What Our Young Athletes Learn From Pro Sports

[electronjohn]

Youngsters who are into sports should watch the Twins' Torii Hunter closely. Granted, he's quite gifted to be able to play what's essentially a kids pastime at the age of 40...but it's his attitude that makes the difference. Doesn't matter if it's a strikeout or a double off the wall...Torii's always smiling. He knows. It's just a game...and it's supposed to be FUN!

 

[Sam Cogley]

I've seen organized sports programs be very helpful in the development of young people.
A LOT depends on the coaching staff. ( both amateur and pro )

Even with adult amateur sports, a whole lot of the tone is set by the coaching staff.

Yeah,if anything the pros are taught to avoid them.BUT,it does happen.
I'm thinking baseball mostly,and mostly verbal. .

True, but baseball, as a long-standing tradition, allows a bit more leeway for arguing with officials - though pretty much any argument is going to get a player ejected, it's just acknowledged as something that will happen. Contact to an umpire by a player is not going to end well. Managers get a bit more leeway to argue calls, but it doesn't take a whole lot to get ejected, and contact is still considered a bad idea. LaSorda was an outlier there. The fact that any of it is as tolerated as it is depends on players and managers respecting a line in their interactions with the umpires - if someone intentionally or negligently pushed or attempted to strike an ump, the reaction from the Commissioner's office would be swift and unpleasant for those involved.

 

[c.coyle]

Youngsters who are into sports should watch the Twins' Torii Hunter closely. Granted, he's quite gifted to be able to play what's essentially a kids pastime at the age of 40...but it's his attitude that makes the difference. Doesn't matter if it's a strikeout or a double off the wall...Torii's always smiling. He knows. It's just a game...and it's supposed to be FUN!

This is not directed at you, but why do people always assume that kids watch jerk pro athletes, but don't watch good guys like Hunter or Andrew McCutchen?

 

[gadget73]

A cancer upon the world? Really? You must work at the Department of Hyperbole.



Besides too much emphasis on winning, what other "negative aspects" and "collateral damage" are you referring to? I admit that two real concerns currently are concussions and overbearing parents.

Sounds better than "I think its dumb", but the issues I mostly have in mind are the promotion of the attitude that you can get away with anything as long as you can catch a ball. Look at the theatrics of some of these so-called "role models" that young atheletes aspire to imitate. I don't want my kid growing up to be a rapist (Rothlissburger), a wife beater (Ray Rice), an animal abuser (Vick), a cheat (Brady), or a murderer (Hernandez) because their hero did it and mostly (not Hernandez) got away with minimal repercussions. You can see the same sorts of BS at the high school and college level too, particularly with regards to the rape and abuse aspects. Yeah yeah, not all *ball players, but its prevalent enough to be a real concern. There have been stories about various big name schools faking grades or inventing dummy classes for students just so they could keep playing football. These same kids were probably pushed through high school with the same end-goal. There is no excuse for someone graduating high school in this country with a minimal reading level, but an extreme aptitude for running and throwing.

http://www.businessinsider.com/uncs-fake-class-scandal-was-much-bigger-than-anyone-realzied-2014-10
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steubenville_High_School_rape_case

Mind you this is just a couple quick hits, and its of what we learn about. Not to put on the tinfoil hat, but how much stuff has been ignored, hidden, or simply not reported ?

I don't have a problem with sports per-se, but I have a real problem with the notion that they are the ultimate goal in life often to the detriment of everything else. I know its not entirely the kid's fault, but they are often either allowed or encouraged to do this kind of crap, and that needs to stop. it is just a game, not a battle for the survival of you and yours with no quarter to be given.

 

[onwardjames]

Organized sports are a cancer upon the world. So much emphasis on winning some pointless goal without any attention paid to the negative aspects. Its supposed to be a game, not a life and death winner-take-all war with no regard to collateral damage.

This THIS THIS.


I've never understood the importance of placing a 12'' ball in an 18'' hoop, or "violent ground acquisition games such as football" (from "Back to School").

If perhaps we gave attention to, say, the work of Ray Kurzweil, Lawrence Krauss, or any of the world's great thinkers, seeking to solve the world's problems, perhaps we'd get somewhere.

Modern Gladiatorial combat, minus the lions. History repeating itself.

 

[Tom Brennan]

The social purpose of big time sports is to give the average guy something trivial to be an expert on, lest he turn his attention to important things.

 

[onwardjames]

The social purpose of big time sports is to give the average guy something trivial to be an expert on, lest he turn his attention to important things.

Tom, I do believe I am you on a 25 year delay. :scratch2:

Wonderfully put. :thmbsp:

And for those of you who enjoy sports, hey, I do as well, but let us not pretend that it really matters compared to countless other things.

Everything in its right place, and sorry, NOBODY is worth a billion dollars to play a game. They may command that in our nutty society, but worth it? No.

 

[chodad]

I believe there is a time and a place for sports but nowadays it has gotten completely out of hand from high school to the pros.

