Why do soccer, tennis, hockey, and basketball players specialize so early?!?

Some reasons...

Soccer - many who end up playing soccer at the college level are a nationality or of origin where soccer is, by far, the dominant sport.  Also, soccer requires a completely different skill set that doesn't cross over into other sports as well.

Tennis - tends to be country club/academy sport.  Those athletes are less likely to get serious about basketball, football or baseball. 

Basketball - opposite of tennis.

Hockey - has a heavy regional culture.  It is available to fewer "other sport" athletes due to limited facilities and high costs.  It also takes more time to master, IMO.  So, it tends to require more year-round participation.

Yes, these are generalizations and there are plenty of exceptions.

I'm going to take a different angle on this.....I think the NCAA answers are more based on what countries these athletes come from.   Tennis and soccer are international sports.  In the case of tennis there was a dramatic change about 20 years when D1 coaches started recruiting the majority of their players outside the US.  Their specialization started in their country because football, baseball and other sports weren't offered.   The few high school age US tennis players took lessons from local pros, moved into an academy setting to get better, and play for national or regional rankings where the college coaches find them at tournaments.   Hockey is a different and similiar to tennis.  Talented hockey players play for private high schools and clubs and get offered or picked up in their "minor leagues" before attending college.  In some cases these players have been away from home for a couple years and start college at 19 or 20. 

The other part of this is that other countries don't have the athletic opportunities that US kids have, and other countries don't necessarily put as much emphasis on athletics in college as the US does.  It is a cultural thing.   When I was a high schooler 35+ year ago, it was all about the 3 sport athlete.  Today, I think it is very different.  It is more about trying to get that elusive D1/D2 athletic scholarship.  The money is tighter on athletic scholarships and it is more competitive to make a college roster at any level.  Coaches have choices.  Do they want to pick that 3 sport athlete who did well in all 3 sports or do they want to pick the athlete who is very accomplished in one sport and dedicated himself to that sport?  I'm not saying it is right or wrong, but if I was a coach that is a tough decision.

Also, I think there is a "silent majority" of student athletes who either want to use athletics as a "hook" to get into a school they normally wouldn't have access to or just because they love a particular sport.  They have no plans of going professional and any athletic scholarship dollars that might come their way is incidental.   it is about playing a sport they are good at, and enjoying the comaraderie of college athletics.  However, they are limited to that one sport they've developed skills for due to time limitations.....they have other things in their lives that are more important.

As always, JMO.   

Soccer, hockey, tennis, basketball are all primarily club sports and play year round indoors/outdoors.  Can't really play football or baseball inside due to space.  Although they are doing 7 on 7 football work indoors these days.  

Baseball is much harder sport to become great at it. Basketball for example to become great one needs to be 70%  accurate. In baseball it only takes 30% for same type of caliber of player.  An example of that take Michael Jordan and Ken Griffey Jr.  Much more time in baseball to foster an above average ball player.  Then there is the inner city versus suburban kids equation.   Inner city kids will most likely pick football or basketball over baseball.  And I think this has to do with the way popular culture has glamorized football and or basketball. 

2019Dad posted:

Survey of college athletes by NCAA asked Percent of Division I Men Who Specialized in their Sport by Age 12:

Soccer: 68%

Tennis: 66%

Ice Hockey: 55%

Basketball: 49%

Swimming: 37%

Golf: 35%

Football (FBS): 33%

Baseball: 32%

 

Seems to be in line with my son's high school. 6 of 7 kids who would go onto play D1 baseball in college from son's team jr year played another sport (at least freshman year) in hs. Not sure about the other one. On the other hand, son was only one on soccer team who did not play club level. The tennis players are tennis only.

I was surprised hockey was so high, but then D1 hockey is quite selective (and international) and often requires a PG year so I can see where a hockey kid would focus early.

One omission I see that's not the list that's growing --LAX. Son's school has a number of players committing to LAX, who play football or hockey. A Defensive end who just broke an NFLers state HS sack record is going to college to play LAX instead.

Tennis players tend to specialize early but the two greatest players of the last decade federer and nadal were great soccer players ( like nationally ranked) until they were 12-13. Djokovic plays good soccer too, tennis and soccer seems to mix well.

Dominik85 posted:

Tennis players tend to specialize early but the two greatest players of the last decade federer and nadal were great soccer players ( like nationally ranked) until they were 12-13. Djokovic plays good soccer too, tennis and soccer seems to mix well.

Well, none of the three played in college so not directly relevant to the OP but I guess it brings up another point in that they, like so many other tennis pros, never went to college at all, declaring as pros at a very young age.  This would be another motivating point for aspiring tennis players to specialize really early.

Also, again, all three are from other countries where soccer is so predominant.  I think it was Federer who was told at a very young age that he had to choose between football (s*cc$r) and tennis.

Neither soccer nor tennis pros outside of the USA play college, they usually turn pro at 16-17 ( Boris Becker won Wimbledon at age 17). Top tennis players start traveling a lot at age 13 or so so they can't play another sport.

Soccer - Soccer clubs force kids to drop other sports. Many of them won't allow the kids to even play for their schools.  The first time my son was approached he was twelve. He laughed at the idea of quitting baseball and basketball.

