I asked coaches two years ago about BURNOUT and Multi Sport Athletes. Here are some responses.
Hey
Todd,
I
couldn't agree with you more about the direction of athletics in general but in
particular basketball. It's a travesty about where parents priorities are
at this point. This obvious decline of the sport certainly attributed to
my retirement. The reasons I went and continued to remain in coaching
seem to be no longer valued or relevant to today's youth and families. It
has become about the all might dollar whether it's in the form of a full
scholarship or the professional ranks.
Don't
get me wrong, if a parent feels this is the only avenue to get HER child (most
dads aren't around) through college so be it. But what about making the
completion of a degree the top priority as opposed to a lucrative professional
contract (that statistics show is least likely to happen). What about
teaching character, values, morals, courtesy, appreciation and discipline
through the sport as opposed to everything goes and is ok.
I truly
believe there needs to be honest discussion about this topic from all the
shareholders. Let's see if those policy makers and governors of the sport
are willing to do something to turn the tide. We really need it and soon.
Gary
Gary
Cain
Cerritos
College
Coordinator
of Judicial Affairs
Student
Activities
(562)
860-2451 x2472
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Todd, I agree with you 100%. I have a daughter who will be a
varsity starter on the soccer team. They moved our league games to
the exact same time as my basketball games. I think this may be my last
year of coaching. I want to see her play. Yes, the club
thing is out of hand. Parents believe that club is the only way to get a
scholarship. I had 5 kids play club ball this past summer, two
received major knee (ACL) injuries this past year. I don't know if going
24/7 caused it. One played on the FBC 5th team. That's below J.V.
level. She has not improved and will never be a major college player, but
they tell her she will. She missed all my fundamental practices this summer.
The habits they bring back from club are not to my liking and
standards. Club coaches take all the best kids and say look at my win/lost
record. Why are they not taking freshman and J.V. players and improving their
skills? The club players have become selfish players.
They spent thousands of dollars and the two seniors didn't receive
anything. West Point game one an official visit. The others didn't
get any official visits. Seattle Univ. came in last week on one because
they are scrambling for players. Many volleyball kids would play
basketball but volleyball has a die hard club attitude, so they won't
play two sports. I tell my players to play other sports and always have.
About a third of my teams plays a second or third sport. Believe this, we have
not had an organized practice yet this fall. We shoot 6th period one day a
week and weight train the other four. We won't have our first practice until
November 7th. Some teams have been practicing since school started.
Yes, things have changed and more and more coaches I talk to say
"it is time to move on".
Mel Sims
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HI Todd,
Interesting
thoughts. I have never had anyone agree with me on this issue
before. Here's a story for you . . . my daughter Stephanie graduated with
the class of 2009. She lettered in Volleyball, Basketball and Track all
four years in HS. She never played a day of club . . . she didn't have
time to do that, play three sports, run ASB, go to youth group, and be the FB
watergirl . . . and carry almost a 4.0 gpa. In the spring last year, she
said, "mom, I think I want to play VB in college." I chuckled. She
is a volleyball player born into a BB family! She has always been a good
sport, supported her school teams, etc. even when she really didn't want
to. She just felt it was her responsibility to compete for her
school. Anyhow, she had been accepted at every college she applied, but still
hadn't committed. I said, "fine . . . get on the internet, contact some
coaches of small schools and see what happens." She did. She got
some interest, emails, etc. In the end, she decided to save some $, go to
Community College and try to play VB ? in hopes of transferring to a 4-year
school. In the meantime, the VB coach at The Master's College (GSAC)
emailed . . . long story short ? on JULY 17TH, we drove up, had a
private tryout, and the next day she was offered an unbelievable scholarship to
attend a fantastic Christian collage and fulfill her dream. The coach was
impressed with two things: the fact that my daughter had done all the
correspondence ? I never got involved. That showed maturity. And
the fact that she was a versatile athlete . . . in fact, she may compete in
track for Master's as well. Needless to say, I know that the story is
unusual. In fact, when I tell people, they don't believe me.
At
Linfield, we encourage our student-athletes to play multiple sports. The
life lessons you learn from starring on one team and being on the bench in
another are invaluable. Fact: kids who want to play college sports
(and are competent) can . . . they just need to be willing to look ? there are
tons of small schools with money to give to athletes.
