Looking inward can prevent becoming the ‘crazy sports parents’
Ben Shelton on his relationship with Trinity Rodman American tennis star Ben Shelton talks about the launch of his new relationship with USA soccer’s Trinity Rodman. Sports Seriously The “crazy sports parents,” Skye Eddy says, have ruined the experience for everyone. You know them. They live vicariously through their child. They have unrealistic expectations for […]
Ben Shelton on his relationship with Trinity Rodman
American tennis star Ben Shelton talks about the launch of his new relationship with USA soccer’s Trinity Rodman.
Sports Seriously
The “crazy sports parents,” Skye Eddy says, have ruined the experience for everyone.
You know them. They live vicariously through their child. They have unrealistic expectations for him or her as an athlete. Or they are simply so unreasonable that there’s little we can do to help them understand us better.
“As a coach, I’ve had an irrational parent on my team, and it has made my season miserable,” says Eddy, a former USWNT hopeful turned sports parent advocate. “They’ve been taking way too much of my time and energy from the children by asking too many questions. And so as coaches, when we’ve been in those experiences, we say, ‘OK, well, we’re just gonna avoid all parents, because that was a really difficult season.’ ”
Even Eddy, a one-time defensive MVP of the NCAA women’s soccer Final Four for George Mason who later coached on the staff at the University of Richmond, found herself labeled as one of them.
She saw a veil come over the organization’s executive director when she wanted to chat. To him, she was “a crazy parent, complaining about my daughter … I’m like, ‘Oh no, no, no, I’m just here to help,'” she says.
Then the door shut. It was the ignition that launched her passion project, soccerparenting.com, which today has about 43,000 members nationwide. It offers advice, training and encouragement for coaches and parents and youth sports leaders with a goal of helping us understand each other a little better.
From Eddy’s experience and research, the vast majority of parents are not “crazy,” but level-headed folks who just stressed.
“Parenting is stressful these days, like society’s stressful,” says Eddy, 53, a mother of two kids put through the athletic wringer. “You add on a sports experience, and there is a lot.”
Eddy spoke with us about how our soccer parenting, and sports parenting, can improve when we take a more introspective look at ourselves. From the discussion, USA TODAY Sports came with ways we can soothe our stress around our kids’ games and improve the environment in which they are playing.
Your child’s sports journey is unique from your own. Maybe you need to care less about it.
Eddy, a former goalie, reached as high as U.S. women’s soccer player could go in the 1990s, barring making the national team. She played professionally in Italy. She pushes back at the notion that she was living out her own athletic experiences when her daughter, Cali, also became an elite soccer player in high school.
“I loved my athletic career,” Eddy says. “I just didn’t know what to say to her to help her, because our mindsets are so different.
“She was like, ‘I want to play D-I, I want to play D-1,’ and she was getting D-1 interest, but she wasn’t pursuing it. She would not pick up a phone and call the coach. She was struggling with her self-esteem, her confidence around herself as an athlete, and so she really needed coaches calling her. She needed to be built up like that.”
Eddy was seeing things from her own point of view, and what she would have done. In more recent years, she came across a term (“Decoupling”) that would have helped her.
It is associated with a romantic relationship, where two people pull back from their emotional connection but remain friends. It can also apply to teenagers growing into their own identities as athletes.
“It’s sort of like not feeling things so deeply, letting our children dictate the path and us really being OK with it,” she says. “That is the learning, the making the mistakes: Not calling the coach, not eating the right food, or going to the sleepover the night before and playing really badly.
“And I think that because as parents, it’s so easy to feel like the stakes are so high, we try to interject too much.”
But how do we redirect ourselves? The process can start with our actions on the sidelines, and often when our kids are very young.
Your sideline behavior may be relieving your stress but stunting your child’s progress
You may not admit you’re stressed at your kids’ games. But perhaps unintentionally, you are projecting it onto them.
You cheer loudly. You jump up and down on the bleachers. You call to them. You interfere.
“That’s stress,” Eddy says.
Soccer Parenting’s Sideline Project, which helps condition parents on game day, identifies three types of sideline behaviors:
We’re “supportive” when we sit in attentive silence, cheer after positive outcomes for our child and his or her teammates, and perhaps even a good play from the other team.
We’re “hostile” when we yell at referees, yell at our child, or even other players. (Keep reading.)
We may not realize when we’re being “distracting.” This means we’re offering specific instructions to a child. Go to the ball! Get rid of it! Run!
“Distracting behavior serves one primary purpose: To alleviate our stress as parents and coaches,” Eddy says in her Sideline Project online course. “Players should be hearing their teammates and reasonable information from their coach, not their parents.”
