Toxic player on team. How to handle?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is the coach's fault. He needs to shut this down immediately, and he can. There is a boy on my son's team who is a weaker player, and several of the boys have said mean things to him. My own son yelled at him once (he did not follow my son's advice when they were both defenders and a goal was scored. My son yelled, "why the hell didn't you listen to me? I'm trying to help you, and you're just ignoring me and doing stupid stuff."). In every instance, the coach intervened and corrected the kid who was mean, including mine. I fully support that. Now, no one says anything unkind to the kid.

You realize the way you wrote it your son was in the right and the "weaker" player was stupid right?

[Anonymous]

Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.

No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only way it blows over is when people involve leave for other teams. I’ve never seen it work it out like you described.

I guess it could end that way too - but my experience has been tha the girls have worked it out - not exactly as adults would - but well enough.

Yes I have seen it your way. The girl who is being bullied leaves the team.

I’ve seen all variations of it. The bully leaves, the bullied leaves, multiple players leave because its toxic. The coach addressed the issue but only because players/parents force the issue, but either didn’t understand the dynamics and got it wrong or let the players try work it out. In all cases, the coach felt like everyone was blowing it out of proportion or didn’t know what they were taking about. IMO the coachs decisions instigates most of it because of lack of communication, discipline, and poor game decisions.

[Anonymous]

It is the coach's fault. He needs to shut this down immediately, and he can. There is a boy on my son's team who is a weaker player, and several of the boys have said mean things to him. My own son yelled at him once (he did not follow my son's advice when they were both defenders and a goal was scored. My son yelled, "why the hell didn't you listen to me? I'm trying to help you, and you're just ignoring me and doing stupid stuff."). In every instance, the coach intervened and corrected the kid who was mean, including mine. I fully support that. Now, no one says anything unkind to the kid.


You realize the way you wrote it your son was in the right and the "weaker" player was stupid right?

He was in the right about the correct soccer strategy, but was completely in the wrong to call a teammate stupid, and I wrote it as such. If you're not satisfied with that, that's unfortunate, but that's the reality of the situation.

[Anonymous]

Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.


No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

Meh, I know you think you're cute, but there are lots of situations outside of sports where someone has a bad idea or is not pulling their weight. Learning how to handle that in an appropriate and respectful way is an important part of life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.

No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

NP. I believe your child was correct about the soccer strategy, but I think you should reflect on your use of words and how you refer to a teammate as "weak" or "stupid" or even think that way. Children mature at different rates and the weak or stupid player one season may be a great player the next season. The way you worded things here assumes that being "weak" or "stupid" is fixed and a child was born that way. It's a moment in time. To look at the broader picture - and I know I'm really going off topic - but these types of words have been said historically about certain groups of people as a justification for repression. I'm especially sensitive to this type of thing as DH is from URM group. I would gently suggest you teach your child not to think like this. I have no idea of the race of the other player involved but I have heard this kind of talk from people in an academic setting when talking about minority children and group work at our school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.


No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

Meh, I know you think you're cute, but there are lots of situations outside of sports where someone has a bad idea or is not pulling their weight. Learning how to handle that in an appropriate and respectful way is an important part of life.

Exactly. That's why I always stress how important it is not to call weak and stupid people weak and stupid. It's counterproductive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.

No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

NP. I believe your child was correct about the soccer strategy, but I think you should reflect on your use of words and how you refer to a teammate as "weak" or "stupid" or even think that way. Children mature at different rates and the weak or stupid player one season may be a great player the next season. The way you worded things here assumes that being "weak" or "stupid" is fixed and a child was born that way. It's a moment in time. To look at the broader picture - and I know I'm really going off topic - but these types of words have been said historically about certain groups of people as a justification for repression. I'm especially sensitive to this type of thing as DH is from URM group. I would gently suggest you teach your child not to think like this. I have no idea of the race of the other player involved but I have heard this kind of talk from people in an academic setting when talking about minority children and group work at our school.

I have always taught my son to take people as he finds them. Thus he must treat a weak and stupid person as a weak and stupid person (note this doesn't mean be rude to them or bully them - just treat them appropriately). I have also taught him that he must not make any assumptions about people based on the way they look - but that he also must not treat someone with kid gloves based on the way they look either. And I completely agree that a weak and stupid person may well change - and in fact that is precisely the reason for not treating them with kid gloves. If you believed they could never change then it would be pointless providing them with feedback and I would advise my son not to do it. The whole reason for holding weak and stupid teammates to a higher standard is precisely because you believe they can do better.

And I actually think it is just as important to use the actual words weak and stupid if (and only if) they are an accurate description of the behavior in question. Replacing them with less offensive words changes nothing about the underlying reality - merely the ability to describe accurately what is going on. I have emphasized to my son that he should not use those words when addressing his teammate because they are emotive words which are likely to prevent his message being heard and thus his feedback from being effective.

There is a separate question on a soccer field about whether it is my son's role at all to provide feedback to a team-mate or whether it is better to leave that job to the coach.

[Anonymous]

High school soccer coach cut a flakey, senior bench player (GK) but he never turned in his team uniform and kept showing up at practices and games. His father was connected and the coach was afraid he would be fired.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just sayin'. I think these behaviors are learned from parents.

No that's not true. I always very careful to teach my kid to be polite when correcting weak and/or stupid teammates and to most definitely not actually call them weak or stupid.

NP. I believe your child was correct about the soccer strategy, but I think you should reflect on your use of words and how you refer to a teammate as "weak" or "stupid" or even think that way. Children mature at different rates and the weak or stupid player one season may be a great player the next season. The way you worded things here assumes that being "weak" or "stupid" is fixed and a child was born that way. It's a moment in time. To look at the broader picture - and I know I'm really going off topic - but these types of words have been said historically about certain groups of people as a justification for repression. I'm especially sensitive to this type of thing as DH is from URM group. I would gently suggest you teach your child not to think like this. I have no idea of the race of the other player involved but I have heard this kind of talk from people in an academic setting when talking about minority children and group work at our school.

I have always taught my son to take people as he finds them. Thus he must treat a weak and stupid person as a weak and stupid person (note this doesn't mean be rude to them or bully them - just treat them appropriately). I have also taught him that he must not make any assumptions about people based on the way they look - but that he also must not treat someone with kid gloves based on the way they look either. And I completely agree that a weak and stupid person may well change - and in fact that is precisely the reason for not treating them with kid gloves. If you believed they could never change then it would be pointless providing them with feedback and I would advise my son not to do it. The whole reason for holding weak and stupid teammates to a higher standard is precisely because you believe they can do better.

And I actually think it is just as important to use the actual words weak and stupid if (and only if) they are an accurate description of the behavior in question. Replacing them with less offensive words changes nothing about the underlying reality - merely the ability to describe accurately what is going on. I have emphasized to my son that he should not use those words when addressing his teammate because they are emotive words which are likely to prevent his message being heard and thus his feedback from being effective.

There is a separate question on a soccer field about whether it is my son's role at all to provide feedback to a team-mate or whether it is better to leave that job to the coach.

This has to be a joke. Your child may be good at soccer. I don't know. All I know is you think your child is good at soccer but I'll try not to digress... But your child is probably not good at everything. You're saying it's okay for other adults to think your child is weak and stupid in English class or math class and to refer to your child that way behind his back and treat your child as weak and stupid?

[Anonymous]

I fear that poster is real and this is how he thinks.