Playing Multiple Sports

quote:

(Playing more than one sport also has additional costs).

That's definitely relative. I'll almost guarentee that for me to play three sports all 4 years of high school plus local summer baseball 3 years was cheaper than what a lot of people are paying for one summer or fall of baseball.

It is an individual choice that each player has to make either way. He is likely to get criticized which ever way he goes.

iheartbb,

I do have a son, just starting his sophomore year, whose athletic future past high school--if any--will be baseball. We let him choose which sports to play, because it is his life. Most of us are familiar with the saying "the rest of your life starts today". I think that applies with sports participation; part of his future will play out 3 or more years from now, but part of it is next week, and next month. And he wants to play football.

Truthfully, if I were to try to influence my kids' choices of sports, my choice would be either golf or tennis (which they probably can play for the rest of their lives) or none at all. Similar to the argument for playing baseball exclusively, playing none at all would free up time to hone those skills which will benefit their likely non-athletic career. My wife and I reject this idea in favor of the notion that playing sports (possibly multiple sports) will broaden their life experience.

We're going to continue to let them choose their own sports.

Let me start off by saying that my son was lucky in the sense that our head baseball coach was also our defenceive coordinater. It allowed us to have a couple gaurdian coaches looking after our son. Son was a pitcher and starting QB and was 4 yr letterman in both football and baseball in western PA. bigtime football area. He got offers for both sports and with baseball being his first love he went that route. Both coaches pushed for training but he was never home during the summer for football. We usually where in Georgia or Fla. playing baseball. He also got lucky with our strenth coach who had him doing core, bands and never really did chest or arms. Mostly back and lower body. We also got lucky in meeting Mr. Henson who,s son was the QB at Michigan state and also got drafted by the Yankees. He told us that if his son had been a defender and an outfielder he probably could have made both work out but because he was a QB and a pitcher he could not give enouph time to concentrate on just one to make it work. If he could do it all over again he would have just picked one. This is in college not HS. One thing for sure is to each his own because every example is different just like the players. Over the last couple years we where pleasantly supprised that ALL of the major league scouts we came into conntact with loved the idea that jr. played other sports. They told us that they like to see other muscle groups worked out and others rested. Not one scout or college coach gave any negative remarks about 2 or 3 sport athletes.
You can sit and say what if,s all day but let them enjoy the high school years.
Just a side note but NC States starting QB is also on the baseball team....GO STATE

quote:

Originally posted by TPM:
If you go back to BLprkfrnks's original post, there is discussion about having to force new baseball practices upon his player (who is not as sharp as he should be due to football) and states it hasn't been "fun". He states the predicament as, "we" are in.

So I will tell you what I AM NOT going to do as a parent. If my player shows strong ability in one sport, yet wants to have fun and plays two or three sports, not concentrate on his school work (most important in the entire picture) I AM NOT going to be the one who gets on his case to practice or do homework and make both of us miserable, this is going to be his problem (or hers) not a 'we" problem.

And, last but not least, after all of this, I am not going to b and moan when my son doesn't get recruited to the school I think he should be recruited to or not drafted.

My original dilemma was whether I should push for more offseason baseball practicing. The problem was that he chose to do football and committed to it mentally, then found he made a fallball team. He really needs to get his foot in the door on this baseball team and he realizes that.

Since my original post, he played in his first two games over the weekend. Game one was rusty, but game two he hit well and had one of his best pitching outings ever (just two innings). He was e-mailed by a college coach that watched him play and wanted him to fill out a questionaire. Funny thing is that now he is showing more interest in doing a few short practices a week to stay sharp. I think he figured out that he needed to stay sharp since"they" are watching.

If I wasn't letting my son make his own decisions, he wouldn't be playing football right now. The tough thing as a parent is knowing when your advice is really needed and when it is nagging. That is the part that hasn't been "fun".

One note about the cross-training. The lifting and quickness training for football has really improved his first step. It also looks like he is using his legs more in his pitching. Throwing a football has really helped his velocity on all his throws. Maybe he is just physically maturing, but he seems to be improving his baseball skills during this offseason more I would have expected.

i think kids need to do what makes them happy. life will happen to them all to soon. both son's played the big 3 as long as they were chosen to.

scout liked the football mentality of the lefty, the kind you didn't like to play against,but loved to play with. being out for a year took that away,but that'sa the big reason he got there.

Interesting . I was listening to my favourite sports program and the last 2 days has been about long term effects on athletes who play violent sports.
There is a new study that followed premature deaths of foootball players and other hard hitting sports. They found a huge link to these deaths and health problems that lingered long after the [laying days were over. We often thing because they get up and walk away that the player is okay. Apparently this is far from the truth.
We let kids play football, hockey etc at a very young age and yet we get upset about BB overuse etc. We never let our son play hockey or football. HS age kids are not developed enough until 17-19 yo. I played both and know what it can do to a player. If my son insisted I would have let him play but I would let him know the risks.

Bobble -
Did that study look at football players who never played past high school?

I didn't read it but they mentioned players who had suffered concussions and players who died young.
One guy they mentioned died at 46 and they did an examination and found extensive damade to the brain. Another commited suicide at around the same age. He had show loss of memory and became disoriented. They found similar brain damage resulting from hard hits to the head.
It has been a talk show topic for the last couple of days.

That sounds like professional football players were the subjects of the study.

Ex-NFL'ers are indeed paying a huge price for their profession. There is a huge contoversy about the older guys, retired before about 1975, who don't even have medical care. The NFL is turning its back on these guys, denying disability claims, and refusing to help them with their medical issues.

A good friend of mine is in the middle of this debate. A former running back, retired mid-1960's. He is in good shape, but he has started a foundation to step in where the NFL has not.

It is really quite sad. A lot of guys we all remember - guys like Conrad Dobler - are physically destroyed, medical costs and prescription costs far beyond their means to pay.

NFL, and the NFLPA (led by the late Gene Upshaw, who I was no fan of) basically dragging their feet hoping these guys would die off.

I remember reading a few years ago NFL lineman average dying before age sixty. What they do to their bodies to become pro linemen wreaks havoc on their heart. Then when they retire, if they don't change their eating habits and slim down, they're really in trouble. I can't imagine what The Fridge weighs now. He must be a heart attack waiting to happen.

I was reading in the NATA News, a National Athletic Trainers' Association magazine, that a normal high school football player was found to shrink as much as 1cm per game. Now, that doesn't sound like much, but think about that over 4 years if we're talking anywhere between 9-15 games per year...

Believed to be caused by compression of the vertebrae..

quote:

Originally posted by Bulldog 19:
I was reading in the NATA News, a National Athletic Trainers' Association magazine, that a normal high school football player was found to shrink as much as 1cm per game. Now, that doesn't sound like much, but think about that over 4 years if we're talking anywhere between 9-15 games per year...

Believed to be caused by compression of the vertebrae..

So what you are saying is because I played football in HS it hurt my chances of playing pro basketball because I didn't end up at 6'6"?????? Man that stinks.........I guess I wish I had concentrated on the one sport I didn't play instead of playing the two I did

I think the study was trying to determine the risk of brain injury on early death due to heavy contact hitting. The damage can occur in HS not just pro.

Of course damage can happen in high school football. The question was who did the study look at. Studies look at cohorts. I'll bet you the study you reference looked at pro football players, not kids who stopped playing after high school.

That doesn't mean injuries don't happen in high school, but I would venture that the risk of long term health problems from playing high school football are pretty slim.

You're talking playing about 50 games over the span of four years, and the speed of the game, and force of the collisions are nothing like that of the pro game.