Which sports are good for short boys?
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Anonymous
| Get him started in whatever he wants. If he is a good athlete, he can do almost any sport through middle school. If he is a phenome, he can do almost any sport through high school. In my experience high school is where they started cutting some talented kids in sports due to height. |
Anonymous
+1 |
Anonymous
Depends where you are and what level your child wants to eventually play. I have seen very small kids participate at high or competitive levels for swimming and diving (national training teams), soccer (DA) but NOT for basketball. I have seen bias against short kids for competitive basketball for kids as young as in mid-elementary. Went to an AAU tryout a few years ago and the best kid at the scrimmages was the smallest. Rebounded a very large number of shots, stole the ball away from larger players and basically had the ball the whole scrimmage and passed it off or shot like a pro. I thought for sure he'd get in, but, no, when they broke out the kids into groups and had a few kids play with the existing team he was not among them. They did not even look seriously at him. My child who did okay but is pretty tall for his age and the other 2 tallest boys were part of the group that made it in to the finals. It is like they took the three tallest kids and only looked at them. They only had one spot so my child did not make it but I keep thinking about that because younger DS2 is much shorter for his age and really enjoys basketball. I am picking up on a lot of things I didn't notice with DS1. On teams and camps they sort kids by height not by ability. DS2 is usually put with kids much younger than him which is discouraging. He's still very young but we have tried to encourage other sports knowing it will be an uphill battle for him. |
Anonymous
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Of course kids can play lots of sports when they are short.
Long term gymnastics is the sport where there is an actual advantage to being short. As others have noted, wrestling is a sport where participation is directed by weight so a smaller person will be matched up with smaller opponents. Other fight sports do the same thing but arm length becomes a bigger factor so a taller person with longer arms within the weight class can have an advantage. Arm length again is important in paddle sports but balanced with weight and strength. Motor sports also have benefits for small and light weight. If I had a kid who I knew would be short (say 5’6” max) I would look at getting him involved in the neighborhood stuff - little league baseball, rec soccer etc, and then basic gymnastics. As he aged, I would look at a local wrestling program too. I would be honest with him and involve him in the process. It will not be news to him that he is small. |
Anonymous
PP here. Thanks for the explanation. Laughing here at running like a wounded camel. My cousin loped like a wounded camel too- he's now 6'5" so I can totally picture it. My own 9 year old catches but is slender (though tall). |
Anonymous
| In the youth years, all sports are great and height is not a deterrent. At the older ages (i.e. competitive HS, College) basically - anything other than basketball or volleyball (or GK in soccer). I.e. avoid sports where the net is significantly above his head. Even football is ok depending on the position (RB, CB, LB, K, P, Safety) |
Anonymous
| Figure skating |
Anonymous
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Baseball/t-ball now
Wrestling later - like age 7 - but go really easy to make sure he doesn't burn out. Wrestling is the BEST sport for little guys, but it's incredibly difficult so go slow and keep it positive/happy. My (short, skinny) sons would take entire years off from wresting competition when they were younger, but by high school they were very good and loved it. One does it in college now. |
Anonymous
| I don’t put any limitations on my athletic short son (7th percentile) and encourage him to try more sports but he loves soccer so much! He idolizes Messi (5’7’’) and since he’ll probably end up being that height believes anything is possible. He’s only 8 but is so quick with great ball skills and it’s so fun to watch him have no fear against all these boys a head taller than him and take the ball from them every time. I hope his fearlessness stays, as long as he’s not afraid of the big guys, he’ll be great. |
Anonymous
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For younger children, coordination and awareness are a lot more important than size.
A kid with cerebral palsy acquitted himself well in my son's machine pitch baseball league (7-8 yo) because, while he couldn't run, he could pretty reliably hit the ball. |
Anonymous
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This is an old post, but I can't help but respond, because there were so many non-answers. I understand the reason for the question, with all other things being equal, why not encourage a kid to go into a sport where is height along is unlikely to disqualify him from playing at some future point. For some of these being short may be an advantage, for others, it isn't necessarily a disadvantage, or at least, not an overwhelming one.
Middle infield in baseball Field Hockey Curling Short track speed skating Middle to long distance running Badminton Squash BMX or mountain biking Snowboarding, downhill skiing Gymnastics, trampoline, diving Judo/wrestling |
Anonymous
+1 to distance running, being short isn’t at all a disadvantage there. Many of the world’s top male runners (and I mean considered #1, GOAT, etc) are 5’3 -5’6. Anything from the 1 mile - marathon distance is possible to dominate at if you are a short guy. |
Anonymous
| Wrestling a good one for midgets |
Anonymous
| You don't normally think of great runners as being short, but my father (5'6" and stocky) was a champion cross-country runner. |
Anonymous
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you'd be surprised at the number of smaller players on national soccer teams playing for the world cup.
i think for swimming and basketball it gets to be a big disadvantage after elementary but for most other sports it doesn't matter as much. |