The Ways Youth Sports Have Changed Over The Years and At What Cost To The Children Playing Them

Playing little league baseball or joining your first soccer team when you were 9 years old used to be fun, beginner level experiences for kids to be exposed to the fun of learning how to play a particular sport. You used to join a rec league for a season and then if you wished, could try a different sport the following season. Youth sports have changed dramatically over the past 20-30 years and now children are beginning to play organized team sports at the ages of 3 or 4 years old and picking a sport to specialize in and play year round by the ages of only 10 with special private coaching and using the best pitching machines and batting cages in the off season, for example. The level of intensity for kids athletics is the same as it was for teen atheltes and even some college athletes 25 years ago and this is causing several new problems.

One of the biggest changes is the age at which children are now signed up for sports. Not long ago, the youngest age typically, was about seven or eight years old to play soccer and ten or eleven years old to try basketball. Now it is 3 years old for soccer and five years old for basketball. Most of the kids at these young ages don’t have neither the physical coordination nor the mental capacity to be able to handle an hour long sports event. Due to this, children quit a sport very young because it was too hard for them.

Children are also being told that they have to specialize and focus on one sport by the time they are 10 years old in order to get an athletic scholarship for college. This has increased stress related injuries in a lot younger kids as a result of overdoing it on their still developing bodies. The overuse on the kids physically and mentally has caused a whole generation of youth to completely burn out by the time they reach middle school or high school which is a real shame.

This increased intensity of athletics at a younger age is also seen by the coaches and the parents too. There have been so many parents that got caught up in their children’s games or competitions that they cause problems with their inappropriate behaviors and must be told to leave. Because of this, most schools and youth leagues now require parents to sign a contract for acting in a well mannered way. Coaching has also become much more intense for kids. In the past a parent would volunteer to help coach a team and that was much appreciated. Now parents are hiring private coaches and personal trainers to have their kid to be the best athlete ever. The Financial investment parents put into their children’s athletic endeavors is huge.

Maybe, people will realize that kids need to be kids and don’t need the physical or mental stress that is being placed upon them in their sports by their coaches and parents.