ESCONDIDO, Calif. — Like many mothers in Southern California, Paula Gartin put her twin son and daughter, Mikey and Maddy, into youth sports leagues as soon as they were old enough. For years, they loved playing soccer, baseball and other sports, getting exercise and making friends.

But by their early teens, the competition got stiffer, the coaches became more demanding, injuries intervened and their travel teams demanded that they focus on only one sport. Shuttling to weekend tournaments turned into a chore. Sports became less enjoyable.

Maddy dropped soccer because she didn’t like the coach and took up volleyball. Mikey played club soccer and baseball as a youngster, then chose baseball before he suffered a knee injury in his first football practice during the baseball offseason. By 15, he had stopped playing team sports. Both are now in college and more focused on academics.

“I feel like there is so much judgment around youth sports. If you’re not participating in sports, you’re not doing what you’re supposed to be doing as a kid,” Gartin said. “There’s this expectation you should be involved, that it’s something you should be doing. You feel you have to push your kids. There’s pressure on them.”

Youth sports can have a positive effect on children’s self-esteem and confidence and teach them discipline and social skills. But a growing body of recent research has shown how coaches and parents can heap pressure on children, how heavy workloads can lead to burnout and fractured relationships with family members and friends, and how overuse injuries can stem from playing single sports.

A report published by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2024 showed how overuse injuries and overtraining can lead to burnout in young athletes. The report cited pressure by parents and coaches as additional risk factors. Another study, in the Journal of Sport &Social Issues, highlighted how giving priority to a win-at-all-costs culture can stunt a young athlete’s personal development and well-being. Researchers at the University of Hawaii found that abusive and intrusive behavior by parents can add to stress on athletes.

Mental health is a vast topic, from clinical issues like depression and suicidal thoughts to anxiety and psychological abuse. There is now a broad movement to increase training for coaches so they can identify signs and symptoms of mental health conditions, said Vince Minjares, a program manager in the Aspen Institute’s Sports &Society Program. Since 2020, seven states have begun requiring coaches to receive mental health training, he said.

Domineering coaches and parents have been around for generations. But their pressure has been amplified by the professionalization of youth sports. A growing number of sports leagues are being run as profit-driven businesses to meet demand from parents who urge their children to play at earlier ages to try to improve their chances of playing college or pro sports. According to a survey by the Aspen Institute, 11.4% of parents believe that their children can play professionally.

“There’s this push to specialize earlier and earlier,” said Meredith Whitley, a professor at Adelphi University who studies youth sports. “But at what cost? For those young people, you’re seeing burnout happen earlier because of injuries, overuse and mental fatigue.”

The additional stress is one reason more children are dropping out. The share of school-age children playing sports fell to 53.8% in 2022, from 58.4% in 2017, according to the National Survey of Children’s Health. While more than 60 million adolescents play sports, up to 70% of them drop out by age 13.

While groups like the Aspen Institute focus on long-standing issues of access and cost in youth sports, combating mental health problems in young athletes is an emerging area. In recent years, professional athletes like Naomi Osaka and Michael Phelps have shined a light on the issue. But parents who want to teach their children the positive parts of playing sports are finding that some of the worst aspects of being a young athlete are hard to avoid.

That was apparent to the parents who took their sons to hear Travis Snider speak at Driveline Academy in Kent, Washington, one Sunday last spring. Snider was a baseball phenom growing up near Seattle and was taken by the Toronto Blue Jays in the first round of the 2006 MLB draft.

But he finished eight unremarkable seasons as an outfielder and played his last major league game at 27. While attempting a comeback in the minor leagues, he worked with a life coach to help him make sense of why his early promise fizzled. He unearthed childhood traumas and unrealistic expectations on the field.

In a playoff game as an 11-year-old, he had had a panic attack on the mound and was removed from the game.

Though he reached the highest level of his sport, Snider felt as if distorted priorities turned baseball into a burden, something he wanted to help others avoid.

Last year, he started a company, 3A Athletics, to help children, parents and coaches develop healthier approaches to sports that include separating professional aspirations from the reality that most young athletes just want to get some exercise and make friends.

“We as a culture really blended the two into the same experience, which is really toxic for kids as they’re going through the early stages of identity formation,” Snider said. “You have a lot of parents who are sports fans that want to watch youth sports the same way they watch pro sports without recognizing, ‘Hey, the thing I love the most is out there running around on the field.’”

