Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - is youth sports right for your child?

Episode Date: August 27, 2025

In today’s episode we talked about how to encourage effort over outcome, balancing competition with fun and enjoyment, when to push, when to step back, managing expectations if your child plays for fun vs. playing to compete, preventing burnout at a young age and much more!! Let us know your thoughts :) Love you guys! Shawn & Andrew ▶ Get EASTFAM for 15% off at https://www.kachava.com ▶ Use our code EASTFAM for up to 40% off at https://www.CozyEarth.com Beam Kids is now available online at https://www.shopbeam.com/COUPLETHINGS Take advantage of our exclusive discount of up to 40% off using code COUPLETHINGS Subscribe to our newsletter ▶ https://www.familymade.com/newsletter Follow our podcast Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/shawnandandrewpods/ Follow My Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/ShawnJohnson Follow My Tik Tok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@shawnjohnson Shop My LTK Page ▶ https://www.shopltk.com/explore/shawnjohnson Like the Facebook page! ▶ https://www.facebook.com/ShawnJohnson Follow Andrew’s Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/AndrewDEast Andrew’s Tik Tok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewdeast?lang=en (00:00) number one cheerleaders of the east crew!   (01:34) 4-year-old flag football story to kick us off   (05:30) why we want to talk about youth sports   (08:08) youth sports today = no fun?   (15:38) we experienced the broken system   (18:20) the stats that scream volumes   (24:50) setting the perspective in participation numbers declining   (27:50) the best thing you can do as a parent   (32:20) sport impacting other areas of our lives   (34:42) but what if i want them to go pro?   (36:00) data on parental pressure   (40:02) ugly parent syndrome   (42:33) quitting and navigating worth   (45:35) you cannot want it more than your child   (47:16) how can we reshape youth sports?   (52:50) closing thoughts   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up, everybody? Welcome back to a couple things. With Sean and Andrew. I feel like I am losing my voice because we spent all weekend screaming as the number one cheerleaders of the East crew playing t-ball, softball, flag football, games and practices. It was an epic weekend, to be honest. It was the first weekend that we've had full of sports like that. Yes.

And so today we wanted to talk about youth sports. Yes. And this is coming from an Olympic gold medalist. And an NFL player. And so maybe we have a unique perspective on this that... We do. You think we do? We do.

I've actually changed my perspective before having kids, then having kids, and then now that the kids are old enough to play sports. I've changed my perspective three times. I think I've been pretty consistent. I'm excited to get into this. But I want to... Go ahead. I will say, too, adding into that, I coached for about...

eight years. So I got to see firsthand so many different things. We also want to make this a conversation because our kids are five, four, and one. Yes. So we don't know everything. And some of you may have kids older than ours and you may have a different perspective. So please share that. You can comment or DM us. We love the conversation part of social media. I do want to warn you ahead of time. I feel very, very strongly about this topic. So I don't know if my take can be changed. I want to start by sharing a story from this weekend that was the first time I felt something like this. So we go out to Jets' first flag football game. He's pumped. Last week we got to go to a Vanderbilt football practice and it was like so fun to see how much he loved it and how into

he was and all he wanted to do was wear a helmet and we got to meet the head coach. And it was like a full circle moment for me to be able to bring my son to the place where I play college football. So fast forward to the weekend, he's super excited for his flag football match. We had a practice two days before and found out very quickly or was reminded very quickly that this is four-year-old flag football and they don't know left or right. We're not running plays. They don't understand defense or offense. And it's a lot to take in.

So you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're here to have fun. And that was my perspective from the start. So you ended up playing Sharks and Minos as assistant coach, which, well done. Yeah. I'm really proud of you. We had a blast. Shout out to that coach. Fast forward to the game.

We go out there and we see the other team running these elaborate plays with a five-year-old quarterback calling the count. There were two refs for a five-year-old game. No, for a four-year-old game. Yes. Two refs. So we see the practice, we go out there, we see the two refs, and we're like, wow, this is totally different than what we had expected, which is just for fun, right?

We don't need two reps. We could do coach reffing. Literally. Then we do a coin toss. They have a send-out captains, and we do a coin toss, which is hilarious. We won the coin toss, and we deferred, which is hilarious. This is what you do in, like, college and pro football. I can't believe it.

So, yeah, we won, we deferred. They get the ball first. And the coach on the other team was very clearly into this, okay? Which is great. Yes. Yeah. He knew the entire rule book so well that he could find the loopholes in them. Yes.

And so turns out that... Which is also so confusing for the kids. Yes. Turns out that essentially you can't tackle someone until three people have touched the ball. The center, the quarterback, and then the last person, which would be the running back, you could then pull the flag of. Stay with us here. Okay.

