1VaBlue1

June 19th, 2019 at 4:28 PM ^

My 8 yr old plays little league, and I can imagine the trauma he'd go through if all the parents pulled that crap.  It's hard to believe how fucking stupid people are, but we keep seeing valid evidence of the idiocy.  Far too often...

Kevin13

June 19th, 2019 at 6:34 PM ^

Parents are what ruin kids sports. Every parent thinks their kid is the next great thing and a bad call will derail their DI scholie when they need to realize that’s not happening and let the kids play a game and ha e fun. People are just idiots 

jace owen

June 19th, 2019 at 7:39 PM ^

I totally agree. I have 3 boys who played little league this year and am amazed by the parents watching and appaled by some of the coaches. It really turned me off to the whole league by how it was run, teams were stacked by coaches who were all on the board, and many coaches only cared about their own kids.

Wendyk5

June 19th, 2019 at 7:49 PM ^

When my kid was in 4th grade, he was a perfectionist, and often got upset with himself if he didn't play well. So after the first practice, my husband went over to the coach to offer advice and give a heads up about it. After my husband explains the situation to the coach, the coach says to my husband, "What do I look like, a psychiatrist?" My husband said he was thankful there was a chain link fence between them because he wanted to choke the guy. After the season, the dad was permanently relieved of his coaching duties. He was a real nut job, screaming at people who got too close to the dugout, etc...These kids were 10U!

Wendyk5

June 20th, 2019 at 2:23 PM ^

Thanks for your opinion. I watched my kid go from falling apart on the mound when he was 11 (and other stuff way before then in every other sport he played) to pitching in college with a reputation for having ice in his veins in high-pressure situations. He accomplished that himself, with no shaming from his parents. I'm more proud of that than anything else. 

ijohnb

June 20th, 2019 at 6:35 AM ^

I have two boys and I almost don't want them to play sports.  For the most part, everybody involved with the little leagues in most sports are complete assholes.  At least that is what I have found.  I have looked and found a couple of places that offer a lot of beginner leagues that are cool and stick with those.  A lot of the Parks and Rec type offerings in fairly affluent areas and filled with the worse kind narcissistic assholes who are actually measuring worth of children based on their ability in sports at 4 and 5 years old.

F all that.  I will take them golfing.

BroadneckBlue21

June 20th, 2019 at 8:37 AM ^

1. A woman coaching 3yo soccer told a kid, “Pay attention while in goal or you might get hit in the face—(then whispers), and it might be me.” I was a parent volunteer. I picked up my kid, walked off the field, and sent an email to the organizers. She was consistently berating and complaining to us parents about bleeping 3yos.

2. Our neighborhood has community summer track that is just about getting kids to run. They have three “contests” towards the end of summer, one each week. A former neighbor of ours who our son played with won his heat the first two weeks but finished second or third the last week. His dad is hyper competitive—played D3 baseball or something—he was (I get it) proud of his son for being a fast 5yo, but was way too competitive in comparing how our sons performed. My kid finished last each time, but he dressed as a dinosaur half the time and lives in his own world. We were just happy to get him exercise—and dude, they’re 5. Running is important part of our family life, but who tf puts that much pressure on babies? 

These kinds of stories keep me away from organized sports as a parent. It’s a damn shame. 

 

ijohnb

June 20th, 2019 at 9:28 AM ^

There is a large segment of people who try to base their entire personality around being the type who reject "participation" trophies.  These people will do just about anything to steer a conversation toward the concept in order to make it a huge, loud point that they hate this "participation trophy" culture and that only "winners" should get trophies.

I am like, dude, these kids are like 4 or 5 years old.  Most of them fully believe that Spiderman is an actual existing person who can shoot webs from his hands and swing from building to building.  Most kids who receive these trophies will probably spend a nice day inside turning it into their own version of the Piston Cup.

People are beginning to take youth sports way too seriously and it takes it from just being a fun family and interest building activity and makes it something kind of corrosive.  It is a damn shame really.

Hail-Storm

June 20th, 2019 at 10:35 AM ^

I coach my two oldest kids soccer rec teams (4 and 6) in Plymouth and went to a coaches meeting with a USA soccer coach with a lot of experience.  It was great to get a new perspective on how to run practice and help reinforce things that were working.  One of the things that stood out was how he spoke about coaching at the youth level.  You can coach with a focus on winning or a focus on kids getting better.  He had coached college players and joked that he didn't care about how many games their teams won when they were 11. 

Kids are funny though.  They keep track of who is winning and figure out who the best players are quickly. 

MGoBlue-querque

June 19th, 2019 at 4:36 PM ^

Had one happen at my kid's baseball game 2 years ago. Pretty unreal. Coaches fighting parents. Moms throwing hands with other moms.  Thankfully the kids got off the field without issue and weren't involved.  I was flabbergasted. Fighting at little league baseball. Who knew it was worth fighting over?

 

KO Stradivarius

June 19th, 2019 at 4:37 PM ^

7 yr olds playing and a 13 year old umpire. Yeah, let’s go for blood, that makes a lot of sense. 

I had a run in when I was 14 umpiring a 9 year old game. I made a controversial call, which was correct, but one coach started using every word in the book. Ejected him but he wouldn’t stop coaching from the stands. Many parents on his team were heckling. That was long ago, probably would’ve been a brawl in today’s messed up society.

Moleskyn

June 19th, 2019 at 9:38 PM ^

Sounds very similar to an experience I had! I was working the field, part of a 2-man crew. I couldn't have been older than 13. Runner on first, ground ball, fielder throws to second-baseman who tries to step on second for the force, but he missed the bag. I saw it, called the runner safe, everyone lost their minds.

To his credit, my partner behind the plate just asked me: "you know there was a force there, right?" I just said "he missed the bag", and he backed me up on it.

Team batting ended up coming back that inning to win the game. Walking away afterwards, I had parents  from both teams flagging me down to either congratulate me (from the winning team, telling me I made the right call) and to let me know I was blind (from the losing team).

Crazy amount of stress for a 12 or 13 year old.

Moleskyn

June 20th, 2019 at 10:17 PM ^

Sounds very similar to an experience I had! I was working the field, part of a 2-man crew. I couldn't have been older than 13. Runner on first, ground ball, fielder throws to second-baseman who tries to step on second for the force, but he missed the bag. I saw it, called the runner safe, everyone lost their minds.

To his credit, my partner behind the plate just asked me: "you know there was a force there, right?" I just said "he missed the bag", and he backed me up on it.

Team batting ended up coming back that inning to win the game. Walking away afterwards, I had parents  from both teams flagging me down to either congratulate me (from the winning team, telling me I made the right call) and to let me know I was blind (from the losing team).

Crazy amount of stress for a 12 or 13 year old.