He added, “We’ve got to take a step back and detach from what has become normalized and what kind of vortex we get sucked into.”

Driveline Academy, an elite training facility filled with batting cages, speed guns, sensors and framed jerseys of pro players, might be the kind of vortex Snider would want people to avoid. But Deven Morgan, director of youth baseball at Driveline, hired 3A Athletics to help parents and young athletes put their sport in context.

“It’s part of a stack of tools we can deploy to our families and kids to help them understand that there is a structural way that you can understand this stuff and relate to your kid,” he said.

“We are going to get more out of this entire endeavor if we approach this thing from a lens of positivity.”

During his one-hour seminar, Snider and his partner, Seth Taylor, told the six sets of parents and sons how to navigate the mental roadblocks that come from competitive sports. Snider showed the group a journal he kept during the 2014 season that helped him overcome some of his fears, and encouraged the ballplayers to do the same.

“It’s not just about writing the bad stuff,” he said. “The whole goal is to start to open up about this stuff.”

Taylor took the group through a series of mental exercises, including visualization and relaxation techniques, to help players confront their fears and parents to understand their role as a support system.

His message seemed to get through to Amy Worrell-Kneller, who had brought her 14-year-old son, Wyatt, to the session.

“Generally, there’s always a few parents who are the ones who seem to be hanging on too tight, and the kids take that on,” she said. “At this age, they’re social creatures, but it starts with the parents.”

Coaches play a role, too. The Catholic Youth Organization in the Diocese of Cleveland has been trying to ratchet down the pressure on young athletes. At a training session in August, about 120 football, soccer, volleyball and cross-country coaches met for three hours to learn how to create “safe spaces” for children.

“Kids start to drop out by 12, 13 because it’s not fun and parents can make it not fun,” said Drew Vilinsky, the trainer. “Kids are tired and distracted before they get to practice, and have a limited amount of time, so don’t let it get stale.”

Coaches were told, among other things, to let children lead stretches and other tasks to promote confidence. Track coaches should use whistles, not starting guns, and withhold times from young runners during races.

“We’re trying not to overwhelm a kid with anxiety,” said Lisa Ryder, a track and cross-country coach for runners through eighth grade. “CYO is not going to get your kid to be LeBron.”

© 2025 The New York Times Company

STRONG TO THE HOOP — Oak Glen’s Gavin Geisse drives to the hoop past Madonna’s Reno Fuscardo and Luke Wingett during Tuesday’s game. – Andrew Grimm

NEW MANCHESTER — Knowing his team had a big edge in experience, veteran Oak Glen head coach Jerry Everly wanted to see his group take care of business against Madonna in its last game before the new year.

His Golden Bears did just that, pulling away for an 80-34 victory over the youthful Blue Dons inside the Bears Den Tuesday night.

The victory sends Oak Glen into the new year above the .500 mark at 3-2.

“We played well against a team that we should beat,” Everly said. “They’re very young, their time will come, so we wanted to take care of business and get them while they’re young. We wanted to take care of ourselves, worry about our own game and execute, and I thought we did.

“I told them to take care of business and not take anything for granted, not come out sloppy and execute the things we work on in practice and I thought we did a good job of that. We still have some things to work on, but that’s good, we’ll keep working.

Madonna’s Tyler Dillon jumps against defense from Oak Glen’s Elijah Knisley. – Andrew Grimm

“It’s good to go into the new year above .500.”

Oak Glen had four players reach double figures — two of whom did so coming off the bench — and knocked down nine 3s in the victory.

Gavin Geisse netted 14 points to lead the way, while Mason Kell hit three of the triples to finish with 11. Colt Hissam also tallied three treys and finished with 11 points off the bench, while Tyler Evans came off the bench and also tallied 11.

All told, 10 of 11 players to see the floor for Everly’s team scored, all 10 contributing at least five points.

Oak Glen opened an 18-8 lead after one, then scored 25 points in the second quarter to push the lead to 24 at halftime, then continued to build it the rest of the way to the 46-point victory.

Oak Glen’s Kam Hebron puts up a shot past the Blue Dons Vinny Chiodi and Anthony DeCaria. – Andrew Grimm

For Madonna (1-6), which dressed a lineup of five sophomores, three freshman and a junior, the early season growing pains continued, though they continue to play hard for their veteran coach.

