Anonymous wrote:I'll preface this by saying I'm not athletic and have no clue about sports. But my 2nd grade boy is really sporty and at this point there aren't enough hours in the week to do all of the sports. All things being equal, how do I figure out which sports are most desired for boys for, say,college admissions? For example, he's been invited to be on a competition gymnastics team, but it is a lot of hours per week. He also likes baseball, soccer, wrestling, running. And he seems to enjoy them all equally. How did you help your kid choose, or did you just let them do 2 + hours of sports per day, every day?

Anonymous wrote:Better goal is not to pursue college sports. If you can manage college without any sports money it is a better experience. College sports force the students to keep doing the same thing they have done for 12 years into college at the exact time they should be exploring new pursuits. Regret getting my kid on that train.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a lot of advice here. I’m no different I suppose. My would be:

1. Take a hard look what your family can do. Set aside what you want to do and focus first and what is possible to do. What can you afford? What can you do time wise? Plan for other activities of course and education. You have to take into account future time demands particularly with other kids.

2. As in pretty much everything - ability grows slowly over time. You don’t sit down at the piano for the first time and play Chopin. Learning and improving take years. But, at young ages we really are just starting. So - no - kindergarten is not a cut off.

3. While not a huge factor at young ages, it is important to think long term and guide kids into activities that they are more likely to be physically suited to undertake. This is a little less impactful for girls than boys, but obviously still exists. A couple obvious examples - if your kid is going to be over 6 feet tall then gymnastics is not going to be a very good competitive sport for them long term. Knowing roughly where your kid will be in terms of size and speed is going to be very helpful in guiding them to sports that they can be comfortable competing in.

4. Do not expect your kid to drive decisions. They get input. But, do not expect a 10 year old to be aware of family finances, time and travel demands of the new job, time demands of siblings etc. Be a parent. We do what we can.

5. Do understand the environment you are in. Look at the likely high school your kids will attend. High school seems a long time away, and it is. But, unless you are considering options to move to an area where the high school has 500 kids what your kid is doing at younger ages has some affects on what your kid can do in high school. There are sports in high school that a rank beginner can participate in and even eventually do well. Some sports don’t even really get started until high school (football and running sports). There are also a good many sports where you have to have been playing for many years to have a chance of making a high school team.

6. Be aware and willing to allow kids to try new sports and switch sports. My daughter played college soccer and played club soccer starting a 9. Over the years she played with many girls who ultimately decided to switch from soccer to other sports that they played in college at a high level (Big10 and SEC). Do not get locked in. As a parent one of your ongoing jobs is to continually assess and advise your kids on available options. They lack the knowledge and experience to do that.

A quick note on college sports having had a daughter who played college soccer for 4 years - it is not a think that works well for very many. For the athletes it is “who you are and what you do”. In a D1 school there is very little time to do anything else. In a D3 school - that holds true for the semester you are playing. The head coach is not your buddy, and may well not even be particularly friendly (even if they like you). They don’t work for you. You work for them. They get paid by having teams do well and obey the rules by not getting into trouble and getting decent grades. Teammates are not unfriendly but if you get cut, get injured and can’t play, or quit - you are no longer competition for playing time. That is a plus for them. My daughter got a starting position early in her Junior year when the girl playing the position got hurt and was out 3 weeks. By then my kid had staked a claim and kept the starting job. While she felt sorry for the person getting hurt, she was happy to get the playing time and prove she could do the job. Thus the not uncommon college athlete revision to the saying - “There’s no I in team”. … “but there are two in playing time.”

This was a great post. But you're wrong about football. If your kid wants to play for the HS team, they need to be in pads in elementary school.

Unless they are the fastest kid in the school, there is just too much of a steep learning curve to the sport. The time to learn the sport is grades 4-6, and then the time to find your true position is 7th and 8th.

The kids that are starting the JV team as freshman are the ones that played 7u or 8u football with pads on

It depends. My husband played little league and soccer growing up, not on travel squads or anything. His first experience was with football in 9th grade and he was a D1 player in college.

Anonymous wrote:I'll preface this by saying I'm not athletic and have no clue about sports. But my 2nd grade boy is really sporty and at this point there aren't enough hours in the week to do all of the sports. All things being equal, how do I figure out which sports are most desired for boys for, say,college admissions? For example, he's been invited to be on a competition gymnastics team, but it is a lot of hours per week. He also likes baseball, soccer, wrestling, running. And he seems to enjoy them all equally. How did you help your kid choose, or did you just let them do 2 + hours of sports per day, every day?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a lot of advice here. I’m no different I suppose. My would be:

1. Take a hard look what your family can do. Set aside what you want to do and focus first and what is possible to do. What can you afford? What can you do time wise? Plan for other activities of course and education. You have to take into account future time demands particularly with other kids.

2. As in pretty much everything - ability grows slowly over time. You don’t sit down at the piano for the first time and play Chopin. Learning and improving take years. But, at young ages we really are just starting. So - no - kindergarten is not a cut off.

3. While not a huge factor at young ages, it is important to think long term and guide kids into activities that they are more likely to be physically suited to undertake. This is a little less impactful for girls than boys, but obviously still exists. A couple obvious examples - if your kid is going to be over 6 feet tall then gymnastics is not going to be a very good competitive sport for them long term. Knowing roughly where your kid will be in terms of size and speed is going to be very helpful in guiding them to sports that they can be comfortable competing in.

4. Do not expect your kid to drive decisions. They get input. But, do not expect a 10 year old to be aware of family finances, time and travel demands of the new job, time demands of siblings etc. Be a parent. We do what we can.