In the video, she demonstrates the Stroop Effect, named after an American psychologist who measured selective attention, processing speed and how interference affects performance.
She has an interactive exercise using colors to illustrate how your children feel when they are concentrating in a game and adults interrupt them. I hitched when I did it.
“There’s a lag,” Eddy says. “This moment of interruption. That is how your child feels when they are playing, concentrating on the technical skill and what their decision is going to be, and they hear your voice telling them to shoot or pass.”
Instead, a good youth coach won’t distract, but give a subtle cue – a nod, a whistle, a finger point or a closed fist – to trigger something they worked on in practice.
“Whatever it is that we’re screaming, we’re taking away their learning opportunity,” Eddy says.
‘Do you realize I’m 13?’ If we focus on being less distracting, the truly hostile parents stand out
Cali was a tough defender. So tough, apparently, that she once came home from road club soccer tournament and reported: “Another parent from the other team was sitting on the sideline, flicking me off. She just sat there, giving me the finger, staring right at me.
“I said, ‘You do realize I’m 13 and you’re a grown adult, right?'” she told her mom.
Eddy estimates that 2% of the youth sports ecosystem, perhaps one parent per team, are these hostile ones. Many of us are merely distracting, a quality we can correct.
U.S. soccer recently updated a referee abuse prevention policy for youth and amateur soccer. Suspensions from two games to lifetime bans are now issued if you belittle, berate, insult, harass, touch or physically assault sports officials.Report the abusers and get them thrown out. They are not part of our experience.
I like to sit with the opposing team’s fans when my sons are pitching in their baseball games. While I get a different video angle, I meet new people and feel and hear their emotions. Sometimes I just listen to them. It helps remind me why we are all in this.
“We care so much about sport because of the connection,” Eddy says.
We can communicate easier with coaches if both sides respect boundaries
Cali quit soccer for short time when she was eight. She was bored.
Players were standing in lines. They did the same warmup at every practice. They weren’t even given adequate instruction, Eddy thought. It was labeled as an advanced development program.
When she asked other parents what they thought of the environment, they were fine with it.
“It struck me that until parents understand what a good learning environment looks like, to lead to player inspiration and joy and really giving kids a connection to sport, then we’re really going to be missing a big part of the solution when it comes to improving youth sports,” she says.
“The last thing we want to do is be perceived as one of these irrational parents, so we’re not curious, we don’t ask questions, we don’t listen to our instincts, we don’t follow up when we when we probably should, because we don’t want to be perceived to care too much when there’s a big difference between being irrational and caring.”
When she tried to speak up and was rebuffed, she became a youth coach. And soccerparenting.com was born.
One of its foundational principles is to encourage coach and parent interaction, with clear and appropriate boundaries.
Some suggested parameters a coach can use:
The door is open to chat … When your kid comes home from practice in a bad mood or doesn’t want to go the next day; if he or she is having trouble playing a particular position; if you don’t fully understand the scoring system or rules of the sport.
The door is closed to chat … If you have a complaint about another player that doesn’t involve a safety issue; if you’re wondering why the coach made a tactical decision; if you don’t respect a coach’s time and want to have a long conversation after practice. (You can schedule one instead.)
“We see the correlation between parents having more understanding and the children’s experience getting better, and then therefore clubs and coaches having to get better,” Eddy says.
Coach Steve: Three steps to dealing with a ‘bad’ coach
Be proactive, and intentional, about the way you handle stress
Even when we feel we have things under control during games, sometimes we don’t. Eddy laughs about once walking across the field with a plan in her head of what she would say to Cali. It didn’t involve the game. Instead, in the heat of the moment, she said: “You really need to work on your left foot.”
“Where did that come from?” she says. “I had zero intention of saying that. It just poured right out of me.”
When I posed a question on social media about how we can be better soccer parents, Palmer Neill, of Dallas, told me: “Basically, when you feel like doing something at a game or practice other than cheer or clap … just don’t do it. Let the coach be the coach and let the ref, ref. You don’t have (a) role. Life gets a lot easier when you realize this.”
But we can also recognize that sometimes we slip, too, and take precautions. When Neill barks to his 10-year-old son to get onsides, or about an opponent’s hand ball, he sits back in his chair and doesn’t get up. He tries to stay seated during the game.
“It seems to give me one extra second to think before I sit up (or stand-up) and yell,” he says.
Our own education and reflection, Eddy says, can relieve stress.
Know the rules (and recent modifications to them). Know your kid’s goals in sports. Be curious, not upset, when other kids have more skills than yours.