Coaching
. . . you are right on the money. I completely disagree with the
direction CIF has taken. I think they just got tired of trying to
regulate something that people were ignoring anyway. I think it is a huge
step in the wrong direction. And I predict it will quickly spin out of
control and they will scramble to fix it! I will not coach
year-round. That is a ridiculous and unhealthy expectation, and one that
is not supported by our athletic department. Our AD is a huge support,
but looks for other ways for the kids to participate in their sport, or simply
take a break. Our boys BB does play a lot of games, but our coaches do
have to share athletes. We even have kids who want to play three sports
during our summer programs! Crazy!
Thanks
for speaking up! I know that you are a very well-respected voice in the
BB community; you have taken a very unpopular stand. Just know you are
not alone!
Gay
Bennett
Dean
of Students
Linfield
Christian School
951.676.8111
ext. 3203
gbennett@linfield.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Todd,
I haven't taken any time off
for way to long! I first started playing basketball because all I needed
was a ball and a hoop. The game is broken and we are not getting it
back! Pat Springer, MSJC
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Todd,
You make a great point. not only are kids having to pick their
sport early but we are excluding so many young people who are not from affluent
families. Many kids do not know what their best sport is until they are 17-18
years old. The pressure put on a multiple sport child now is also very
difficult for the child and the parents. Thank you for the e-mail.
Danny Miles
Oregon Tech
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The year I experienced with the no restriction/ year round
coaching was great. I was able to bring in small groups of kids to work
on footwork, cutting, shooting, and other fundamentals of the game.
However, I did get out of coaching, partly because of burn out and no wanting
to miss my kids lives, because I saw the time begin to dominate my life and kids,
parents were still complaining about wanting to play more games. We
neither had the budget, nor the competitive drive to play games every weekend
and still see the season as important. As I got to the spring, I felt the
change in what was happening. More coaches were running season type
practices year round, instead of skill based workouts. If you work with
the kids year round, you have to spend the majority of the off season getting
better at the individual skills of the game. (The problem is a lot of
"coaches" can't teach skills, they teach their plays.---OOO did I say
that)
Monty Owens Former Patriot HS Coach
English 11 Teacher
English 11 Data Team Leader
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Coach Malecki:
I enjoyed reading your opinion and can't agree more with your assessment. I
have two comments.
One, the burnout you describe is not only for the coaches, but the athletes
too. Since the assocation rule was dropped, I know of HS coaches who are
literally doing things with their team 325 days out of the year. Many of these
coaches have highly talented teams who (in my opinion) severely underacheived
during the HS basketball season. My observation is that these teams "peaked"
way too soon and burnt out when the league and CIF titles were on the line.
Also, these coaches seem to forget that the quantity of workouts can erase the
desired outcome if there is no quality to the workout. Many of the 325 days
spent together as a team are playing worthless games where no instruction is
being given and bad habits (i.e. traveling) are reinforced. Not that I have the
perfect plan, but my team finished our summer program (where we practiced more
than played games) in mid-July and just last week started practicing once a
week in preparation for official HS basketball practices starting in November -
they are conditioning and lifting on their own. I used the same format last
year, and our team had a very successful season in relation to the goal's we
set. My take on practicing is that the purpose/quality of the time used is far
more important than how much time is used.
Two, it is unfortunate to see the 2 and 3 sport athlete becoming a thing of the
past. Fortunately, at a small school like mine, we have to share athletes in
order to field teams. My athletes being able to hear and learn from other
coaches (whether basketball or not) seems to be another advantage in not having
my athletes burn out during basketball season.
Just my observations and thanks for your email.
Jon Bahnsen
Athletic Director
Boys' Basketball Coach
Brethren Christian HS
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Lehman, Cajon HS Girls
Just because there's a rule only means that those ethical people
will follow them. For years, some high school coaches just got parents or
friends to run their practices in the off season while they watched them and
conversed with them. Rules only prevent the moral coaches from working with
their players while the others cheat and usually get away with it and continue
to win championships year after year. Yes, many of your points are good, but do
they stop the cheaters? No! By the way, my daughter was a four sport athlete
and all league in all of them so it can be done, but priorites have to be in
place. As for fundamentals, I'd like to believe that most coaches teach them,
but that doesn't mean players practice them off the court. To be a good/great
player one has to put in alot more hours on their own than in practice. I know
this by experience. Nowadays, many athletes would rather be lazy, text, hang
out or do something else except practicing their skills. I teach the
professional way on how to shoot a basketball, but my players shoot like a
sixth grader. We can't whip them into submission like Bobby Knight anymore.
