Stop Telling Us What We Want: We Can Speak for Ourselves Part 3

Having coaches scream at your kids to make them better is simply giving you a reason to say you are not a hover parent. Another news flash for you: a coach that screams at their players so they won’t be mediocre or suck is a type of hover parent, one who is trying to avoid bad things happening to the kids by playing the role of the bad guy and toughening them up so the real world won’t hurt them. Old-school coaches are hover parents trying to achieve the same goal by using opposite to the traditional means so they can tell themselves they aren’t hover parents.

Making me do punishment laps will not make me feel “pardoned” nor will I finish those laps smiling. It will not toughen me up, teach me to shut up and take it, or teach me to stop “embarrassing” myself through my poor play. I will eventually resent you, be angry at my parents for making me go through it, and start taking that anger out on others.

 I’ve met those kids, the people they are outside of their house, away from the yelling and negativity in youth sports and some parenting are not happy people. These are my friends you are talking about. Many are angry, they are withdrawn, they are depressed, they are bullies, and they are hurting, looking for ways to take from other people the love and joy they never had because that’s the only way to make themselves feel better.

I learned how to sacrifice myself for the good of my teammates, not the idea of my ‘team,’ without anyone yelling at me because I knew I could trust them and because they would do the same for me. In the environment my team created, I wanted to sacrifice myself to show my teammates they were so important to me and deserving of that sacrifice, a high complement if ever there was one.

Ask any kid, they will tell you they want a coach to encourage them, but also give them fair guidelines and just discipline. Those are the coaches your kids will enjoy playing for, their lessons are the ones they will remember because they used them, and those coaches will be the ones to find the “it” inside of your kids that makes them perform at the top of their game. They will help mold my child into a happy, upstanding, confident individual. “I am inclined to stand back and let them.”

            I am a former club swimmer, as well as a youth hockey and little league baseball player, and the product of six years of travel soccer. I never played for my high school team, preferring my travel soccer team, and I do not play for my college. I would like to thank VJ for allowing me to guest blog these past few weeks.