What is wrong with the parents of HS athletes?

What is wrong with High School athletics?

I coached football for 3 years about 10 years ago, until the bowhunting bug bit me. I witnessed some stuff that made me not want to coach anyways. Rude parents, kids who had no discipline and talked trash constantly, terrible coaches...etc.

My wife has been coaching highschool basketball for 10 years, 5-6 of which have been as a head coach. She runs a very succesful program (one of the best in the state of Virginia every year) and treats her players with much respect. The things I hear her tell me are absolutely ridiculous. From parents calling in complaining about everything under the sun, to the players trying to run the team from within. My wife talked to the high school football coach the other day and he said not only are the players negative, but so are his coaches, and parents! What in the heck is wrong with people these days? They complain and whine all day long.

Are we in the golden era of the "entitled" athlete. Are we also in the era where parents think they can tell the coach what to do? Don't those parents realize they are hurting the development of their kid by bypassing the coach and his demands? I told my wife they are lucky I am still not coaching as I would tell the lot of em to take a flying leap.

What are your thoughts?

 

I'm sure it goes a whole lot deeper that just athletics. Seems about everyone thinks they're owed something.

You should try to work retail sometime....

 

In the church, it's called the Laodecian church age .... the Rights of the People ... all of america lives there .... they want what they want with no thought to anyone else ...

 

i spent time coaching pee-wee football the past couple seasons, coached some high school soccer (asst. coach), and coached kids soccer... in my experiences, its only about 10% of the parents that are problematic... and often a good level-headed discussion with them can work wonders with their attitudes... however, there are some that just can't be pleased... dealing with them I find to be quite easy as well... but i'm kind of a prick when it comes to that, if they are disruptive to the team, i actually punish the kid for the parents actions by not letting them play, it usually only takes one instance of the parent saying "why won't you play him?" and me sayin "cuz you're being an a-hole!" to cure the problem... once they figure out that their actions hurt the kid they usually STFU... its a cruel but effective technique...

 

Am I wrong in my view of what it takes to make a good athlete or person. Work hard, listen to your coach/teacher/mentor.....repeat? Other than that, just shut up and deal.

 

Try coaching the son of a former Triple A pitcher. That was fun. I offered to let the dad take the team over SEVERAL times, told him the league would pay him the same amount they paid me, jack sheit. One kid threw a bat at my assistant coach because he got pulled. Had mothers call me names that would make a sailor blush, dads say the same thing..... all over playing time. I had to play every kid at least one inning according to rules. I did, and we won the league and the tournament that year....didn't lose a game. Yep thats right, every kid got to play and we never lost!! Yet that wasn't enough, because lil Timmy didn't get to pitch, Ryan wanted to catch, etc.

BTW, all that BS was on a PEE WEE ( 8 and 9 year olds) team. I honestly think I would have choked slammed one of the parents if our season had gone on much longer. I won't ever coach again, period.

 

Button I hear you. Sports in general at all levels are just sucking lately. I have a theory. The MALE coaches and parents are letting the kids down by being poor role models. and for tolerating terrible behavior/sportsmanship, over and over and over. It is like the men in our society are too weak or scared to act on a situation.

 

i feel for ya bro.... imho, baseball is the worst of the bunch for some reason...

 

* Dave steps away from his normal PC stance* :D


Most of the BS came from the fat, whitetrash, single moms, with a litter of kids....all with a different last name....bitter at every man on the planet. They weighed 280+ and got winded sucking down their skittles, but by God....they (an actual quote overheard by my wife at a game LOL ) "had more baseball knowledge in their little toe than the coaches did in their whole body!! " You can't please everyone, so I stopped trying to please anyone when it came to coaching. The kids wanted to play and everyone wanted to win. So I tuned the distractions out, its all you can do.

 

As a "star" HS athlete, I can tell you that alot of the times, the kids are quite embarrassed of their parents.

In HS basketball, I hated when my Dad would come to be games. Absolutely hated it. I played worse b/c he was there, b/c if I made a mistake, I would be able to hear him from the stands yelling at me. So I played tight alot of time when he was there. I love my Dad to death, but he got too involved in my HS athletics. He has since apologized.

I would have other grown men come and talk to me after games and tell me what I was doing wrong or how I wasn't being utilized right. Men that I didn't even know. They would go up to my coach and talk on "my behalf" for me.

