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Other Sports (Tiger's Back) / Re: competitive little kid sports
« on: March 21, 2024, 10:49:31 AM »
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I think a very large part of it is the absolute rough ridin' shitshow the Nebraska BOR has made of the state academic institutions. There's a reason the president, chancellor, and provost all got the eff out. the BOR is supposed to name a priority candidate for the pres. job tomorrow. You can rest assured it'll be some shithead (unless they've learned their lesson).
I read that people think he was making reference to the DEI stuff but he's going to Texas and Texas A&M who will almost certainly cut DEI as well. Apparently there's talk within college athletics that states who are explicit in eliminating DEI programs will have some difficulties with recruiting. I have serious doubts about that.
Finally, we are in the home stretch for competitive little kid sports in my household. Going to California this weekend for a USA Water Polo event, Texas in April, then back to California in June and July.
Then maybe water polo in college? Depends on where she gets accepted but a couple schools have indicated spots on the varsity teams if admitted. Miserable stuff, just send your kids to KU or K-State and do not try to get recruited in an obscure sport or go to a school with competitive admissions.
Ha, I know at least 3-4 dudes from college that played football right out of high school, but ended up at KSU after a year. Just couldn't give up the dream which I totally get, but they were apparently pretty jealous of their HS buds partying and hanging out while they were back to being a nobody on a college team.
my daughter only considered schools that she would consider w/o polo. Although some she eliminated when she realized there wouldn't be a spot for her on the team and/or they brought on girls she hated. (I mean these girls are awful)
My son was in a fairly similar position, but in men's soccer. There are clearly more men's soccer programs than women's water polo programs, but it's still pretty tough.
For context, despite being an incredibly deep area for soccer talent, Texas has only four D1 men's soccer schools, and three of them are places most kids I know don't want to go (Houston Christian, Incarnate Word, and UT Rio Grande Valley, with SMU being the "good one"). The D2 and D3 options in Texas and the surrounding states are slim as well. The Venn diagram of schools with the right academics, geography, and athletics that fit your kid can be very small. Coaches that my kid was contacting were more or less not getting back to him, and schools that reached out to him were schools that he had no interest in for one reason or another.
As of 6 months ago, I thought my kid was going to end up at a big public school, as he had pretty much given up on the recruiting process. But before a a national showcase that he attended last October he contacted one school that he was interested in attending, just to see. They had a coach come out to watch him, and he liked what he saw, and things went really fast from there.
My kid got admitted, started talking to one of the assistants regularly, went on a visit where he stayed with some of the players and went to a camp, and then got an offer.
He knows a fair number of guys that have gone on to play college soccer, some have hated it, and some have loved it. I'm clearly hoping he falls into the latter category.
contacting coaches is the worst. Like, you're a teenage girl emailing a middle aged guy who will either ignore you or tell you that you aren't good enough at the thing you love most. On top of other college rejections. She was in communication with coaches at her top choice academic school and they were very communicative and supportive but wouldn't commit to admission support and she ended up applying early and getting rejected, but one of her best friends in water polo got admitted. It really shitty! I will say though that one coach that reached out to her separately tried to recruit her but she wasn't interested and he offered to refer her to other coaches because he liked her and he was a nice guy! And he did! Still uncommitted and waiting on a few more admissions decisions.
Finally, we are in the home stretch for competitive little kid sports in my household. Going to California this weekend for a USA Water Polo event, Texas in April, then back to California in June and July.
Then maybe water polo in college? Depends on where she gets accepted but a couple schools have indicated spots on the varsity teams if admitted. Miserable stuff, just send your kids to KU or K-State and do not try to get recruited in an obscure sport or go to a school with competitive admissions.
Ha, I know at least 3-4 dudes from college that played football right out of high school, but ended up at KSU after a year. Just couldn't give up the dream which I totally get, but they were apparently pretty jealous of their HS buds partying and hanging out while they were back to being a nobody on a college team.
my daughter only considered schools that she would consider w/o polo. Although some she eliminated when she realized there wouldn't be a spot for her on the team and/or they brought on girls she hated. (I mean these girls are awful)
Football he loves because it’s most of his school friends. We put together a feeder tackle football team for our HS. I coach it with some other guys and it’s fun as hell.
one interesting thing about this discussion I hadn't thought about is how football is one of the last remaining sports that still feels driven at the community level because clubs/private coaches haven't been able to completely take over the high level competition. It might be the last sport in the US where high school competition really means anything when it comes to playing at the next level.
hockey
There's actually quite a bit of hockey in Texas, but none of it is played in high schools.
How many texas hockey players play at the next level?
