SuperCoach, and Little League Parents

It's the hardest second job ever.  The money sucks with horrible pay (as in nada), and in reality you'll spend plenty of money on stuff for the kids and get shorted by the parents but you don't care.  If you do it right, you'll spend tons of hours working for clients who don't really know what they want.  With that said, moms and dads have been sneaking out of work early year after year for pleasure of spending time coaching kids at the fields, courts, and pools for the love of their kids and the game.

Let's meet SuperCoach.

Let's start with a little history as youth sports have evolved over the years.  In my youth, we rode our bikes to practice with our gloves threaded over the handlebars, and our cleats tied together hanging over our necks.  Practice unis consisted of blue jeans, a concert tee-shirt, and of course, your team's dusty adjustable mesh-backed lid.    We would show up to the high school field and wait for them to finish.  We would and take batting practice off the one dad who could make it in time, eat sunflower seeds, and spit like the pros.  We had a bag of a few bats we all shared, and some crusty old helmets that contained little padding, and smelled like gym socks or worse. I can't remember seeing a piece of new equipment in a bag after my first year of little league.

Today, there are at least four or five coaches for each baseball team (7-8 for football).  The kids show up wearing practice uniforms, Oakley sunglasses, $200+ composite bats, customized flat-brimmed hats, and batting gloves hanging out of their back pockets.  They practice on pristine fields with grass infields, covered dugouts, and have scoreboards tracking pitch counts.  They don't ride their bikes to the field, but rather are dropped off by minivan or SUV.  These kids are big-leaguers from the start...and that's just in little league.  There are travel ball teams that have better swag than the Pittsburgh Pirates, and they'll fly across country to play in tournaments.  To put it simply...Little League is the new "Big Leagues."  The thing is, they're not the big leagues...this stuff is just for fun and we just can't forget that fact (more below).

Super Coach gets one or maybe two official practice days a week to mold his group of kids into a winning machine (or at least make the kids into players that can run the bases counterclockwise), but will often schedule time on the weekends or whenever he can to help the kids develop at the local batting cages.  Super Coach has to sneak out of the office early on game day to prep the field, throw whiffle-ball batting practice till his arm falls off, and then wrangle this gaggle of cats into game readiness.  The thing is Super Coach loves the game, his kid, the the other kids, and is good friends with that 4-eyed ump that blows every call.  In little league, the baseball isn't the hard part...often times its those behind the fence that makes life difficult for Super Coach and the kids.

Look around your stands at the next game...you'll see some of these folks in front of you, next to you, or it might just be you:

Day-Care Parent.  These parents drop their kids off a few minutes early, and often show up late to pick up.  They barely slow down as they kick their kid out of the side of the minivan on their way to something they actually care about.  Their kids will miss practice for Cub Scouts, band practice, or just because practice is far away and they just aren't feeling it.  Day-Care Parent never works with his or her kid at home, but whines the loudest to know why Junior isn't playing well, playing enough, or having a great time.  Why can't my kid catch?  Well, have you ever practiced with him...SuperCoach already knows the answer, but asks anyway.  Day-Care Parent skips lots of games, but loves the fact they get 6-8 hours of day-care a week for the price of registration.

MLB Dad.  MLB dad thinks Junior, at 10, is going to the "Bigs."  News Flash to MLB Dad...the best player in [insert your town name here] is not going to the Major Leagues.  I was at the gym several years back and a friend approached me and said he wanted to introduce me to a guy whose kid was going to play college baseball.  My friend thought I might have some advice for this passionate baseball dad being a former player.  This dad told me all about his son, his travel ball team, and the fact his son was playing year round and would play more than 90 baseball games that year.  My first thought...that sucks for that kid, what about soccer, football, basketball or swimming? Anyway, this young man had both a personal hitting and pitching coach, and this Superdad was "pretty sure he would choose college over the draft."  Holy cow, was I talking to the father of the next Ken Griffy, Jr. (Bryce Harper for you young people)?  Was this some phenom who would be called on the first day of the upcoming Amateur draft?  Nope...this Incredikid was 12!  Yup, 12 freaking years old with hitting and pitching coaches? MLB Dad's kid looks in the stands after every pitch, never has a fun time, and doesn't even smile after a win.  MLB Dad can't keep his mounth shut, and tries to coach Junior during every at-bat from the stands.  MLB Dad lives in Fantasy F-ing Land, and whether he knows it or not the pressure is killing his poor kid, and his kid will hate him, the game, or both if he keeps pushing him.