Perhaps it’s the Relative Age Effect, where young athletes born earliest among their age grouping are faster and stronger. Or that those kids move better because they play other sports or have more free play outside with friends and have better functional movement skills.
We can put our own sports paths into better context, too.
Coach Steve: MLS NEXT youth soccer rankings emphasize development over wins
Remember they are still kids, even when they’re creeping toward adulthood. There is satisfaction in watching who they are becoming.
What did you do when you were eight? Twelve? Sixteen?
When Eddy thinks about it, she liked to socialize at the local skating rink.
She only trained twice a week with her soccer team. On off days, she rode to a local park and kicked the ball into a piece of plywood against a fence. She would dive at the rebounds.
She used to wonder if Cali, who came back to soccer on her own terms, was getting enough reps on her own.
“What would I have been doing if I was in intense practices for an hour and a half four days a week, plus traveling to a lot in the games?” Eddy says. “Would I still have been doing that? Likely not.”
In today’s world, it feels like kids sports matter a lot more. Maybe they do when we have more opportunities to play in front of college coaches. Maybe they don’t when we play rec soccer, like Eddy’s son, Davis, did, and parents screamed when he missed a shot.
Davis, now a junior in college, had a better experience playing at a small high school.
“Having that outlet for sport was really important to his development, just as a person, and getting some space and, kind of way to blow off some steam as a student,” she says.
Cali decided to work at a sleepaway camp in Maine during the summer before her junior year, a crucial one for college recruiting. She became a Division III All-American and now works for the Columbus Crew.
“I remember thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, it’s so hard for you,’ but not saying that out loud,” Eddy says. “That was a really important capstone to a really important thing in our life. Yet, she really missed a lot of opportunities, and there were consequences of that. We just need to make sure that it’s our child’s voice that we’re hearing.”
We are when we let them lead the way, to choose friends over sports when they wish, and to have those sleepovers. Well, maybe not the sleepovers.
Steve Borelli, aka Coach Steve, has been an editor and writer with USA TODAY since 1999. He spent 10 years coaching his two sons’ baseball and basketball teams. He and his wife, Colleen, are now sports parents for two high schoolers. His column is posted weekly. For his past columns, click here.
Got a question for Coach Steve you want answered in a column? Email him at sborelli@usatoday.com
’Tis golf season. Since my Spring semester ended in May, I’ve been hitting the range almost every other day and playing a couple of rounds each week. And it’s not just me. Where I live, the morning driving ranges are full of middle-aged and retired players, while evenings bring out a swarm of high school […]
’Tis golf season. Since my Spring semester ended in May, I’ve been hitting the range almost every other day and playing a couple of rounds each week.
And it’s not just me. Where I live, the morning driving ranges are full of middle-aged and retired players, while evenings bring out a swarm of high school kids and 20-somethings. Tee times on weekends? You either book early or hope your country club member-friend picks up the phone. I even saw a friend write up Python code to immediately make reservations in public courses when they’re open.
So, what is it about golf that makes it so enduringly fun for its fans—for both watching and actually playing? Unlike many popular sports, golf isn’t primarily a spectator pastime. It’s a sport that people of all ages and genders actively engage in.
I think my theory of liberating engagement—which I’ve used to describe why some activities are more fun than others—can help explain why golf has such a unique grip on so many of us.
Golf Is Hedonically Engaging
Golf hits the sweet spot between skill and challenge, the classic ingredients for what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called “flow.” Whether you’re a total beginner trying to break 100 or a seasoned player chasing par, there’s always a new milestone to strive toward. It’s never boring. Time certainly flies (four hours, already?) when you’re out on the field, too.
Each course is different—sometimes dramatically so—with new obstacles, changing wind conditions, and ever-varying terrain. Even within a single round, each hole is its own little story. That relative novelty—what researchers like Berlyne (1960) have tied to arousal and interest—is essential for hedonic engagement. Golf keeps you interested because it never lets you fully master it.
Golf Feels Liberating—Especially for Adults
A round of golf gives you 4+ hours where the outside world fades away. No Slack notifications, no emails, no dishes or deadlines. Just you, the ball, and the greenery. This is where my theory of liberating engagement really comes in: Fun isn’t just about enjoyment—it’s about a temporary liberation from cognitive and emotional burdens.
This may be why golf resonates so strongly with certain people in their 30s through 50s, the peak years for juggling careers, parenting, and aging parents. A friend of mine—a scratch golfer and a successful entrepreneur—dreaded going out for a round last week, having been invited to play for a business event. He told me the only time he doesn’t enjoy golf is when he’s overwhelmed with business stress. “I can’t relax into it,” he said. That’s telling. To enjoy golf is to let go of everything else in that moment.