What do you suggest? And please don't say encouragement, motivation and all the
rest of that stuff that I'd would like to believe that all coaches do. Have you
ever heard of the saying "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't
make them drink?" That is unless they're thirsty. Many players today
really don't want to become all they could be because they don't put in the
required effort, time and neccessary work to become great. My daughter did and
so it happened for her. There's no difference between her and anyone else
except daily hard work ethics. Have a nice day. Thanks for your opinion and
time to reflect on it. I now have a grandson and occasionally will miss a
practice and let my assistants coach it while I'm babysitting because it's
often more rewarding especially when I walk in the door and he stops whatever
he's doing and runs to me with his arms up wanting me to pick him up and hold
him because he misses me. Players should love their coaches just as much for
all that they do for them.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great stuff Todd. Tim Cook, Former CBU coach
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
totally agree, well said....while
you know the parents here were ___, i left mostly due to the association rule
change.....after 20 years as a high school- most of them at the varsity level
in multiple sports........it is going to kill high school sports as we know it,
and kill coaches who feel they have to do all this crap--and the standings will
not change much!
later, bm (bill moyer-former great oak
hs)
I agree with a lot of what you say, However, I don't agree a with
CIF policy to restrict high school coaches. It should be left up to the
High School Coach and High School Principal to manage the time spent in the
sport. All CIF policies do is create rules with no enforcement which
become inequitable. What good does that do? It harms the coaches
and schools following the rules and benefits AAU coaches. It also
benefits High School Coaches who choose not to follow the rules because CIF
never has any consequences. I do not see regulation by CIF as a
positive. Every community is different and every coach has a different
burn out point as you put it. No association rule is a benefit to high
school coaches, It does not benefit programs such as yours, but one of
the intended outcomes of getting rid of the association rule was that High
School players would spend more time with there High School Coaches. You
are also to hard on High School coaches. There are a lot of great high
school coaches in the Southern Section. There are a few great High School
coaches in your area as well. Yes, there are some bad ones out there, but
there are bad coaches at every level, college and pro included. I think
when you look at the big picture as a high school coach I would say it is
generally advantages for high school kids to be working out with high school
coaches.
I guess my point is: It is not regulation that will make the sport
better, but education.
Dennis Zink / Varsity Boys Basketball
Palm Springs High School
(951) 566-6376
Hey
Todd,
I
couldn't agree with you more about the direction of athletics in general but in
particular basketball. It's a travesty about where parents priorities are
at this point. This obvious decline of the sport certainly attributed to
my retirement. The reasons I went and continued to remain in coaching
seem to be no longer valued or relevant to today's youth and families. It
has become about the all might dollar whether it's in the form of a full
scholarship or the professional ranks.
Don't
get me wrong, if a parent feels this is the only avenue to get HER child (most
dads aren't around) through college so be it. But what about making the
completion of a degree the top priority as opposed to a lucrative professional
contract (that statistics show is least likely to happen). What about
teaching character, values, morals, courtesy, appreciation and discipline
through the sport as opposed to everything goes and is ok.
I truly
believe there needs to be honest discussion about this topic from all the
shareholders. Let's see if those policy makers and governors of the sport
are willing to do something to turn the tide. We really need it and soon.
Gary
Gary
Cain
Cerritos
College
Coordinator
of Judicial Affairs
Student
Activities
(562)
860-2451 x2472
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Todd, I agree with you 100%. I have a daughter who will be a
varsity starter on the soccer team. They moved our league games to
the exact same time as my basketball games. I think this may be my last
year of coaching. I want to see her play. Yes, the club
thing is out of hand. Parents believe that club is the only way to get a
scholarship. I had 5 kids play club ball this past summer, two
received major knee (ACL) injuries this past year. I don't know if going
24/7 caused it. One played on the FBC 5th team. That's below J.V.
level. She has not improved and will never be a major college player, but
they tell her she will. She missed all my fundamental practices this summer.
The habits they bring back from club are not to my liking and
standards. Club coaches take all the best kids and say look at my win/lost
record. Why are they not taking freshman and J.V. players and improving their
skills? The club players have become selfish players.
They spent thousands of dollars and the two seniors didn't receive
anything. West Point game one an official visit. The others didn't
get any official visits. Seattle Univ. came in last week on one because
they are scrambling for players. Many volleyball kids would play
basketball but volleyball has a die hard club attitude, so they won't
play two sports. I tell my players to play other sports and always have.