After being fouled and the ref not calling it, a parent came out of the stand and tackled the ref to the ground at one of my games.

I never understand why parents get so worked up, but then again, I cannot say how I will react when my future kids start playing sports.

Now my senior year, I did lead a rebellion against our coach during my last home game. It was his first year to coach, and he was the worst coach I have ever had in my life. I'm serious. He was horrible. We were playing our major rivals, they were ranked #2 in the state, and we had a down year that year, so we weren't going to make the playoffs, but we were within 5 points with under 3 minutes to play, they had the ball, and were content to just hold the ball till the game expired. For some reason unknown to me till this day, our coach told us to just let them hold the ball and back off of them. I was not about to let that happen, so after he told the team that, I gathered the other players around and called a trap defense. When we went to trap, our coach called a timeout, but I kept all of the players at halfcourt, and talked to them there, then told the ref to not let our coach to come on the court. He understood, and obliged.

Our coach ended up getting kicked out of the game, (to the cheers of the crowd), and we won the game by 1. That was the last game that guy coached. He was fired after the season.

 

Thats the big thing in America right now, especially with the bad economy. Everybody is owed something and expects "the most" out of every little thing..including there kids sports teams. Its sad.

 

This Is the new times and ways of our world these days. It's 100% BS, kids are what they are because of how parents raise their kids these days.

Also In my opinion It kinda depends where your located too I think. Back when I played hockey In high school 20 years ago the players and parents from the bigger cities were absolute jerks for the most part. They were all poor sportsman when they didn't agree with a call and stuff like that. When we played smaller city teams the players and parents were much better In the respect department.

 

In my experiences, I found the opposite.

It was the small town parents that were worst.

 

Agreed Jeff, life is not fair, all of us are not the same on the athletic field=life moves on. Some people just don't get it. The more I hear my wife talk, the more I want to slap some people. Last night I was at the boiling point. She has a major college prospect who has not even played one minute at the highschool level (she is a rising freshmen)..her father is making some comments already. This girl is going to be bigtime by the time she is a senior, probably will sign way early at a major ACC school. I told my wife not to put up with it, no matter who the player was whose parent is behaving poorly.

 

shadow- at which school does your wife teach just out of curiousity? Being a fellow Virginian I might know the school!

 

shadow- at which school does your wife coach just out of curiousity? Being a fellow Virginian I might know the school!

 

Yup V.S. the culture of America these days is "entitledment" and on top of that, all these parents living vicariously through their kids. The thing most people don't understand is that it takes a very special athlete to make up the small percentage of D-1 scholarships given out. Not to mention any level of college athletic scholarship.

 

Agreed Shed----people just do not get it!

Rockin, PM sent.

 

EXACTLY right!! Took the words right out of my mouth. I'll just add one more thing (caught a lifetime of flack over this topic in my time). Whoever said it doesn't matter if you win or lose was not a successful person. Winning DOES matter. It's the only thing. That's why you play the game.... to win. I've coached a ton of different teams in different sports.

I won't give you my resume, but it is pretty impressive. A couple years ago I took our little league all start team to the New York State finals. First time our little town here in central NY has gone to states. Best bunch of kids with mutual respect I've ever had. We lost in the finals to some team of 6'6" 12 year olds from New York city. Anyway I have an old school coaching philosophy that I stick to. I get the best I can possibly get out of each individual. I dont' expect to exceed an individuals potential ability but I won't accept an athlete NOT playing to their potential either. Hard work, discipline, and mental toughness are the guidelines to success. If you're not as talented as another team you simply out work them and out think them. There's always a way to win.

Now to get bashed some more by you guys. Another part of the problem IMO is some of the coaches really shouldn't be coaching. Nothing against them they are voluntaring their time and doing a good thing for the kids (kinda). But... some of these people coaching have absolutely no clue about the sport they are coaching and really have no business trying to teach what they don't know to the kids.

Anyway.. that's all for a different topic. As far as the parents? Yeah they can be a pain in the butt. When they see the way you run your team and you are in complete control I've found helps. Stand up to them and discipline them just like the kids. Most parents if they are comfortable that their kid is in good hands and really being taught well will be ok. I can deal with them. The ones that bug me are the ones that think their kid is the next Babe Ruth or Jerry Rice. They think their kid deserves some sort of special treatment. Don't think so. Whatever the case may be I'll get right in their face and let them understand the deal right away.

 

amen and the culture is only getting worse