other parents would explain that he was executing the play laid out by the coach.

We actually ran into her at a tournament years after our kids quit playing together. My kid was playing up 2 years for a 17u team at a very well thought of club, and her kid was playing 15u. Her kid’s team had lost badly to the 15u team from my kid’s club, and she noticed that my kid’s uniform was different. She actually asked my kid “If you play for X team, why is your uniform black’?” (or whatever the color was). Like she really thought he was walking around a tournament in a fake uniform or something. Her husband — who had seen my kid’s game and said nice things to him about it before she walked up — explained that he was playing for the 17U team whose game had just ended, and she looked like she was going to be sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be weary of the team managers. They are always self serving back stabbers.

Serious. We have one that bad mouths the other player that plays his kid’s position to the coach. He has a direct line. Not the first club it’s happened.

You too? Yes we have one of those. And my kid plays the same position as his. It is a blast.

OP- my sympathies. I know you are just venting. Many of us in the same boat.

A parent bad mouthing other kids to sell his own is just sick. Sadly, we have been in that boat too.

We had this. It was kinda hilarious because the mom who tried to do it knew nothing about the sport. My kid was the one she always tried to target, and he was a super coachable kid who was always doing exactly what the coach said, so she’d loudly say “what’s THAT kid doing?” in a mocking tone, and the other parents would explain that he was executing the play laid out by the coach.

We actually ran into her at a tournament years after our kids quit playing together. My kid was playing up 2 years for a 17u team at a very well thought of club, and her kid was playing 15u. Her kid’s team had lost badly to the 15u team from my kid’s club, and she noticed that my kid’s uniform was different. She actually asked my kid “If you play for X team, why is your uniform black’?” (or whatever the color was). Like she really thought he was walking around a tournament in a fake uniform or something. Her husband — who had seen my kid’s game and said nice things to him about it before she walked up — explained that he was playing for the 17U team whose game had just ended, and she looked like she was going to be sick.

Damn