Tennis - It's a country club sport. The top shelf tennis players who went on to college tennis I know gave up other sports early.

Hockey - it's a special skill to be able to skate well enough to play. With the expense if you're in you're all in. 

Basketball - A majority of college basketball players are inner city kids. Basketball is part of the inner city culture. 

The rest of the sports are getting down to 1/3. Nothing unusual about that.

Golfman25 posted:

Soccer, hockey, tennis, basketball are all primarily club sports and play year round indoors/outdoors.  Can't really play football or baseball inside due to space.  Although they are doing 7 on 7 football work indoors these days.  

Minnesota is the Mecca of hockey in the US but none of it is really club. Kids growing playing up play in their cities association and then go on to play for one of the 200+ high school teams in the state. There are AAA teams that play in the summer and fall before the high school season but those don't disrupt the hockey players from playing other sports.

Ripken Fan posted:

2019Dad posted:

Survey of college athletes by NCAA asked Percent of Division I Men Who Specialized in their Sport by Age 12:

Soccer: 68%

Tennis: 66%

Ice Hockey: 55%

Basketball: 49%

Swimming: 37%

Golf: 35%

Football (FBS): 33%

Baseball: 32%

 

Seems to be in line with my son's high school. 6 of 7 kids who would go onto play D1 baseball in college from son's team jr year played another sport (at least freshman year) in hs. Not sure about the other one. On the other hand, son was only one on soccer team who did not play club level. The tennis players are tennis only.

I was surprised hockey was so high, but then D1 hockey is quite selective (and international) and often requires a PG year so I can see where a hockey kid would focus early.

One omission I see that's not the list that's growing --LAX. Son's school has a number of players committing to LAX, who play football or hockey. A Defensive end who just broke an NFLers state HS sack record is going to college to play LAX instead.

Indeed D1 hockey is selective with only 50 or 60 D1 teams and about half or more of those spots are taken up by kids from Minnesota, Michigan and Canada. Hockey does seem to be specialized in non traditional states as they have to travel by air every weekend to hotbeds to play in tournaments. High school hockey is only really popular in Minnesota where everywhere else they play tier 1/AAA (Minnesota Hockey doesn't allow MN teams to play in these in season but we do host tournaments due to the amount of rinks). These youth-high school kids from the non hockey hotbeds are forking out $30-40K+ a year on hockey. Association prices in Minnesota for youth (6-14) are about $2k a year before moving onto high school where they just pay the school athletics fee ($200?)

So I can definitely see kids from areas where hockey isn't real popular and needing to travel constantly specializing. 

There seem to be some very uninformed people about hockey in he US. A lot of the college hockey players come from MA. MA must be the Mecca. The kids play year round. In the summer if they're not at a rink they're playing roller hockey.

RJM posted:

There seem to be some very uninformed people about hockey in he US. A lot of the college hockey players come from MA. MA must be the Mecca. The kids play year round. In the summer if they're not at a rink they're playing roller hockey.

Men's college ice hockey is definitely unique. Here are some interesting facts from College Hockey Inc.

http://sportdesigns.com/chinc/...15_CHI_Media_Kit.pdf

Most DI players enter their college freshman year 2 years after graduating HS. They play high level Junior hockey for those 2 years (and often for a year or two during HS). They might enroll in college part-time while in Juniors, or not at all. It's not unusual for college seniors to be 25 years old. Check some DI rosters and you'll see that many list the players' ages. I guess there are advantages and disadvantages to starting college at age 20.

If you think travelball is over the top in baseball, you should check out hockey. Kids moving away from home as Jrs and Srs in HS, paying thousands to play/stay in Junior leagues that will never get them into college, and totally screwing up their high school academics because they miss so much school. Most of the lesser leagues are selling a dream, and there are plenty of people willing to buy it.

There was a point in time where a handful of colleges dominated the college hockey scene. When University of Maine went from D3 to D1 they loaded up recruiting from the juniors programs. By recruiting twenty year old freshmen quickly rose to the top. Other programs copied the practice. At one point, Jack Parker the coach at Boston University said he hated the practice. But it was now the norm for remaining competitive. By refusing to recruit the older players BU went from a dominant program to losing seasons. Players out of high school typically struggle against older players with juniors experience. That is unless they are quality pro prospects. See Jack Eichel, 17yo Player of the Year last season now playing for the Buffalo Sabres.

Years ago Cornell had a dominant program. They also had Ken Dryden in goal for four years. The coach Ned Harkness asked why he liked coaching at Cornell. He explained it's closer to the Canadian border than a lot of other colleges.

Ken Dryden is the answer to an unusual question. Name a player that was the MVP of the NHL finals before he was Rookie of the Year. He signed in the spring after his senior year of Cornell. He went straight to the Canadiens. He was the Stanley Cup MVP versus the Bruins. He played few enough games during the regular season to be considered a rookie the following year.

Dryden could have come out of college any year. He was adamant he was staying for his degree. He went to law school while playing in the NHL. The Bruins drafted Dryden when he was eighteen. When they found out he was going to college for four years they traded him. It was a huge mistake. He killed them for years on he way to a Hall of Fame career.