Football he loves because it’s most of his school friends. We put together a feeder tackle football team for our HS. I coach it with some other guys and it’s fun as hell.
one interesting thing about this discussion I hadn't thought about is how football is one of the last remaining sports that still feels driven at the community level because clubs/private coaches haven't been able to completely take over the high level competition. It might be the last sport in the US where high school competition really means anything when it comes to playing at the next level.
hockey
Football he loves because it’s most of his school friends. We put together a feeder tackle football team for our HS. I coach it with some other guys and it’s fun as hell.
one interesting thing about this discussion I hadn't thought about is how football is one of the last remaining sports that still feels driven at the community level because clubs/private coaches haven't been able to completely take over the high level competition. It might be the last sport in the US where high school competition really means anything when it comes to playing at the next level.
In general I think travel coaches and training centers scare parents into the idea that early specialization is necessary to keep them from being "left behind" when in fact it is probably actually detrimental to most kids if you care about things like burnout and injury
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3658407/#:~:text=Results%3A,sports%20at%20a%20young%20age.
This is all true, but the problem is that baseball has evolved to play on these competitive teams or don't play baseball. My kid whipped ass in summer and fall rec leagues with his pals. As they got a bit older, those teams dissolve and fewer of his pals played baseball anymore. He was good enough to make a "competitive" team so he's still playing, but I know he'd rather be just playing league or whatever with a bunch of his buddies. Thankfully our coach is the best and doesn't go full on and encourages everyone to play other sports, but I know Lil SF doesn't like it as much as he did in the past. I was talking to a dad a year or so ago and he said his kid was on a team that does tryouts and cuts every year. Its a constant shuffle. I asked him if that was any fun at all and he basically said both he and his kid hate it, but he knows the kids and doesn't want to go to a random team so its that or don't play baseball anymore and he likes playing baseball.
Seems like a pretty good argument for not playing baseball
I've seen a lot of youth baseball and I don't think I've seen a lot of plucky try hards out perform the natural athletes.
uhhhh, not sure what kind of youth baseball you are watching. the best athlete on our baseball team is probably our worst player. similar situation to the other teams in our club. we did take him on because he's an elite football player and fast AF and is a very hard worker. I think we can mold him into something but it'll take awhile. hitting a baseball, fielding a hard ground ball, etc. are hard AF and being really fast and strong, while definitely helpful, don't get you the majority of the way there. it's a game of repetitions. unless you believe Dominicans are just the greatest natural athletes on the planet.
Yep, doesn't matter how good of an athlete you are, you have to see a bunch of pitches to be a good hitter. Sure there are "naturals", but its just too hard and requires live pitches and swings especially as they get older. The main problem is that baseball can be boring AF for young kids so lots of kids wash out early. I love baseball, but I totally get it that hitting once every 3 innings and maybe standing out there for 2 hours and having one ball hit to you isn't that fun for a 10 year old. I loved the crap out of it, but I know Lil SF doesn't like it as much as I do and will probably wash out soon, which makes me sad.
Also one other thing about rugby, football, and collisions, I'm fairly certain that research shows most injuries occur at the line of scrimmage. The wide receiver or running back getting blown up is certainly eye catching but that happens what maybe 3-4 times a game, at the very most?
Yeah....I'm sure Tom has some good memories associated with that one year but the actual helmet looks like PukeMy annual Tom is old af helmet rant.Those primer gray helmets were awful.
On the 40th anniversary of our first bowl game the AD still refuses to roll out the best pre powercat helmet in our history shown below.
Tom
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Instead of OU losing to an Iowa State or K-State once a year, they'll lose to a Mississippi state or a Kentucky 2 times a year, including getting pounded by Alabama and Georgia. 8-4 is their new future. Trust!
aTm has averaged 8-4 since joining the SEC, I think OU will do better!
I'm pretty sure I've criticized youth football coaching as a factor in concussions on this blog, and there's definitely been talk of baseball coaches ruining the throwing arms of kids from overuse.
But I definitely don't know cheer and will defer to people who know more.
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While we're discussing this, it's amazing how little middle school administrators care about middle school sports. Club sports definitely go harder. My daughter has had back to back cross country meets cancelled on total bullshit. Last Thursday she couldn't run because their bus was cancelled. They didn't give parents the option of taking our own kids to the meet. Yesterday the meet was cancelled by the host school because of a thunderstorm watch. Not thunder, not rain, not a thunderstorm warning, just a watch. It ended up raining for 10 minutes, an hour and a half before the meet was scheduled to start. The Ames coaches didn't practice after the cancellation.
crap is frustrating.