Everyone's A Critic-Sport Parents Edition

A @generikat Rant

I love sports. In all honesty, I would rather play sports than watch them, but either way, any form of athletic competition is pretty awesome in my book. However one thing I absolutely detest is the "culture of the sports parents."

My husband and I volunteered to coach our daughters's Park and Rec volleyball league this year. I'm going to reiterate the word "volunteer." We are both pretty well versed in the game, as he played when he was in the Army, coached high school volleyball, and even had a couple of his kids attend the University of Hawaii on scholarships. I lived and breathed the game and still play in adult competitive leagues. Not huge accolades or titles, but we have an understanding of the game.

Our league is an instructional league, not competitive, and we get a grand total of two, one hour practices each week. Of our eight players, four have never touched a volleyball in their lives, let alone pass one. The other four are a little more advanced, but even they seem to be foreign to the concept of moving their feet. With the limited amount of practice time we focused on fundamentals and having a lot of fun. The kids seem to enjoy us, and tonight they won their first game! It was great!

Then there were the parents.

One mother told my husband that we weren't "mean enough" to the kids. It was implied that we weren't teaching them anything. I found that statement rather amusing later as I had just taught her daughter, whom had never played before, how to serve overhand the night before. She scored multiple points in the game and had a huge smile on her face. Why would I want to wipe off that glee by being "mean" to her? What does that even mean?

Another group of parents huddle together picking apart every single move, play, and decision that is made during the game and practice. As a person that works with the public, that kind of behavior has a negligible effect on moi, but you know who it bothers? The kids. When parents only cheer for certain kids, or just when someone does something right, it is noticed. When someone is beginning to learn something it can be a real confidence killer when it's obvious that some of the other kid's parents show you through their actions that you are a drag for the team. Don't get me wrong, I am the first person that detests the special snowflake mentality that sets up an entitlement attitude for life, but when young people are putting forth effort and improving they are going to hear about it in the form of loud and boisterous cheering from yours truly.

It is a great wish of mine that people would realize that most of us play sports for recreation. Sure, there are some kids that are natural athletes or put the training in to go on to become college and/or professional athletes. That's a great thing! However, when a parent is trying to act like Park and Rec ball is the equivalent to club league, high school, college, or even professional level play, there are bound to be issues. I hate seeing kids check out or get psyched out by a parent that is trying to live out a desire or dream through their child's performance. It's great to push your children, in fact all kids need discipline and encouragement. What they don't need is a parent ruining their enjoyment of a recreational activity because they think that their precious angel is college-level sports star material.

I have close personal friends that spent thousands upon thousands of dollars on their daughter's fast-pitch softball career. I call it a career because that is what it was, a job. After a decade of pouring the financial equivalent of the cost of a college degree a few times over into her playing the sport, their daughter is now just playing high school ball and is going to join the Air Force. Sports are supposed to be enjoyable, teach us team work and self-discipline, and for a lucky, hard working, and athletically-talented few, pay for a college education or become a professional career. What sports shouldn't be is some weird socioeconomic, cultural, status symbol game similar to playing the lottery.

It is with the above thoughts that I leave you all this evening. I am so proud of our kids and the effort they put forth tonight, and I just want to give a shout out to all of the coaches out there, volunteer and paid, for you have totally gained even more respect and admiration from this Kat. I know that no one is above rebuke or reproach, but I'll be for sure reflecting on this rant before I go to criticize anyone else's instructional efforts in the future!

And as always, all of the images in this post were taken on the author's water bottle crushed iPhone.