Ex-Player Dad.   Ex-Player Dad knows the game, and how it should be played, and just can't come to grips with flat hats no matter how hard he tries.  Ex-Player Dad doesn't like showy players, and learned the game from watching Pete Rose on the This Week in Baseball. Getting dirty is how the game is played, and Ex-Player Dad cares more about seeing hustle than success, but beams with pride when he sees his kid play the game the "right way."  Ex-Player Dad doesn't think about his kid going pro because he knows the odds, and moreover that luck and opportunity (i.e. staying healthy) are as important as talent and drive. Ex-Player Dad knows if it's going to happen, it won't be because of him, but it he won't be a bar to progress either.  It is a delicate balance of providing the kid the platform for success and the occasional shove, but preserving his desire to play the game.  Push too hard, it's over by high school.  If the kid is going to make it, you'll know it, and it will be because he loves the feeling of hitting the ball, making the great play, or throwing the 3-2 fastball for a called third...not because you lit him up after a strikeout looking.  The kids that make it love taking batting practice, playing catch, or just watching the game.  

The Proudies.  The reality is most of us fall somewhere in between on the spectrum above. We want the best for our kids, and try to give them every opportunity, but we recognize the realities of the situation. The bottom line is all parents should be beaming with pride when his or her kid steps to the plate, free-throw line, or up on the block.  If your kid hits home runs, dominates on the mound, wins every race, or bombs three-pointers, it's easy.  Sure you should be proud.  But, as a coach and parent, I find I'm far more proud of the kid who gets his first hit 6 games into the season or the one who fights off five fouls balls and gets a dinker single.  It takes a tremendous amount of guts to get into the batter's box knowing you've had little or no success, but digging in anyway and giving it your all.  Sports are fun, but they can be scary too.  I'm proud of all of the kids, and whether or not they succeed, but I'm beaming with pride if my kids are out there diving for a ball, making a special play, or just digging hard down the line to beat out a grounder.

Reality

I would never squash a kid's dreams of playing anything professionally, and I'm fortunate enough to have had that chance however brief.  I remember asking my dad if I could play pro-ball (about 10-12 years old), and he said "of course, you can do anything."  Well, that's a nice line, but the reality is there are tons of guys like me.  We actually beat the odds and got drafted, played in the minors, and yet we aren't retired at 40.  What happened?  Reality happened...ohh, this is gonna hurt MLB Dad.


The reality is 1 in 11,437 little league baseball players will take the field as a Major League Baseball player. Take that in for a second.  A very large little league probably has 500 kids, so that's one kid out of more than 20 leagues making the big leagues.  The Bigs are probably out (MLB dad still actually thinks his kid is the one).  Hey MLB dad...that's .00009%

Well, shoot, the odds of making the Minor Leagues are far better right?  At least my little Johnny can have the "Bull Durham" experience...more like bullshit.  The odds of those same little-leaguers just making the Minors...the odds are 1 in 2,298 or .04%.

One more thing, if your kid doesn't have the physical gifts, and I'm talking about those you are born with, it doesn't matter how much batting practice you force him to take, he's gonna be in the stands next to you watching the A's (and that's not a bad thing), but he won't set foot on a major league field unless he is cutting the grass.  Most of the drafted players have ungodly arms, can run like jack-rabbits, have lightening fast hands, and/or all of the above.  I've seen some of the greatest infield plays of my life in A ball...far from the fresh cut grass in Yankee Stadium.  NO ONE GETS DRAFTED ON THEIR LITTLE LEAGUE PERFORMANCE.

So, let Johnny Rocket-arm play with his buddies, but if it's not working out, that's okay too.  I've been around the game a very long time as a player, umpire, coach, and now as a parent.  I love the passion my son shows for the game, and he's pretty darn good at it too.  However, I have no illusions that Incredikid is going to make his living swinging a bat or throwing a ball.  Nope, he's going to do it swinging a golf club.  Okay, probably not that either, but he might make some money taking a client out to the golf course or throwing a game with his boss for a promotion (never do that son).  Anyway, I have a goal to make sports fun for the Incredikids.  That might mean hours of throwing batting practice at the park, catching bullpens in the yard, or rolling grounders, but only if the Incredikids want to be there.  There are times when it's work for them...sure, that's how we learn anything, but I always ask myself who am I doing this for?  If the answer is me, then it's not something that needs to be done.  My father had it right...he would help me train anytime I asked (it was often long and painful for him), but he almost never made me do anything I didn't want to do, and certainly it was never for him.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't coach kids hard to learn to play hard, and honor the game and opponents they play.  If the kids have the passion, they put that pressure on themselves, they don't need us adding to it!  I remember one of my coaches from little league driving us down to Oakland to play the Fruit Loops and the other Kellogg sponsored teams.  We would pile in his yellow suburban, all 12 of us (yeah, no seat-belts baby), and roll down to play in Oakland.  Our parents were hardly ever there, and we played hard every day in the powdery all dirt fields of Alameda County.  Some of my best memories are playing on that team, and coming home to tell my folks how great we played.  Maybe sports were purer then, but we can make them that way again.  Cheer hard, be positive, and don't be that douche yelling "strike three" when you team gets a big strikeout.