5. Do understand the environment you are in. Look at the likely high school your kids will attend. High school seems a long time away, and it is. But, unless you are considering options to move to an area where the high school has 500 kids what your kid is doing at younger ages has some affects on what your kid can do in high school. There are sports in high school that a rank beginner can participate in and even eventually do well. Some sports don’t even really get started until high school (football and running sports). There are also a good many sports where you have to have been playing for many years to have a chance of making a high school team.

6. Be aware and willing to allow kids to try new sports and switch sports. My daughter played college soccer and played club soccer starting a 9. Over the years she played with many girls who ultimately decided to switch from soccer to other sports that they played in college at a high level (Big10 and SEC). Do not get locked in. As a parent one of your ongoing jobs is to continually assess and advise your kids on available options. They lack the knowledge and experience to do that.

A quick note on college sports having had a daughter who played college soccer for 4 years - it is not a think that works well for very many. For the athletes it is “who you are and what you do”. In a D1 school there is very little time to do anything else. In a D3 school - that holds true for the semester you are playing. The head coach is not your buddy, and may well not even be particularly friendly (even if they like you). They don’t work for you. You work for them. They get paid by having teams do well and obey the rules by not getting into trouble and getting decent grades. Teammates are not unfriendly but if you get cut, get injured and can’t play, or quit - you are no longer competition for playing time. That is a plus for them. My daughter got a starting position early in her Junior year when the girl playing the position got hurt and was out 3 weeks. By then my kid had staked a claim and kept the starting job. While she felt sorry for the person getting hurt, she was happy to get the playing time and prove she could do the job. Thus the not uncommon college athlete revision to the saying - “There’s no I in team”. … “but there are two in playing time.”

This was a great post. But you're wrong about football. If your kid wants to play for the HS team, they need to be in pads in elementary school.

Unless they are the fastest kid in the school, there is just too much of a steep learning curve to the sport. The time to learn the sport is grades 4-6, and then the time to find your true position is 7th and 8th.

The kids that are starting the JV team as freshman are the ones that played 7u or 8u football with pads on

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll preface this by saying I'm not athletic and have no clue about sports. But my 2nd grade boy is really sporty and at this point there aren't enough hours in the week to do all of the sports. All things being equal, how do I figure out which sports are most desired for boys for, say,college admissions? For example, he's been invited to be on a competition gymnastics team, but it is a lot of hours per week. He also likes baseball, soccer, wrestling, running. And he seems to enjoy them all equally. How did you help your kid choose, or did you just let them do 2 + hours of sports per day, every day?

The best kids at 8-12 are 99 percent of the time not the best at 17-18 so throw that college admission pipe dream out the window right now

Disagree. The kids that are the best at 17-18 were also athletic and fell anywhere from very good to the best. I've been around youth sports in various capacities and rarely see a college athlete that was a dud as an 8-12 yo. Obviously, there are also plenty of kids that were very good to the best at 8-12 end up at the same place as the kids who were never any good.

OP, my view is let your kid play as many sports as they want and you can afford (both time and money) to support for as long as possible. I don't think any of the sports you listed are early specialization sports. I'm not a big soccer player, but it does seem like a sport that requires a big commitment, but at that age, you should be able to play club soccer + other sports.

What I have seen is that if you pair a very athletic kid as young as 8 or 9 with an excellent training program, that kid is very likely to end up an excellent, recruitable player by HS age. PP’s are correct that size or other body type variables are limiting factors for some sports, but not for most. I also recognize that it’s no easy feat to find coaches who can both accurately assess athletic ability in younger kids and provide them outstanding training. But for kids lucky enough to have those traits and end up with great training, I’ve noted burnout is much less of a factor. Burnout is definitely a reason why you don’t see some great youth athletes ending up as top players at older ages.

Ah I guessed it. You’re a ping pong player!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll preface this by saying I'm not athletic and have no clue about sports. But my 2nd grade boy is really sporty and at this point there aren't enough hours in the week to do all of the sports. All things being equal, how do I figure out which sports are most desired for boys for, say,college admissions? For example, he's been invited to be on a competition gymnastics team, but it is a lot of hours per week. He also likes baseball, soccer, wrestling, running. And he seems to enjoy them all equally. How did you help your kid choose, or did you just let them do 2 + hours of sports per day, every day?

The best kids at 8-12 are 99 percent of the time not the best at 17-18 so throw that college admission pipe dream out the window right now

Disagree. The kids that are the best at 17-18 were also athletic and fell anywhere from very good to the best. I've been around youth sports in various capacities and rarely see a college athlete that was a dud as an 8-12 yo. Obviously, there are also plenty of kids that were very good to the best at 8-12 end up at the same place as the kids who were never any good.

OP, my view is let your kid play as many sports as they want and you can afford (both time and money) to support for as long as possible. I don't think any of the sports you listed are early specialization sports. I'm not a big soccer player, but it does seem like a sport that requires a big commitment, but at that age, you should be able to play club soccer + other sports.

What I have seen is that if you pair a very athletic kid as young as 8 or 9 with an excellent training program, that kid is very likely to end up an excellent, recruitable player by HS age. PP’s are correct that size or other body type variables are limiting factors for some sports, but not for most. I also recognize that it’s no easy feat to find coaches who can both accurately assess athletic ability in younger kids and provide them outstanding training. But for kids lucky enough to have those traits and end up with great training, I’ve noted burnout is much less of a factor. Burnout is definitely a reason why you don’t see some great youth athletes ending up as top players at older ages.