So I'm teaching the boys like, okay, and they were listening so well, hey, this is a guy you want to pull the flag of, okay? And they did a great job. Also, the field is 70, 80 yards long. And I was expecting, like, you know, living room size. So the whole thing was overwhelming. But next play, after we get this penalty, there's a quarterback sneak. He's the second person, touched the ball, not the third.

Yes, and scores. And I was like, hey. Didn't think that was allowed. And so it turns out that one play of every series, you can have the quarterback sneak. And it was something about that interaction where the other coach was like exposing us on this weird thing that it was like a loophole in the rulebook. That the kids didn't even understand. But only the coach did. Yeah.

And he was passionate. He was not going to. He was playing chess. Yes. Yes. For four-year-old flag football. Yes. So that fired me up.

And I was like, okay. If this is how we're going to play, I'm not going to lose this fight. And anyway, I felt whatever the problem of youth sports is in me. Turns out the owner of the Browns was at the game. Also, Jett had an epic goal line stand to win. Also, hilarious that we were even keeping score in the first place. I was not counting on that. Also, we had some of our boys going to like the wrong end zone.

But still, on our team, we were like screaming so hard. I was like, I'm so proud of you. like the goal line yeah and they have no idea what they've done wrong or like right or whatever but they can see if you're proud or not and they're having fun and whatever all this to say i wanted this is my idea to do this podcast i wanted to talk about youth sports some of the do's some of the don'ts and from firsthand experience what i think is the best way to succeed for your child and use sports.

And when you go to a four-year-old flag football game and you see people prioritizing, winning and strategy and complexity over celebrating

children having fun and learning the foundational like core basic level rules of the game in my opinion having seen this for many many years I think you're doing wrong by those kids

if you make it a complex strategic we are going to find a way to win sport from day one you are prioritizing that the most important thing in youth sports is winning

if you can reverse engineer that to say today's practice, we're going to play sharks and minos. Today's practice or today's game, I want you guys to have so much fun and try really hard and learn like the ABCs of your sport, you're setting up a foundation for the kids that will take them into more complex things later in life that they can figure out.

but it just you're writing the whole the whole story wrong from the get-go so to summarize it's it's an issue of parent over-involvement yeah and I think that that applies in the sense that during the games parents are too involved in the outcome and so you hear stories about about clashes on the sideline or parents getting in fights on the sideline with the refs which is being too involved way too but then over time parents are too involved as they try to force their kids into getting college scholarships or have expectations that they would go pro and it's too involved in the macro sense as well so here's my observation okay the state of youth sports today ready okay I have seen firsthand with children's sports that we are no longer signing kids up in sports to have fun.

We are looking at our children from a very, very young age, trying as quickly as possible to find what their gift is, sometimes not even that, sometimes just selecting whatever. it is you want them to do. In trying to create and force a D1 scholarship, a Super Bowl title, an NFL team, an Olympics, you're trying to commit your child to that by the age of five. We have learned firsthand signing up for youth sports. There is this huge reputation already within every league and every sport and every team and every school this is the good one this is the most elite one this is the most well organized these are the best coaches these coaches know the MLB scout these this soccer team is actually the feeder for the competitive team if you go to this gymnastics gym you have your best like chance of getting to the Olympics like all of this

And all of these parents are being brainwashed by a broken system of coaches who are selling to parents this idea that if you bring your child to me, I will guarantee their success. Now, that is where we are in society. Society is like, youth sports is like, if you get the right team, your kid is going to make millions of dollars. NIL, all this stuff. And they sell you on that because that's how they make money. Absolutely. It's a massive industry, youth sports. The town where I'm from or near where I'm from in Indiana just built this huge youth sports facility.

And it's like full every weekend of traveling teams, of five-year-old soccer, baseball, the whole thing. And it's like you think about the effect that has on families. Yep. I'm reminded of the gymnastics community, the phenomenon of Sean and her coach, Chow, had amazing success. And Chow had never been to the Olympics before. And Sean had never been in the Olympics. Fast forward after the Olympics, all these families are moving to Des Moines, Iowa.

Because they're like, if my kid just can be coached by Chow, they'll go to the Olympics. Yeah. Yeah. Which is like, great. Set your kid up for success. But also, that gymnast has, she has siblings that now got uprooted. from their whole, like, and that, yeah. And my brother, who is a professional cyclist,

is actually not putting his kids in sports because of the way that it negatively impacts families when this kid has to travel to Kentucky and this kid has to travel to Michigan, and now we're never together as a family. Which I have thoughts on too. I am going to, we have so many thoughts on this. So I apologize if this entire podcast is going to be disjointed, trying to, like, put it all together.

