Let them play other sports

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son will play soccer for a Power-5 school this fall with 25% of the scholarship. He played soccer, golf and tennis when he was six years old and did not focus solely on soccer until he turned 16 years old. He competed in USTA and junior golf. He is also with DA soccer. He is nationally ranked in both golf and tennis at the age of 15. By 16 years old, he just likes soccer more. We hire a D1 soccer coach to stay at our house during the summer for the past two years to train my son. The coach said that kids should play multiple complementary sports in addition to soccer to prevent burnout and improve the mental aspect of the athlete.

You hire a coach to stay at your house for the summer? That explains how he can compete in soccer so we'll.

[Anonymous]

^well

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gretzky lived lacrosse in the off-season.

I thought it was baseball but he has talked of how he didn’t touch a stick for four months each year as a kid

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m personally in favor of multiple sports.
I think skills learned in one sport can translate to other sports
Diversity of sports helps prevent overuse injuries and burnout
But what do I know?

Just so we're clear, more sports will lead to less use?

Overuse injuries are just that. If you're running playing soccer then running playing basketball, you're overusing your legs, end of conversation. The whole multiple sport argument only holds water in the US, where all the big sports don't face competition from outside. Messi didn't waste his time playing 20 sports, playing 3 instruments, and take SAT prep classes in 3rd grade. Seems to have turned out ok focusing on one sport.

You apparently are uneducated on the research on cross training. Also, Messi is a freakish anomaly so calling him out demonstrates your delusion. Hopefully, you focus your kid on only soccer while my kid focuses on school and soccer and a few other things and one day your GED kid will work for my kid who has a masters degree. Good parenting plan Einstein.

Good plan until little Tommy burns out from 20 activities. He'll walk out 200k in debt from his master's and make enough money to live in your basement until 35.

Let your kid be passionate about something and support that. Forcing anything on them isn't helping. "Cross training" and playing multiple sports at high levels lands you a college acceptance in the best case scenario. More likely it leads to a torn ACL like we see an epidemic of in this country.

Just for reference, new father, travel coach, and I've already said I dont care if my son plays soccer. It won't affect my enjoyment of the game.

Who’s talking about “20” activities? 2 (or 3) at most. That’s it. And over different seasons, not overlapping. Soccer in fall and spring, b-ball or volleyball in winter. Summer is fitness training and light soccer or the other sport, and light. No he won’t have debt cuz I have a 529 and will pay for him to get undergrad and he’ll save up from his first job and pay for his own masters. No basement either as I won’t allow it. Anyhow, didn’t mean to upset you but people seem to take things to the extreme examples here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The multiple sport argument is only made by Americans using predominately American sports as the basis of "proof".

Soccer is a global sport and elite world class soccer players pretty much just play soccer. Messi didn't move halfway across the world to La Masia to be a three sport athlete.

America produces world class gymnasts. I don't think any of them play another sport.

America produces "world class" three sport athletes in sports that only American's generally play.

Of course kids should try and play different sports because it is good for them and they are fun but not because that is what a NFL player did as a kid. That NFL player isn't fighting for a job in a global sport the way a professional soccer player is.

---
Right because nobody plays baseball, tennis, basketball, track and field, or hockey outside the US --- those sports are mostly ignored outside the US.

America does produce world class gymnasts but in the process it breaks a significant amount on young bodies because the coaches haven't been bright enough to figure out that they could reduce the overuse injuries by getting kids into other sports instead training them year round.

You're right about the NFL player --- he's fighting for a much tougher jobs to get. There are far fewer NFL jobs than are professional soccer jobs world wide.

For every 1 U.S. Olympic gymnast, there are 1,000 who have quit from burnout or overuse injures. Burnout is notorious in gymnastics. Those girls should be seen as the example, rather than the 1 who is named Simone Biles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The multiple sport argument is only made by Americans using predominately American sports as the basis of "proof".

Soccer is a global sport and elite world class soccer players pretty much just play soccer. Messi didn't move halfway across the world to La Masia to be a three sport athlete.

America produces world class gymnasts. I don't think any of them play another sport.

America produces "world class" three sport athletes in sports that only American's generally play.

Of course kids should try and play different sports because it is good for them and they are fun but not because that is what a NFL player did as a kid. That NFL player isn't fighting for a job in a global sport the way a professional soccer player is.

---
Right because nobody plays baseball, tennis, basketball, track and field, or hockey outside the US --- those sports are mostly ignored outside the US.

America does produce world class gymnasts but in the process it breaks a significant amount on young bodies because the coaches haven't been bright enough to figure out that they could reduce the overuse injuries by getting kids into other sports instead training them year round.

You're right about the NFL player --- he's fighting for a much tougher jobs to get. There are far fewer NFL jobs than are professional soccer jobs world wide.

For every 1 U.S. Olympic gymnast, there are 1,000 who have quit from burnout or overuse injures. Burnout is notorious in gymnastics. Those girls should be seen as the example, rather than the 1 who is named Simone Biles.

There are only 8 spots on the team. It really doesn't matter. The point is they became elite WITHOUT other sports.