 

[Beatnik]

Friday night lights in Texas, where you drop all the arts and build an indoor air conditioned practice football field or a 60 million dollar high school football stadium.

 

[Sam Cogley]

Tom, I do believe I am you on a 25 year delay. :scratch2:

Wonderfully put. :thmbsp:

And for those of you who enjoy sports, hey, I do as well, but let us not pretend that it really matters compared to countless other things.

Everything in its right place, and sorry, NOBODY is worth a billion dollars to play a game. They may command that in our nutty society, but worth it? No.

If the market is willing to pay a certain amount for tickets, TV viewing rights, merchandise (especially merchandise directly related to a certain player), then the players involved certainly deserve a fair share of that revenue, rather than most of it going to an already extremely rich owner. Are they "worth" it in a greater societal sense? No, but if the revenue is coming in, they certainly should share in it. No players, no team.

 

[onwardjames]

If the market is willing to pay a certain amount for tickets, TV viewing rights, merchandise (especially merchandise directly related to a certain player), then the players involved certainly deserve a fair share of that revenue, rather than most of it going to an already extremely rich owner. Are they "worth" it in a greater societal sense? No, but if the revenue is coming in, they certainly should share in it. No players, no team.

Only point I wished to make, otherwise, agreed. :yes:

 

[cubiclecrush]

For those with the desire to complain, there is no shortage of topics.

What's the problem here? Kids with invincibility complexes going too far and using violence to enact some form of misaligned justice? Is someone thinking this is a new phenomenon? Is someone thinking this is limited to sports?

Using violence to solve problems is something we teach our children at all levels of society; from Governmental Foreign Policy, to domestic Police policy, to TV and musical entertainment.

We glorify violence, and many of us like it - despite what we say when we get behind the pulpit.

Violence in sports is the least of our problems in this area.

 

[Tom Brennan]

For those with the desire to complain, there is no shortage of topics.

Yeah, there are many problems, we just so happen to be talking about this one. Indulge us.

 

[djwhy60]

Wow...a Cancer on society? Really? I played organized sports from the age of 5 through High School. Went from football to wrestling to baseball..year round. Lets see what trauma it wreaked on me.....I learned teamwork and the whole is more important than the one. I learned how to count on someone to do their job and made sure I did mine to support the effort. I learned how to win with grace and fail with dignity. I learned how to stay in shape and keep myself healthy. I learned it is not always the biggest and strongest that wins...you need brains to wrestle (not WWE!) I felt the pain of losing and the thrill of winning,on some pretty big stages, and accepted both. The lessons I have learned served me well...while in the military and now in the civilian sector. One of my proudest moments was being named the coach of a local HS wrestling team...a job I took without pay..because it was my turn to make a difference in some persons life like my coaches did in mine. I would venture to say that my life would be entirely different without sports....most likely not in a good way.

 

[Pio1980]

When have you ever seen a pro athlete attack an official? I'm sorry, but your thread title is astonishingly misguided.

As an amateur sports referee myself, I take things like this very seriously.

This should have never happened, but the players claimed they were provoked by the stand-in ref's overt racism. I'd write that off except I'm familiar with Friday Night Lights and the author's statements on rampant Texas racism in school sports. They may not get a pass on this and rightly so, but it should be checked out.

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[Sam Cogley]

This should have never happened, but the players claimed they were provoked by the stand-in ref's overt racism. I'd write that off except I'm familiar with Friday Night Lights and the author's statements on rampant Texas racism in school sports. They may not get a pass on this and rightly so, but it should be checked out.

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I've read some reports to that effect today, and if it's true, the ref should be dealt with appropriately. If he was behaving like that in a game, the proper thing to do would have been to inform the coaching staff, so that the head coach could express those concerns to the head official. If no action was taken, then it should have gone up the chain of command to the Texas high school athletic organizing body. As justifiably angry as those players might have been, their actions were not in any way acceptable.

 

[onwardjames]

For clarification, I wish to say that I believe in the wonderful lessons that team sports can teach us.

Didn't mean to smear into the amateur stuff. That certainly benefited me, and many others, I'm sure.

It's the adulation that some of these guys (and gals) get from playing games for ridiculous sums.

THAT is what I don't get. Sorry for rankling anyone.

 

[bshorey]

The social purpose of big time sports is to give the average guy something trivial to be an expert on, lest he turn his attention to important things.

Funniest thing I've read all day. I love it when truth and humor collide.

bs

 

[Tom Brennan]

Funniest thing...

I can't tell you how many guys I've seen expounding with vehement certainty about what the Bears or the White Sox need to do, meanwhile having no clue about what they need to do. Guys that can name an entire team roster but don't know who their alderman or state rep is.

 

[Pio1980]

I can't tell you how many guys I've seen expounding with vehement certainty about what the Bears or the White Sox need to do, meanwhile having no clue about what they need to do. Guys that can name an entire team roster but don't know who their alderman or state rep is.

Bread and circuses.

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