But I do think within society right now, it's broken because parents are getting swept up in this movement of, I know my kid can be successful. As long as I find that right coach and set them up for success, they're going to be set for life. Yeah, which is not true. Not true at all. Just to clarify, there are a lot of factors that go into it,

beyond the coach. I would say a coach is a major factor, but also something like genetics or does a kid want to still compete when they're older and it's time for the Olympics or it's time for college? Or are they hurt by that time? So don't put the cart before the horse, if you will. It's also interesting because I think when you look at professional sports now, people are breaking records all the time and people, it's more exciting and better than it's ever been, right?

And I think that can actually be attributed to how specialized kids are these days. You know what I'm saying? Now you have pitchers who have been pitching since age four, and so the pitching quality in baseball. That's not necessary. Let me just make sure people know that and hear that. Pitchers in the league

who started pitching at age four you don't have to start pitching at age four to be a pitcher in the league. I agree with you. Just listen to that and please know that. You don't have to start at three to guarantee you're going to be somewhere. I would say the result has been more injuries

from people specializing earlier. More burnout? More burnout. More dropout? Yes. Probably some fringe bubble players who made it maybe a little further than otherwise their genetics would have

taken them because they specialized. And then the rare, rare diamond in the rough is, hey, that four-year-old pitcher who actually was always, he was destined to be a professional pitcher. Since he specialized earlier, now we have this once in a generation talent who is an amazing pitcher. But that's the rare case. More often, it's the injuries. It's the burnout. It's the issues, you know. Yes. Our life can be pretty hectic between having three little ones, work, travel, speaking engagements, spending time with friends and family, you name it. On days where I feel like I can't keep up, I'm so grateful for Kachava. It is a whole body meal shake that keeps your body in mind nourished all day long. And they just launched a new strawberry flavor with a real freeze-dried

strawberry. It is so good, you guys. No, it's not good. It's great. And as you may or may not know, Sean and I are big into supplements and trying different protein powders. And we genuinely can't rave enough about Kachava. This is a staple in our household. And I, I think right now we have two bags of each flavor on our pantry. It is that good. I love their new strawberry flavor. It's creamy, not chalky, and it's packed with so many vitamins. It tastes like a sweet treat, but it also has over 85 superfoods, nutrients, plant-based ingredients,

25 grams of plant-based protein, antioxidants, and adaptogens. I honestly feel amazing after drinking any flavor of kachava. Yeah, and all the flavors are really good, honestly. I'm going to be kind of the chocolate one, and I'll mix it with peanut butter, maybe some almond milk and a frozen banana, and it tastes like a milkshake. but it leaves me feeling energized and focused. And I'm not just saying that it genuinely does. That's why I've drank it for years.

I agree. And I was a skeptic at first, but it's amazing. It is worth it, you guys. You've never tasted strawberry like this. Go to cachava.com and use code eastfam for 15% off your next order. That's Kachava, K-A-C-H-A-V-A-com, code EastFam for 15% off. And I truly believe like that is very broken. the entire system is very, very broken because of that.

Okay, that's like the state that I feel like we are all living in. We even felt it. Our daughter got recruited, scouted for ice skating. At age three or four? Was she three or four when we got approached? I think she got first approached at three. Yeah. But then like scouted at four, which is absolutely comical, absolutely comical.

and they say hey we want to put you in the accelerated program which costs more money we're going to do yeah yeah we're going to do off ice training where this four year old is doing ladder drills for footwork we're going to do extra practices they wanted four practices a week all this stuff and let me just tell you I know the sports world so well so does Andrew I know what I believe I know what works I know it doesn't work and I fell for it. as a parent not in my sport I was like wait

am I actually holding her back if we don't do this and you know what happened I fed into the friggin' statistic we tried it for a tiny little bit not the four sessions a week but like moved her into this class and she absolutely hated it yeah

absolutely hated it she went from loving ice skating talking about it all the time really asking to go every day to then not wanting to go at all. Now, coincidentally, could that have just been she decided not to like ice skating? Yeah. But I also have heard from her firsthand that she would like to still ice skate, but she'd like to go back to her first class. An ice rink filled with kids all learning, all celebrating, all excited to try something new rather than an intensely focused,

specialized, like driven path. I'll never forget. So we always go to, in any kids, that has a practice, we all go. One of our family values, which we just did an episode on, is togetherness. And so we want to actually use sports in our family as a way to be together more and, like, put ourselves in different contexts. I'll never forget us being there watching this off ice training through the window. And she's doing push-ups at age four and looking at us like, I wanted to ice skate. I didn't want to do push-ups.