About a third of my teams plays a second or third sport. Believe this, we have
not had an organized practice yet this fall. We shoot 6th period one day a
week and weight train the other four. We won't have our first practice until
November 7th. Some teams have been practicing since school started.
Yes, things have changed and more and more coaches I talk to say
"it is time to move on".
Mel Sims
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HI Todd,
Interesting
thoughts. I have never had anyone agree with me on this issue
before. Here's a story for you . . . my daughter Stephanie graduated with
the class of 2009. She lettered in Volleyball, Basketball and Track all
four years in HS. She never played a day of club . . . she didn't have
time to do that, play three sports, run ASB, go to youth group, and be the FB
watergirl . . . and carry almost a 4.0 gpa. In the spring last year, she
said, "mom, I think I want to play VB in college." I chuckled. She
is a volleyball player born into a BB family! She has always been a good
sport, supported her school teams, etc. even when she really didn't want
to. She just felt it was her responsibility to compete for her
school. Anyhow, she had been accepted at every college she applied, but still
hadn't committed. I said, "fine . . . get on the internet, contact some
coaches of small schools and see what happens." She did. She got
some interest, emails, etc. In the end, she decided to save some $, go to
Community College and try to play VB ? in hopes of transferring to a 4-year
school. In the meantime, the VB coach at The Master's College (GSAC)
emailed . . . long story short ? on JULY 17TH, we drove up, had a
private tryout, and the next day she was offered an unbelievable scholarship to
attend a fantastic Christian collage and fulfill her dream. The coach was
impressed with two things: the fact that my daughter had done all the
correspondence ? I never got involved. That showed maturity. And
the fact that she was a versatile athlete . . . in fact, she may compete in
track for Master's as well. Needless to say, I know that the story is
unusual. In fact, when I tell people, they don't believe me.
At
Linfield, we encourage our student-athletes to play multiple sports. The
life lessons you learn from starring on one team and being on the bench in
another are invaluable. Fact: kids who want to play college sports
(and are competent) can . . . they just need to be willing to look ? there are
tons of small schools with money to give to athletes.
Coaching
. . . you are right on the money. I completely disagree with the
direction CIF has taken. I think they just got tired of trying to
regulate something that people were ignoring anyway. I think it is a huge
step in the wrong direction. And I predict it will quickly spin out of
control and they will scramble to fix it! I will not coach
year-round. That is a ridiculous and unhealthy expectation, and one that
is not supported by our athletic department. Our AD is a huge support,
but looks for other ways for the kids to participate in their sport, or simply
take a break. Our boys BB does play a lot of games, but our coaches do
have to share athletes. We even have kids who want to play three sports
during our summer programs! Crazy!
Thanks
for speaking up! I know that you are a very well-respected voice in the
BB community; you have taken a very unpopular stand. Just know you are
not alone!
Gay
Bennett
Dean
of Students
Linfield
Christian School
951.676.8111
ext. 3203
gbennett@linfield.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Todd,
I haven't taken any time off
for way to long! I first started playing basketball because all I needed
was a ball and a hoop. The game is broken and we are not getting it
back! Pat Springer, MSJC
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Todd,
You make a great point. not only are kids having to pick their
sport early but we are excluding so many young people who are not from affluent
families. Many kids do not know what their best sport is until they are 17-18
years old. The pressure put on a multiple sport child now is also very
difficult for the child and the parents. Thank you for the e-mail.
Danny Miles
Oregon Tech
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The year I experienced with the no restriction/ year round
coaching was great. I was able to bring in small groups of kids to work
on footwork, cutting, shooting, and other fundamentals of the game.
However, I did get out of coaching, partly because of burn out and no wanting
to miss my kids lives, because I saw the time begin to dominate my life and kids,
parents were still complaining about wanting to play more games. We
neither had the budget, nor the competitive drive to play games every weekend
and still see the season as important. As I got to the spring, I felt the
change in what was happening. More coaches were running season type
practices year round, instead of skill based workouts. If you work with
the kids year round, you have to spend the majority of the off season getting
better at the individual skills of the game. (The problem is a lot of
"coaches" can't teach skills, they teach their plays.---OOO did I say
that)
Monty Owens Former Patriot HS Coach
English 11 Teacher
English 11 Data Team Leader
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Coach Malecki:
I enjoyed reading your opinion and can't agree more with your assessment. I
have two comments.