Golf Is Social in a Special Way
Golf has built-in social rituals that make it surprisingly connecting. Most courses require foursomes, meaning even if you show up solo or with one friend, you’re likely to be paired with strangers. But that’s part of the charm. You introduce yourself, shake hands, and spend hours together, all focused on the same shared task.
What’s interesting here is that the social bonding happens around a focal activity—playing the game—which fosters a sense of connectedness without forcing it. Golf provides that social structure, a key ingredient that can enhance the fun of the same activity.
There’s also a low-key, non-competitive camaraderie that helps: Everyone is just trying to hit the ball, find their ball, and get it in the hole—eventually.
The Hook is Gentle, but Lasting
There’s a learning curve to golf, yes—but once you’re good enough to keep up and hit some clean shots, it’s easy to get hooked (yes, some pun intended). Especially if you go out with someone more experienced who’s patient enough to teach you the rhythm and etiquette of the game.
And then… you’re in. The fun sneaks up on you and stays. As Chi-Chi Rodriguez aptly said, “Golf is the most fun you can have without taking your clothes off.”
I’ll wrap this up now—I’ve got a 9 a.m. tee time tomorrow
Today Youth golf U.P. Junior Tour, at Wawonowin Country Club, Champion, 9 a.m. American Legion baseball Westwood at Post 44 Reds (doubleheader), at Haley Memorial Field Complex, Field #1, Marquette, 5 p.m. Tuesday High school softball MHSAA Division 3 quarterfinals, at Cheboygan: Boyne City regional champion vs. Houghton Lake regional champion, 4:30 p.m. MHSAA Division […]
Last Wednesday evening Lamppost Head, playing for the first time on their designated home field, Oak Glen’s new synthetic turf Field of Dreams, broke a slump by crushing the ball to the fence and racing around the bases for an inside-the-park home run. Two days later he did It again on the same field but […]
Last Wednesday evening Lamppost Head, playing for the first time on their designated home field, Oak Glen’s new synthetic turf Field of Dreams, broke a slump by crushing the ball to the fence and racing around the bases for an inside-the-park home run.
Two days later he did It again on the same field but against a different team, scoring even through he slipped and fell on the “slide-friendly” turf rounding second. These teams play in rain – they have to, if they want to get a season in – but this was a steady downpour and the game was called, erasing Lamppost Head’s home run.
A couple of days before, his brother, The 747, pitched four and a third innings and struck out 13, walking only four. On Friday, playing catcher on a rural baseball Field of Mud, where the rain was not so heavy as to prevent play, he went hitless at the plate and overthrew a pickoff attempt at third, allowing a tying run to score. He had an awful game, as did almost the whole team.
So it goes in spring youth baseball.
We grandparents bring our own chairs and sit with daughter Shark behind the chain-link fences, squinting into the sun or bundling against a chill wind or dripping on each other with our umbrellas. We cheer the good plays and moan at the bad ones, calling out “You’ve got this” to a pitcher searching for the strike zone and “Get the next one” when he doesn’t find it. We use their names when we yell encouragement to the players because they can hear us, at least when they want to.
Our daughter Shark’s boys play every organized youth sport available, including basketball, track, and soccer, which is probably their favorite. They tried football one year over Grandma Honey’s objections. She made them watch the movie “Concussion” before she would reluctantly agree to attend their games.
They both love baseball, at least when they’re not in a hitting slump. When Lamppost Head got out of his, he marveled that it was like a switch suddenly turned on. Coach moved him up in the lineup. The 747, a usually dependable hitter batting leadoff, is doing everything right at the plate but not finding that switch. We know he will.
Lamppost Head is 13, playing in the Pony Division of the Ohio Valley Youth Baseball League. The 747, 12, plays 12 and under, the Bronco Division. There are nine Pony teams and 23 Bronco teams in the league this year, all from towns in the valley or just up out of it, from East Liverpool down to Brilliant.
In that Field of Mud game, the balls in play were all uniformly brown after a few minutes. Except for the muffed throw to third, The 747 played his position well, even cutting down a runner stealing second.
The opposing team was short a couple of players and apparently called up a boy from a Mustang team, but still had only two in the outfield. (Players can play up an age group, but not down.) The call-up boy, who was very undersized, played left field, right in front of where we were sitting. He had a different uniform, and his name, “Pettit,” was stitched on the back, prompting unkind remarks from me because it’s from the French for “small.” My doubts abouthis abilities were dead wrong. This kid could throw and hit, and he caught the only fly ball our team managed to send to the outfield.