I know. I don't want to do balanced drills. I want to go ice skating. Needless to say, that lasted about three weeks. And we're like, we're never doing this again. I'm so sorry. We get a very sincere conversation with her of like, baby, if you love ice skating and you like that first class, that's what we will do.

Like, this is not, like, this is a wrongdoing that we did to you, and I apologize for it. Oh. So hopefully it can be redeemed. We'll see. But whatever. But the stats also back up our experience. So the dropout rate is that by age 13, 70% of children, quit organized sports.

Okay. So if you think about, do you want to spend eight, nine years of your parenting life, the time in your life where you get to spend the most time with your kids, that they're listening to you, that they want to hold your hand and cuddle

and do all the sweet things, do you want to instead spend that trying to force them into a sport? They're probably going to quit at age 13. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. I do think the... Maybe that rate has gone up, but I will say, for the most part, it's very, very normal within young, teenage, adolescent puberty years for kids to have a massive change in life.

Yeah. So even in gymnastics back in the day, that was just a very widely known thing that like when kids start hitting puberty, things change. Hormones, minds, passions, bodies. they get insecure at practice or they, you know, just things change to where there is a huge dropout rate. I do think you can help with that on the forefront by instilling a love of sport and not a pressure to succeed to where that dropout rate can, like, decrease to where,

even if they want to change sports, they aren't, you know, burnt out and dropping out because they have a negative association. Yeah. also the stats on the age and specialization trends are that many kids stop playing a sport by age 11 and often after playing a sport for less than three years so so I would say the majority quit by age 11 and then 70% quit by age 13 and then the high school dropout stats is that only 39% of high school seniors play organized sports these days and that's down from 90% in

middle school. So there's a lot of factors that go into this, but what we're positing here is that some of that has to do with parents. And also, parents just need to realize your kid just might not want to do the sport thing. So don't force it on them. Also, this one's wild. Early sports specialization leads to physical injuries and mental burnout. 67% of kids aged 10 to 14 will quit due to an injury. Yeah, it's nuts. You know how wild that is? Do you want to explain to you why that's wild?

Because what happens between the ages of 10 to 14? Puberty. Puberty. Do you know what happens to kids' bodies during puberty? Everything changes. Tendons become looser. They're growing. They're changing.

Actual just like physics change for their body. So if they're normally running and their body's completely changed and different and has different angles to it, running is completely different for them. What you're seeing in sports, this is a huge thing that I learned within the gymnastics world and like PT and strength and conditioning. If you don't have people around your child in child athletics that know how to handle and prepare kids for puberty in the sense of, oh, I notice there. body's changing. You know what we're going to do? We're going to go back to the basics and now

strengthen their body to actually be able to support the sport that they're doing. They will break them. They will absolutely break them. If you don't have people protecting your child in the sense of we are going to make sure that we're protecting your child and not the team, if that makes sense you will break every child in sports. Yeah. I also just think

specialization trained your body in one way. So if I'm playing football and I'm only doing linear sprints and then I try to do side to side cut,

my knees are going to be more likely injured. Right? If you over train in one specific way, any other new movement you do put you at risk of injury. So doing multiple sports

train your body in a more holistic way. I want to give you another example just so it makes sense. I was talking to a very frustrated gymnast the other day and she was really frustrated about her backtuck, like a standing backflip. She was like a year ago, this felt so much easier.

And I'm like really struggling with it now. And she was very, very frustrated. And I rarely see this girl, okay? So I'm not her everyday coach. I don't coach her. I just happen to be with her for a second. But even just having seen her, you know, a couple of times, I was like, you know what? How much have you grown in the past year?

And she's literally grown like a foot. She just shot up in height. And I said, babe, you're learning a completely different skill with a completely different body. than you were doing a year ago. So there's nothing to be frustrated about, but you have to relearn it. Like your physics have completely changed. So you need to go back to the drawing board

and relearn skills based off of your height now. And that's ever changing for children. And if you don't have coaches that, like, realize that and know how to teach that, that can be really dangerous. Yeah. Speaking of learning, I also just feel like when you expose a kid to more than just one sport and you maybe expose them to a couple sports over the years and maybe music and some STEM stuff, their framework and rubric for learning things and being able to place this concept with that practice or interconnecting things, which is a really powerful way to learn, gets so enhanced.

but if you're only doing one thing, I actually think that hinders and hampers the broader learning. But I also, can I talk through just to set the perspective on the numbers behind the high school, college, and professional participation numbers? Because there are a certain group of parents who think my kid's going to get a college scholarship or my kid's going to go pro, right?