One, the burnout you describe is not only for the coaches, but the athletes
too. Since the assocation rule was dropped, I know of HS coaches who are
literally doing things with their team 325 days out of the year. Many of these
coaches have highly talented teams who (in my opinion) severely underacheived
during the HS basketball season. My observation is that these teams "peaked"
way too soon and burnt out when the league and CIF titles were on the line.
Also, these coaches seem to forget that the quantity of workouts can erase the
desired outcome if there is no quality to the workout. Many of the 325 days
spent together as a team are playing worthless games where no instruction is
being given and bad habits (i.e. traveling) are reinforced. Not that I have the
perfect plan, but my team finished our summer program (where we practiced more
than played games) in mid-July and just last week started practicing once a
week in preparation for official HS basketball practices starting in November -
they are conditioning and lifting on their own. I used the same format last
year, and our team had a very successful season in relation to the goal's we
set. My take on practicing is that the purpose/quality of the time used is far
more important than how much time is used.
Two, it is unfortunate to see the 2 and 3 sport athlete becoming a thing of the
past. Fortunately, at a small school like mine, we have to share athletes in
order to field teams. My athletes being able to hear and learn from other
coaches (whether basketball or not) seems to be another advantage in not having
my athletes burn out during basketball season.
Just my observations and thanks for your email.
Jon Bahnsen
Athletic Director
Boys' Basketball Coach
Brethren Christian HS
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Lehman, Cajon HS Girls
Just because there's a rule only means that those ethical people
will follow them. For years, some high school coaches just got parents or
friends to run their practices in the off season while they watched them and
conversed with them. Rules only prevent the moral coaches from working with
their players while the others cheat and usually get away with it and continue
to win championships year after year. Yes, many of your points are good, but do
they stop the cheaters? No! By the way, my daughter was a four sport athlete
and all league in all of them so it can be done, but priorites have to be in
place. As for fundamentals, I'd like to believe that most coaches teach them,
but that doesn't mean players practice them off the court. To be a good/great
player one has to put in alot more hours on their own than in practice. I know
this by experience. Nowadays, many athletes would rather be lazy, text, hang
out or do something else except practicing their skills. I teach the
professional way on how to shoot a basketball, but my players shoot like a
sixth grader. We can't whip them into submission like Bobby Knight anymore.
What do you suggest? And please don't say encouragement, motivation and all the
rest of that stuff that I'd would like to believe that all coaches do. Have you
ever heard of the saying "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't
make them drink?" That is unless they're thirsty. Many players today
really don't want to become all they could be because they don't put in the
required effort, time and neccessary work to become great. My daughter did and
so it happened for her. There's no difference between her and anyone else
except daily hard work ethics. Have a nice day. Thanks for your opinion and
time to reflect on it. I now have a grandson and occasionally will miss a
practice and let my assistants coach it while I'm babysitting because it's
often more rewarding especially when I walk in the door and he stops whatever
he's doing and runs to me with his arms up wanting me to pick him up and hold
him because he misses me. Players should love their coaches just as much for
all that they do for them.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Great stuff Todd. Tim Cook, Former CBU coach
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
totally agree, well said....while
you know the parents here were ___, i left mostly due to the association rule
change.....after 20 years as a high school- most of them at the varsity level
in multiple sports........it is going to kill high school sports as we know it,
and kill coaches who feel they have to do all this crap--and the standings will
not change much!
later, bm (bill moyer-former great oak
hs)
I agree with a lot of what you say, However, I don't agree a with
CIF policy to restrict high school coaches. It should be left up to the
High School Coach and High School Principal to manage the time spent in the
sport. All CIF policies do is create rules with no enforcement which
become inequitable. What good does that do? It harms the coaches
and schools following the rules and benefits AAU coaches. It also
benefits High School Coaches who choose not to follow the rules because CIF
never has any consequences. I do not see regulation by CIF as a
positive. Every community is different and every coach has a different
burn out point as you put it. No association rule is a benefit to high
school coaches, It does not benefit programs such as yours, but one of
the intended outcomes of getting rid of the association rule was that High
School players would spend more time with there High School Coaches. You
are also to hard on High School coaches. There are a lot of great high
school coaches in the Southern Section. There are a few great High School
coaches in your area as well. Yes, there are some bad ones out there, but
there are bad coaches at every level, college and pro included. I think
when you look at the big picture as a high school coach I would say it is
generally advantages for high school kids to be working out with high school
coaches.
I guess my point is: It is not regulation that will make the sport
better, but education.
Dennis Zink / Varsity Boys Basketball
Palm Springs High School
(951) 566-6376
