Are kids’ sports for the kids or the parents?

Grade 9 students in the Collective Voice program at Aden Bowman Collegiate share their lives and opinions through columns. Selected columns run each Monday in The Saskatoon Starphoenix. I’ve been playing sports for the better part of my life.

I have seen kids and parents with all sorts of personalities. Most were competitive and there were the few who just wanted to have fun. At first, I didn’t notice how much the parents almost relied on how their kid performs to prove some sort of importance to other people.

It always seemed like when I was younger everyone played sports; it was something every kid did to stay active. But when I started to grow up I noticed how competitive sports — baseball in my case — would start to get and the pressure the kids would face from coaches and parents.

I have multiple terrible examples of parents and coaches ruining something that should be for kids and for fun. Parents and coaches berate umpires who are just young teenagers, no older than myself.

I think one of the main things that constantly happens is you see the parents trying to relive their “glory days” and coach their children to be as good as they were, or achieve what they couldn’t accomplish. That’s generally when it’s the worst — there is nothing the kid can do; if it’s been happening their whole life, they will think it’s normal.

The best advice you could give your kid is to go out and do all they can, because some kids are meant for competitive sports while others aren’t. Adding pressure really doesn’t help. It’s important to teach your kid without taking things too far and ruining it for them.

Team sports or activities can be a crucial part of a kids life and it’s important parents don’t take that away from them. It helps them develop basic skills they need, like learning to work with other kids and staying active.

Pressure naturally comes with competitive sports. It’s not a bad thing, some people perform better with it. But too much pressure can ruin your kid’s experience.

Something I have noticed throughout my time playing sports is all the politics going on. You will see kids who were maybe deserving of making it to a certain team but other kids’ parents might be a bigger part of the team and their kids, who may be a bit undeserving, will make the team solely due to their parents.

If you see your kid upset after a game, just let them know how to improve — or, if they know what happened, then give them space.

I understand people want to raise their kids the way they see fit. I’m just expressing my opinion from my past experiences and that of other kids I have played sports with in my life.

As unfortunate as it seems, I think some adults ruin sports for kids.