If you're thinking that at the age of five, shame on you I actually put this together I put this together as part of my master's program so the best data I could find was that in football an American football so just one sport

yeah the number of participants age 6 to 14 was 2.9 million in the U.S. Great. Fast forward to high school football after the age of 14 just over 1.1 million so less than half that's right so the number of players

from age 6 to 14 that play high school is 38% okay that's how many moved to high school now college football participation has about 90,000 players so from high school about 8% of kids will play college football and that's division one division two division three so all divisions so if you're thinking d1 those numbers are even smaller tiny okay from college College to pros, under 2% of people and players will advance. There are only 1,196 players on a professional football roster. There's 32 teams, 53 players per team.

That's just under 1,700 players. That's also different generations. Yeah, that's over in high school and college, you're talking. Very similar ages. And so let's just say the 90,000 in college, that's divided between, four classes, right? Freshman, sophomore, junior, senior. So let's just call it 20,000 per year, right?

Which again, I'm just thinking of that percentage shrinking. In pros, you have people who play for 15, 17 years, so the turnover is lower. So really, that percentage is even lower. Those numbers are exaggerated. Because the entry rate is not 1,696 positions. It might be 400 positions a year. Yeah. Which is wild.

But let me just summarize it too. If you have a six-year-old who's playing football, there are 2.9 million people, kids who are playing football, and you want your kid to be pro, it's less than half of a, half of a percentage point. It's 0.05%. So now I was going to exactly what you just said.

if you want your kid to play pro let's break that down the parental pressures okay i feel like what i have seen work out the absolute best i don't have statistics to and data to back this up but I coached for eight years. I have seen many Olympic teams be formed. I have met so many parents within the sporting world. I have gone to many, many Olympics to work and met swimmers, like Olympic swimmers parents and Olympic cycling parent. I've met so many parents within the highest elite level success of sports.

And the way I can summarize it, the best is if you are a parent to a child, the absolute best thing you can do for your child from day one is be a cheerleader. That's it. All of these parents that I've met at the Olympics, all of these parents that I've seen firsthand supporting their children if they play the role of parent and I love you I support you I will cheer for you and I will help you in whatever passion you find I will not coach you I will not push you I will not bully you I will not degrade you when you have a hard day if you choose to quit I won't say I didn't raise a quitter like if you are a parent you are a parent

who loves your child with or without that sport and that child truly believes that and knows that that sport is for them and not for you, that is your best chance of success. What do you mean by success? A happy, healthy, engaged child that finds confidence in an extracurricular activity of their choice. Is it the best path to having a pro athlete? If you want a pro athlete, I do believe... That is the best route.

But for the most part, all of these parents were ones who at the start line with their children were like, I just want them to be happy. I want them to have a good character, try hard, learn failure, have consequences. And holy crap, I can't believe we're here. I just love them so much. Every home has that one spot that allows you to finally exhale when you get home. Let me paint a picture of what that place looks like for me. Spoiler, it's our bed. Our bed really is the best.

And Sean does a great job of making it as cozy as possible. Right now we have on cozy earth's bamboo sheets, which are made from viscos from bamboo. So they naturally wick away the heat and moisture from your body, which helps you sleep several degrees colder, which Andrew really loves. That's right. I'm kind of a warm body in bed. having cool sheets really makes a world of difference. But we like to turn our air way down at night so we aren't sweating while we sleep. And it is glorious.

Andrew turns it down to like 67 degrees, which is honestly way too cold. But it's fine because I have my own cozy earth bubble cuddle blanket. And you guys, I wish you could feel this thing. It's thick, soft, and heavenly. I agree. It's nice. Anyway, Sean looks so cute, cuddle up all in that blanket. You look cute anyways, but the blanket is a nice touch.

and it is crazy soft. And Cozy Earth has a 100-night sleep trial so you can try them out. If you don't love them, return them hassle-free. But trust us, you won't want to. They also have a 10-year warranty because once you feel this level of comfort, you'll want it to last a decade.

Head to CozyEarth.com and use code EastFam for up to 40% off. That's CozyEarth.com, code EastFam. And if you get a post-purchase survey, make sure to let them know you heard about Cozy Earth right here from us. Because your bed should be more than a place to sleep. should be your happy place and cozy earth makes that possible all of these parents are like that now

are there outliers for sure of parents who have pushed their children so hard and like forced it on them yes every once in a while that works but i can tell you for the most part they're not going to have a good relationship but shan am i over summarizing you're you're trying to say that sport could impact other areas of life besides just my performance on a field. That's what sport is made to do. I think it is, it's hard for me even to separate the performance from the benefits of sport, right? Because they so easily overlap. But you have to keep in mind, at the professional level,

level, at all levels. There are more things and factors that come into play beyond just the quality of play. So there's the character issue. There's, hey, does this guy get arrested? There's, hey, is this guy a good

team participant and does he play into the team culture? Which, if you're just optimizing your kid for the performance, is that important? Yes. Wait. I completely agree with you.