“We’re learning, there are growing pains,” Madonna head coach George Vargo said. “Our kids play hard, they just have to learn the game better. But they keep playing hard and they don’t give up. We start a freshman and four sophomores, so we know we’re going to go through the growing pains. We’ll get better as we go and keep learning and keep growing.

“We’ve seen a lot of improvements from Game 1 to Game 7.”

The Dons were led by 14 points from Reno Fuscardo and eight from Jake Druga.

UP NEXT

Madonna’s Jake Druga drives against Oak Glen’s Gavin Geisse and Will Weekley. – Andrew Grimm

Madonna: Has another tough match up Saturday when it travels to Toronto.

Oak Glen: Has a big game on the road Saturday night at Wellsville.

Oak Glen 80, Madonna 34

M 8-11-11-4 — 34

OG 18-25-18-19 — 80

Below, Oak Glen’s Mason Kell shoots past Madonna’s Vinny Chiodi. – Andrew Grimm

MADONNA (1-6): Wingert 1 1-2 3; Dillon 1 2-2 4; Chiodi 2 0-0 5; Druga 4 0-0 8; Fuscardo 5 4-8 14; Gray 0 0-0 0; Welch 0 0-0 0; Decaria 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 13, 7-12; 34.

OAK GLEN (3-2): Hartung 3 0-0 7; Kell 4 0-0 11; Weekley 2 0-0 4; Willey 3 0-0 6; Geisse 7 0-0 14; Evans 4 2-2 11; Ates 2 0-0 5; Herbock 2 1-2 5; Dawson 3 0-0 6; Hissam 4 0-0 11; Dittman 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 34, 3-5; 80.

3-POINTERS: Madonna 1 (Chiodi); Oak Glen 9 (Kell 3, Hissam 3, Hartung, Evans, Ates).

New England Revolution

Originally from California, Kohler is another signing who has previous ties to newly-installed Revolution head coach Marko Mitrović

By Hayden Bird

December 31, 2025 | 11:06 AM

1 minute to read

The Revolution have continued an offseason path of adding young players who have experience playing under new head coach Marko Mitrović.

On Wednesday, New England announced the acquisition of defender Ethan Kohler as a transfer signing from German club SV Werder Bremen. New England has signed Kohler to a contract through the 2028-29 season, with a club option for 2029-30.

Kohler, 20, is California native, and returns to the U.S. after signing with Werder Bremen in 2023. He appeared at both the U-19 and reserve team levels for the German club, helping Werder Bremen II win the Bremen-Liga title in 2023-24. Kohler also recently made nine appearances for another German club, SC Veri, during a loan stint.

Seen as a versatile defender by New England, Kohler — like fellow recent acquisition Brooklyn Raines — has experience playing under Mitrović at the 2025 FIFA U-20 World Cup. The now current New England head coach led the U.S. team during the tournament, guiding the Americans to a quarterfinal appearance.

Kohler started four games at the U-20 World Cup as a center-back, helping the U.S. achieve clean sheet wins over Italy and France.

“I met and worked with Ethan for the first time almost four years ago,” Mitrović said in the team announcement. “He is an elite professional and highly competitive player who loves to win. His work ethic and standards are very high, important qualities for our team and environment in creating a winning culture.

“Ethan’s strength on the ball can help us control the game in possession, though he is also one of those players who takes great pride in his defending. I am excited to have Ethan with us.”

New England will begin preseason training in January as the club tries to reverse a two-year trend of being shut out of the postseason. Mitrović, hired in November, will have some interesting choices to make as he reshapes the team in his image. The Revolution kick off the 2026 MLS regular season in Nashville on Feb. 21.

NORTH BRANFORD — A youth hockey coach and a parent both were arrested Monday after an argument over a child’s ice time during a game at the Northford Ice Pavilion escalated into a fight, North Branford police said. 

The two Rhode Island men were taken into custody around 6:30 p.m. after officers responded to the Firelite Place facility for a report of a physical altercation, according to the North Branford Police Department. 

Police said in a Facebook post that the fight took place in a hallway outside a locker room after the men began arguing over the amount of playing time the parent’s child had received during the game.

“The North Branford Police Department maintains a zero-tolerance policy for physical altercations involving parents and coaches at youth sporting events,” police said. 

Police identified the individuals as Joseph Desmarais, 46, of Scituate, Rhode Island, and Brian Lacombe, 50, of West Warwick, Rhode Island. 

Police said both men are charged with second-degree breach of peace and are scheduled to appear at state Superior Court in New Haven Jan. 13.