Published: February 27, 2007 11:15 pm            

VALVANO: Now it's on to the tough part

Well, now the tough stuff.

I remember a political science professor I had in college who taught me the radical viewpoint was the easy one. All you do is point out how conservatives and liberals are both wrong. But you don’t have to come up with a viable plan for what actually to do.

I don’t want to fall into that trap. So with that in mind, and in keeping with my earlier columns that youth sports programs are epidemic with things damaging kids and on a greater scale the sports themselves, what to do?

Keeping in mind this topic should be taught over an entire semester not dealt with in one column, I correctly will be accused of oversimplifying some things.

Guilty as charged.

But try to recognize the types of things I suggest while clearly understanding, like any worthwhile endeavor, the implementation may not be that easy. But, it’s worth it.

As I frequently do, I rely on my frames of reference. I start as I always do with youth sports with the two questions I wrote about earlier.

Ask the child each time they play, “Did you have fun?” and “What did you learn?”

The first answer is important to make sure, if nothing else, the child isn’t playing FOR YOU, the parent.

Believe me, that happens ALL the time, and parents are oblivious to it.

Secondly, you must emphasize that every opportunity on the practice floor, a scrimmage, a game is an opportunity to learn. It is not contingent on the number of minutes played, or shots taken, or wins or losses. Or frankly, on how great or not-so-great the coach is. Many of these coaches are volunteers.

They often do the best they can — there is always opportunity to learn whether the coach has much knowledge or not. Respect the coach, adhere to team-first, but take the onus on learning and getting better yourself.

That is a great place to start.

On the organizational level, it helps if you can get a person of experience and some degree of accomplishment to help oversee your league or even team. I serve (as a volunteer) as the commissioner of a high school hockey league. My son plays in the league and in the attempt to appear non-biased, I frequently take the hardest possible line on issues regarding my son’s team. That is no more fair than deliberately favoring his team. What to do?

Through various cancer fundraisers, I got to know former NHL player and legendary referee Paul Stewart, who himself is a cancer survivor. I asked him if he would serve in a pro bono (translated:free) position as advisor to our league.

About five times a year we have an incident — some big, some not so big — that the parents involved disagree about. I go to Paul, lay the facts out, and NEVER suggest what the outcome should be in my opinion.

He gives me what he thinks is fair, more importantly — why the ruling is what it is, and we adhere to it. The people he rules against are probably still disappointed, but ultimately a ruling HAS to be made, someone with great experience is making it, and more importantly he has no dog in the fight.

I cannot tell you how helpful it has been and how much better the league has run.

Why don’t all youth leagues have such a person? I guarantee not everyone you ask would agree, but I equally guarantee it wouldn’t take many calls to find a very experienced person who would gladly do it for the love of the game and the good of the kids.

This is not always easy, because many of these teams are created by parents just to avoid the above. They don’t want to be held accountable to anyone, like the father in Northern Virginia who set up an entire football league just so his son could play every down on defense. (His son is in elementary school.)

In the playoffs, to give his team a better chance to win, the coach played the young man a few downs on offense. The kid enjoyed it, the team won a well played, competitive game. The father — who owns the league — fired the coach immediately.

This ultimately is what you must decide. What message will you allow to be delivered to your child for his or her participation in the sport?

In this case, it is “You are bigger than the team, bigger than the coach, bigger than issues of trying your best within the rules to win.” That kid is getting nothing of value from that league, I don’t care how many defensive “reps” he gets.

Ultimately, he will face kids as skilled as he, and the ones that “get it", who understand what team sports are about, will be more valuable to their team.

Moreover, at some point his involvement with football, I predict, will sour, because ultimately the lesson has to center around team before self. That is the beauty of sports…it is one of life’s examples of believing in something bigger than ourselves. This kid is being denied the opportunity to learn that.

So make the framework one where your child gains a love of the game, a respect of himself and the time he puts into it, and help foster an appreciation of being involved in something greater than yourself…even in individual sports. Appreciate the sport’s history, its rules, and your place in it.

For leagues, try to involve people with no axes to grind, and loads of experience to offer. They will be happy to do it. Then let those people make decisions, support them, teach your players respect for their coaches, the officials, and their opponents and you have something worthwhile.

If you don’t, you’re more a part of the problem than you realize.

        

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