Are you playing devil's advocate? I was that. My question earlier was cheeky. Oh, yeah, yeah. I was saying, we're on the same team. You know this. No, 100%. You have to raise a good human.

Yes. And trust that your little human is in good hands. As a parent, it's your job to find a good one. I don't think you should uprope your family to go find the best one across the country. Yes. There are good humans in your place. Find a good human to be a team with. to help raise your good human.

Does that make sense? I'm using human. I think what you're saying is by being a supportive parent, you unlock all of the things necessary to be successful in sports and beyond. Yes. But if you're just being a parent that applies pressure for performance,

you are only unlocking the performance piece of the successful athlete. Yes. And undermining the broader application of what sports can provide. Yes. And I do think I don't personally believe

in looking at your kid and saying I want you to be a professional athlete. I don't believe in that. But for those of you who are listening, who maybe really want that for your child, I just want to tell you, the best chance of that happening

is treating your child like a child and not like a professional athlete because that's too complex take your child at whatever age they are it's kind of like teaching them the ABCs like I said at the very beginning of this podcast you have to teach your child the foundations of life

and character and humanity and you have to teach them all of the those things before they could ever be a professional athlete. So if you're if you're skipping steps and going to specialization and private lessons and zoning it on only one sport or one activity at a young age, you're skipping so many foundational basic level things that they will have to have to be an elite athlete. Does that make sense? Yes. Yes. Yes. And all of these parents are being sold a quick fix program that guarantees your child will be a professional by skipping all of those steps and then it never went it like never works out yeah so we have

some data on the parental pressure factor parental expectations are a well-documented driver of kids dropping out of sports uh i-9 sports wrote a whole article on this you could find that we'll link it. If it's your dream and not your child's, it won't work. Yes. It should be your child's dream, not yours. And it should not be driven by you. It should be driven by your child. I think this is where we slightly disagree though. And I would say there is, I agree with you, yes. You're going to get into semantics of quitting. As far as, no, as far as finding passions, there is a little pushpole between the parents of like, hey, there's some difficult, uncomfortable things

that are required to like take the next step in any passion. You know what I'm saying? Of like, hey, Jet got tackled and that was uncomfortable for him. He'd never gotten tackled, right? So it's like, oh, no, no, it's okay. And that's not me forcing him to go back up. It's just like I'm pulling them through that discomfort for a second, you know? For sure. But we're also not saying football is your thing. Yes.

Even if you hate it, you have to go back. But what about the kids who don't have anything? That's where I would say it's a parent's job to try to expose them to as many things so they can find their passion. That could come off as parental over-involvement though, which is where, I'm not trying to be semantic,

but it is just like, it's a fine line. It's a fine line. I know, but it's this idea of, you can either stay home, and not expose your child to any activities of any kind. And I'm not even talking about sports. You could talk about piano and violin and the debate team and like whatever it is,

like all of these different things. But if you're sheltering your child from finding something that they love, a child doesn't know what exists out in the world. They're not born knowing about gymnastics or born knowing about piano. So you have to expose them. them to that, over-involvement would be exposing and choosing for them.

Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. I think you should expose them, let them try things out, and then use your parental discernment to say, oh, their eyes light up every time we go to that field, or every time we go to an art class, or for some reason, they start cowering inward and getting some. self-conscious every time we're talking about ballet class or like use your your spidey senses to be like this feels more like something they love and this feels like something yeah that's not fostering a brighter side of them this is going to be a surprise to nobody but just being a parent comes with

a lot of responsibility and it's like responsibility to not move towards the easiest thing whatever that looks like to you and so if the easiest thing to you as a parent is when you're kid asks, hey, do you want to go ride bikes? And the easiest thing is for you to say, no, that's, I would say that's not being responsible, right? It's, your kid is really eager and wanting to explore these different things. Or, you know, apply that to, hey, can I go try soccer practice? And you're like, well, we got to drive 20 minutes. No, I don't want to do that because you're tired. We've all been there. But it's a responsibility to help your kid unleash those passions. On the other side, if it's easier for you to be way over involved and overburden

your child, you have responsibility to not apply yourself in that way and to let your kid explore the passions without your tarnishing it. Anyway, ugly parent syndrome. Yes. Something called the ugly parent syndrome written by the Daily Telegraph says that teens report quitting due to abuse bullying and unrealistic demands from coaches and parents. And one study found that nearly 44% of kids witness or experienced bullying by a coach or teammate. So that's less parent specific because that does include coaches and teammates. But still, that whole suffocating with expectations is real. This is where I feel a duty as a parent.

