And the data is clear as day about it.
“I’m all about competition & high level sport.
However, what I am even more about is seeing high volumes of kids playing sports.
But the data shows the number of kids playing is rapidly declining.
Did masses of kids lose interest or could it be that our system is broken?”
-Ray Zingler on X
As a sports performance coach, obviously I love high level athletics. Seeing incredible athletes do incredible things in training and watching that translate to the field is one of the coolest things in the world for a guy in my shoes.
But I’ll just be flat honest with you, I didn’t get into Strength & Conditioning because I wanted the genetic anomalies to hire me while I watched whatever I have them do “work for them”.
I got into S&C because as a very average athlete myself, it gave me a chance when I was playing sports to play at the highest level I could, which consequently allowed me to leverage sport to learn a variety of critical lessons in my life.
Not only do we see the “elite” club/travel ball matrix funneling kids down into single sports earlier and earlier in life (probably the biggest danger to athletic development) we see what I believe to be a bigger issue: large volumes of YOUNG kids not playing sports at all.
I believe there are a variety of reasons for this, but I believe the main reasons have a lot to do with the toxic, cutthroat environment of the travel ball scene and the demonization of Recreational leagues.
Again, I don’t hate travel ball, I love high level athletics, I love seeing kids try to go as far as they can in whatever it is they choose to do.
But here is the deal, some kids mentally and physically mature slower than others and by pushing this early specialization and early onset “high stakes” competition on kids, we wash out a population of kids who may not have interest in it (yet) or aren’t physically ready for it (yet).
But what if had a true developmental approach. What if we got rid of the cutthroat bullshit in 12u or at least didn’t demonize the true developmental approach?
What if we made it about teaching them the game, learning to love it, and all the positives that go with it?
What if we could get them to 15 years old instead of seeing them walk away at 12?
We’d earn the right to impact more kids and use sports to their benefit. And maybe, just maybe that “late bloomer” would have found his lane.