After the game, I heard our coach chew out our players when I walked on the field to get a picture of them in their muddy uniforms. He told them they played line a 1-and-9 team instead of a 10-and-0 team.
“It’s a win and we’ll take it, but you’d better get your heads on straight for these next games,” he said.
Yep, they won, 4-3, and are undefeated with three games left before playoffs. Lamppost Head’s team is also undefeated. Both teams have won with blowouts and squeakers, winning, I think, not because they are loaded up with the top players, but because they are good teams: solid defense, good pitching, smart and aggressive base-running and not bad at the plate. They have good coaches who care about the kids and can be tough, but don’t abuse their players like some coaches we hear.
The hero of Friday’s Field of Mud game was Brody, who earned three RBIs and pitched the last couple innings with a broken arm. A mostly healed broken arm, they said. Whatta guy.Our son-in-law Snickers is an assistant coach on The 747’s team. When he told the players I wanted to get a picture, one of them ran back to the infield and slid heavily into second because his uniform wasn’t muddy enough. It was just the right thing to do.
The coaches laughed and one yelled “sorry about the laundry” to his mother.
The synthetic turf has its advantages, but it would be a sad thing for baseball if kids never got to play on a Field of Mud.
By STEPHANIE UJHELYI
Staff Writer
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San Antonio Spurs Forward Julian Champagnie youth basketball camp in Los Fresnos
San Antonio Spurs forward Julian Champagnie hosted his youth basketball skills camp at the Los Fresnos United School in Los Fresnos. 85 kids registered for the camp that started at 12 p.m. and ended 4 p.m. They went through fundamental skills, dribbling, shooting and passing. The campers ended the day with a 5v5 game having […]
San Antonio Spurs forward Julian Champagnie hosted his youth basketball skills camp at the Los Fresnos United School in Los Fresnos.
85 kids registered for the camp that started at 12 p.m. and ended 4 p.m. They went through fundamental skills, dribbling, shooting and passing. The campers ended the day with a 5v5 game having the chance to go up against Champagnie.
Channel 5 news asked him about the importance of bringing these camps to the Valley.
“It’s super important because there aren’t any NBA games down here. I think we’re the closest ones out of the three Texas teams so coming out here is super important giving the kids something to look forward too and someone to look up too,” said Champagnie.
He also said he would love to come back out here and hopes to be here as soon as August.
Community and school youth football field support grants
OUR GRANT OPPORTUNITIES: Youth Today’s grant listings are carefully curated for our subscribers working in youth-related industries. Subscribers will find local, state, regional and national grant opportunities. THIS GRANT’S FOCUS: Youth Sports, Youth Football, Physical Activity, Low-income Community/YouthDeadline: June 30, 2025 “The NFL Foundation Grassroots Program provides non-profit, neighborhood-based organizations with financial and technical assistance […]
OUR GRANT OPPORTUNITIES: Youth Today’s grant listings are carefully curated for our subscribers working in youth-related industries. Subscribers will find local, state, regional and national grant opportunities.
THIS GRANT’S FOCUS: Youth Sports, Youth Football, Physical Activity, Low-income Community/Youth Deadline: June 30, 2025
“The NFL Foundation Grassroots Program provides non-profit, neighborhood-based organizations with financial and technical assistance to improve the quality, safety and accessibility of local football fields. Athletic fields can serve as tremendous community assets by offering opportunities for recreation, education and relaxation that contribute to the local quality of life. The NFL Foundation Grassroots Program seeks to redress the shortage of clean, safe and accessible football fields in low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. There are two levels of funding available: (1) General Field Support and (2) Field Surface Grants.
(1) General Field Support: applicants may submit requests of up to $50,000 for capital projects not associated with the actual field surface. This support includes the installation/refurbishment of bleachers, concession stands, lights, irrigation systems, etc.
(2) Field Surface Grants: Matching grants of up to $250,000 are available to help finance the resurfacing of a community, middle school or high school football field. Matching grants of up to $250,000 will be available to applicants seeking to install new synthetic sports turf surfaces. The ability of these new surfaces to withstand constant use and require little ongoing maintenance costs makes this an attractive option for communities, schools and youth groups to consider.
A smaller number of matching grants of up to $100,000 will be available to help finance the resurfacing of a community, middle school or high school football field utilizing natural grass/sod surfaces.”
Funder: The NFL Foundation and the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) Eligibility: Community-based organizations, middle schools or high schools serving a neighborhood consisting of low- and moderate-income families and individuals with 501 (c)(3) tax exempt status or school tax exempt status. Amount: Up to $250,000 Contact:Link →
Related: Q&A: From summer slide to summer glide — Blending learning, engagement and fun
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