And I know we all have bandwidth and we all, you know, everyone has their own bandwidth abilities of like how much can you invest. But similar to, we've talked about this on another podcast with like schools, I do think this is where it's a parent's job to not be overly involved with your child on the field in their sport. So like no sideline coaching. You're not better than the coach. You're not like make sure your role as a parent is as a parent. And I'm not saying you can't coach your kids team. But if you have actively chosen to be a parent and not an on-field coach, don't be a coach from the sidelines.

Don't be a ref. Don't be whatever. But I do think there is a duty as a parent with your children's sports to do your due diligence. Know the other parents, know the other kids, know your coaches very well. ask them a lot of questions it doesn't have to be around your child ask for meetings ask for progress reports get a gauge as to what kind of person is actually like um teaching your kid you need to know what their tone is and what their language is when they get frustrated ask your kid what happens at practice what happens if you you know don't do well what

does your coach say? Like, it's your job as a parent to kind of get that gauge because a coach is almost like another parent. They are teaching your children a lot of life lessons and you want to make sure it's the right ones. And so you do want to be involved in that way? Yes. And deputizing who's spending time with and mentoring your child.

Yes, but when you choose your person, you got to let that person do their job. Here's another stat on. on quitting. So high-income kids quit sports often because of a lack of fun, which is 41% quit because lack of fun. Sorry, sorry, let me read that again. High-income quids, high-income kids quitting sports often cite lack of fun as a reason, and that's 41% quit because of that.

Whereas lower-income families quit less because of that. interesting insight there and then there's also the psychological toll where the youth attribute quitting to a decreased self-esteem, stress and negative parenting behaviors so your kid senses it it's fascinating

there's a lot of conversations Andrew and I have had and studies we've read and all these things from personal experience as well don't be the parent when your kid quit or when your kid loses a game to get in the car

and for the rest of the day be like, well, you should have done this and you should have done that and why didn't you do this and why didn't you try harder and maybe next time you can win next time you'll get them and after you get home

you're at dinner and you're like, well, remember that play that happened where like the other kid he ran like this but you didn't run like sports don't add value to your child so don't let them believe it does your child's perfect the way they are and this is extra you can get in the car and be like

you know what buddy so proud of you i love you or you can if you need a life lesson because we threw a hissy fit and we quit the game or whatever it is be like we're going to try harder next time but then move on your child this is something i have seen firsthand with coaching if you want it more than your child it will never work ever your child your child will quit at some point and your child will probably feel worse at some point because of it your child also needs to know that that sport is for them and not for you if the only time your child gets praised is in their sport and not at home outside of their sport then they're going to feel like

they have to be in that sport to earn your love and earn your respect and earn if the only time you're clapping for them is when they're winning on the field or doing an extracurricular activity that puts in their mind this idea that their worth is in that and you have to make sure

that's not the case which is hard though because it's the easiest it's the easiest thing to praise It is. Like, it's right there in front of you. You scored a goal. You know, it's not like.

And you should praise it. Yeah. But it should not be the only time your child hears that. I agree. I have had parents come into a gymnastics gym before and say, my kid's in the car, crying, doesn't want to come to practice. Can you go get them for me? And I'm like, are you out of your mind? Yeah.

No, how about you get back in the car and you drive your child home? And I know a lot of times it's like child care and like there's complexities to it. However, you cannot want it more than your child. Yeah. At the, at a very basic level, speaking as a coach, that's when injuries happen. When your child doesn't want to be there and they're being forced to do physical activities, and if their mind's not in it, as a coach, that is the scariest time. because a child will get hurt.

I've been challenged recently about the idea of praise as a parent. It's so much easier to critique. Don't do this. Stop doing that. That's bad. Which you need to, right? But it's way harder for me, especially, to say when they do the thing I want them to, to say, great job, you know?

That just doesn't come as naturally off the tongue. It's less urgent, if you will. It takes a little more presence of mind. But I would say in sports, unless it's a value issue, probably don't critique your kid. You know, you don't need to be coaching them up. But do praise them as well as in other areas of life. But how do we reclaim you sports, babe?

How do we bring it back? Let's start having fun and start trying to breed. success. Okay. What do you mean? You know, on the weekends, when you have free time and you're like, should we go to the community pool to go play? It should be with that same ideology that you go to soccer practice.