Frankly, the difficulty of gymnastics is what weeds kids out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^well

I am the 22:41 post. Yes, the D1 coach trains my son, nephew and two of my neighbor kids, all at the same age, for 10 weeks at a cost of $30K, 7.5K per kid. They train at the outer bank in Corolla where we have a 5 bedrooms vacation home. There is a local personal trainer who works with the kids twice a week on physical conditioning. My wife does not work so she is also there to watch them. A local chef cooks for them twice a week meals that are recommended by a certified nutritionist. They train with the coach M, W and F. They have scrimmages with D1 players on Tuesday and Thursday that the coach arranges. This costs us extra. The training goes from 6am-10am and again from 3pm-5pm with physical conditioning in between. Activities on Saturday and Sunday include swimming, hiking, tennis and movies. It is a very intense 10 weeks and cost a lot of money. We cover all the coach expenses for that 10 weeks. At the end of ten weeks, we give the coach $2K appreciation tip.

My son and nephew will play D1 this year while neighbor kids will play at excellent D3 academic school.

Go for it if you can afford it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^well

I am the 22:41 post. Yes, the D1 coach trains my son, nephew and two of my neighbor kids, all at the same age, for 10 weeks at a cost of $30K, 7.5K per kid. They train at the outer bank in Corolla where we have a 5 bedrooms vacation home. There is a local personal trainer who works with the kids twice a week on physical conditioning. My wife does not work so she is also there to watch them. A local chef cooks for them twice a week meals that are recommended by a certified nutritionist. They train with the coach M, W and F. They have scrimmages with D1 players on Tuesday and Thursday that the coach arranges. This costs us extra. The training goes from 6am-10am and again from 3pm-5pm with physical conditioning in between. Activities on Saturday and Sunday include swimming, hiking, tennis and movies. It is a very intense 10 weeks and cost a lot of money. We cover all the coach expenses for that 10 weeks. At the end of ten weeks, we give the coach $2K appreciation tip.

My son and nephew will play D1 this year while neighbor kids will play at excellent D3 academic school.

Go for it if you can afford it.

Is your wife’s name Lori Loughlin?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The multiple sport argument is only made by Americans using predominately American sports as the basis of "proof".

Soccer is a global sport and elite world class soccer players pretty much just play soccer. Messi didn't move halfway across the world to La Masia to be a three sport athlete.

America produces world class gymnasts. I don't think any of them play another sport.

America produces "world class" three sport athletes in sports that only American's generally play.

Of course kids should try and play different sports because it is good for them and they are fun but not because that is what a NFL player did as a kid. That NFL player isn't fighting for a job in a global sport the way a professional soccer player is.

---
Right because nobody plays baseball, tennis, basketball, track and field, or hockey outside the US --- those sports are mostly ignored outside the US.

America does produce world class gymnasts but in the process it breaks a significant amount on young bodies because the coaches haven't been bright enough to figure out that they could reduce the overuse injuries by getting kids into other sports instead training them year round.

You're right about the NFL player --- he's fighting for a much tougher jobs to get. There are far fewer NFL jobs than are professional soccer jobs world wide.

For every 1 U.S. Olympic gymnast, there are 1,000 who have quit from burnout or overuse injures. Burnout is notorious in gymnastics. Those girls should be seen as the example, rather than the 1 who is named Simone Biles.

There are only 8 spots on the team. It really doesn't matter. The point is they became elite WITHOUT other sports.

Frankly, the difficulty of gymnastics is what weeds kids out.

That fact that they became elite without other sports is irrelevant in the same way pointing to Messi as playing only soccer is irrelevant.

The point of this thread is whether playing sports other than soccer is beneficial or detrimental to kids --- not just the few who are top 1% of the top 1%.
Maybe 1 sport, in fact, did serve those individuals well.

Furthermore, I don't believe the difficulty of gymnastics is what weeds kids out.

I new plenty of level 10 gymnasts who opted to stay level 10 because they could get a college scholarship without subjecting their bodies to the rigors, injuries, and mental fatigue of trying to be elite.
The bonus was they didn't have to deal with USAG as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^well

I am the 22:41 post. Yes, the D1 coach trains my son, nephew and two of my neighbor kids, all at the same age, for 10 weeks at a cost of $30K, 7.5K per kid. They train at the outer bank in Corolla where we have a 5 bedrooms vacation home. There is a local personal trainer who works with the kids twice a week on physical conditioning. My wife does not work so she is also there to watch them. A local chef cooks for them twice a week meals that are recommended by a certified nutritionist. They train with the coach M, W and F. They have scrimmages with D1 players on Tuesday and Thursday that the coach arranges. This costs us extra. The training goes from 6am-10am and again from 3pm-5pm with physical conditioning in between. Activities on Saturday and Sunday include swimming, hiking, tennis and movies. It is a very intense 10 weeks and cost a lot of money. We cover all the coach expenses for that 10 weeks. At the end of ten weeks, we give the coach $2K appreciation tip.

My son and nephew will play D1 this year while neighbor kids will play at excellent D3 academic school.

Go for it if you can afford it.

you have a D1 assistant coach for summer, your wife must be very fat and ugly or you are very trusting
maybe you could hire a spelling and grammar teacher for you as well

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parents and coaches pushing for year-round play are doing kids and their families a disservice.

https://kidzu.co/sports-athletics/why-specializing-in-one-sport-is-a-bad-idea/

If your kid just plays a sport for recreation or exercise, multiple sports is fine. However, if the kid wants to play at the highest level of a sport, they need to stick to one sport by the U12 level in my opinion. The competition for the top teams in the DMV is fierce. If the kid is trying to juggle say, basketball and soccer, they will only go so high. At the highest level of youth soccer, missing a soccer practice because he has a basketball or hockey game is unacceptable to most teams and there are many players and families willing to take his/her place.