I'm so excited to go watch you play today. Not play to win. Play. like teach your children that they should be kids who play and with that the greatest things your kids can ever learn in youth sports is failure like doing things completely wrong and losing by 150 points or falling in gymnastics 150 times a day or struggling to get a skill for six months there are so many things they can learn when you allow them to just be children who fail

and they get praised for that because they're trying that sets them up for long-term success Drew played her first softball game which was adorable and her first at bat she missed the first three pitches she was super close and I was just thinking

she was bummed about that and she kind of felt embarrassed or something is kind of the facial expression I got from her. But then I was thinking, they measure batting statistics in thousands. Yes. If you bat a thousand times and you hit 30% of those pitches, you're really good batter. So am I going to be embarrassed or upset at her missing the one? And then have that prevent her from trying any other batting?

You know, it's like, see the big picture and realize that if you teach them how to deal with this thing at this age, failure at this age, then they will bat thousands of times because they'll be comfortable with it. And they'll be able to like pick the bat up again and go take another swing as opposed to like being so bummed out that dang, dad really wanted me to hit that ball, you know? It's like, it's just a better long term strategy, I would say. So you're saying start with fun, teach them how to fail. Yes. On our list, we have multi-sport benefits. So, like, kids who play multiple sports have lower injury risk and higher long-term enjoyment. Try multiple things. Don't specialize. Kids love things that are new.

They love, you know, the excitement of it. Try a bunch of things. I love the next one. It says structured limits. Experts have recommended no more than one hour of organized sports per child's age in hours per week. So if they're 10 years old, no more than 10 hours of sports a week. I love that. Which feels like a lot, to be honest.

It does feel like a lot. But I will say I have heard firsthand a lot of people trying to do more and private lessons and, you know, loading it up. Don't. It's unnecessary. And it doesn't make them better. Yeah. Something that I have done personally that I've seen. And I don't think I did this actively.

It's just kind of something that I was reflecting on. I get asked a lot, especially within my field of gymnastics and knowing the gymnastics world is very small. I can tell you the best coaches, the best gyms across the country. I know all of them. I know every single person. And I have a lot of parents, understandably, within today's society and culture, their first question they ask me is, what's the best gym to send my kid to? like if I want them to be in gymnastics and I just always explain how I chose the gym that our children go to

it's not the person with the highest success it's not the person who's taken you know the most girls to the Olympics or has the most D1 collegiate you know rankings and I say this to every person I send my kids to this certain gym because they are very good humans and I know they're going to take care of our child

in the sense of they're going to teach them how to stand in line and how to have discipline and how to have respect and say yes ma'am and yes sir and they're watching out for the well-being of your child and they're not just trying to teach skills. Yeah. Coming from a sport like gymnastics

where people really try to accelerate rate success, I can tell you firsthand, you don't need the best coaches early on. You just need to teach foundations. That comes way later. Yeah. I agree. It is a shift in the culture where I feel like you just have to understand that there is a time in place where performance and outcomes and winning or stats matter. And I would say if your kid's not in high school, more specifically a junior and senior in high school, the outcome does not matter at all.

So just shift that mindset. But I guess we could close. Yeah. We could talk about this part. With just reminding you that U-Sports is a massive industry, $15 billion industry. Jeez. To remind you that less than 1% of high school athletes go pro.

And that's high school athletes. So less, way less. Way less. if you're talking about a six to 14 year old kid who's not in high school yet. 70% of kids drop out of sports. And I want to remind you that sports can be a wonderful, formative thing in life. They're the best. Sean and I both had amazing experiences with sport.

And that's why we feel so passionate about this because we want to reorient people away from this brainwashing of like just going. through the system of youth sports that are trying to make your kid an elite athlete at age five. It's just not a thing. It's not possible. Listen to us when we say, if you have someone preaching to you that your five-year-old is going to go to the Olympics, no, they're not. That's not to say they might not, like they might actually go, but there is no way to tell that at five, ever. Or six, or seven, or eight. It's probably a red flag. of that person as their quality of coaching.

And if any coach tries to tell you, if we just do a few extra practices, they're going to be so much. No, no, that's not how it works. Yeah. So we love sports. We love sports. And we want to bring them back.

We want to reclaim them. But anyway, curious to get your thoughts. Are we speaking as parents of young kids and we don't know the game yet? Are we too naive? I would say that my perspective has changed from before kids, I was like, oh, I don't care if they play sports to now when we had young kids, I was like, you know, you see your kids start running around and they kind of like, you're like, oh, I would like to, I would like to see them do sports, but I don't care which ones they do. And now I, my, my newest feeling is like, I feel that desire from my end to want to watch them succeed. You know what I'm saying? Like, I totally understand why parents are overbearing. But I just feel so passionately that that is not a good strategy on any account as far as their character formation.

So that's all I got. Let sports build their confidence in community. And I'll tear them down. That's right. That's right. What questions do you have? Let us know. Thanks for listening.

If you made it this far, please subscribe to the show and give it a rating. See you next week. I'm Andrew. I'm Sean. Till next time.