Interesting Coach Quote - Too Much Practice?

Mr. Slippery said:
Football isn't alone. Basketball seems to be getting worse all the time as well.

Soccer, swimming, and volleyball are a pain due to non-school-sponsored club activities (indoor and outdoor club soccer, club swim practices before school, and JO volleyball). As the coach of a girls spring sport, I go through phases of which of those 3 sports I hate the most, haha. A couple years ago, our school softball team couldn't schedule games on certain weekends because of major JO volleyball tournaments that would've wiped out half the roster including the entire battery.
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Here is the thing about having kids miss SB or BB games in the summer.

You can complain about it, which it does suck, and cancel/not schedule games or call up some younger kids possibly to get some invaluable experience.

I know when I was coaching HS baseball in the summer we had kids missing for various things in the summer and yeah at times you take your lumps, but at the end of the day we got some of the backups more PT, or younger kids, more experience.

The one place I was at I had 4 guys missing every Monday, 3 different ones on Wednesday for an open freaking gym basketball. One weekend got wiped out because they went to some team camp but that next Mon/Wed those kids all showed up for baseball. I assumed they had off from hoops because they just were at a tournament until I got a nasty voice mail from their hoops coach that they skipped basketball for a baseball game. Truth be told, the kids said they were sick of playing basketball in the summer (and their hoops program is pretty good).

At the end of the day the record may not be the greatest, but the program can be better off.
 
Mr. Slippery said:
Football isn't alone. Basketball seems to be getting worse all the time as well.

Soccer, swimming, and volleyball are a pain due to non-school-sponsored club activities (indoor and outdoor club soccer, club swim practices before school, and JO volleyball). As the coach of a girls spring sport, I go through phases of which of those 3 sports I hate the most, haha. A couple years ago, our school softball team couldn't schedule games on certain weekends because of major JO volleyball tournaments that would've wiped out half the roster including the entire battery.
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I agree...this applies to all sports. I also coach a girls spring sport (lacrosse) and I’ve lost girls to club soccer, club volleyball, and AAU basketball. I’ve tried to be accommodating and avoid scheduling games one weekends but it’s tough. This last season I had a few girls (varsity starters) playing club soccer and AAU basketball during lacrosse season, and two of them got injured playing with their club team which impacted our school lacrosse team.

Soccer might be the worst in this regard. They don’t ever stop. There is summer club, spring club, fall school, and winter indoor seasons along with year round “training.” I had a soccer girl last year who would literally leave my practice and go straight to club soccer practice for another 90-120 mins of practice. And she played soccer every weekend... so she was practicing lacrosse and soccer 2-3 days a week, playing lacrosse games 2-3 days a week, and playing soccer 2-3 days a week. She literally never had an “off” day from mid February to late May.
 
Walt said:
I agree...this applies to all sports. I also coach a girls spring sport (lacrosse) and I’ve lost girls to club soccer, club volleyball, and AAU basketball. I’ve tried to be accommodating and avoid scheduling games one weekends but it’s tough. This last season I had a few girls (varsity starters) playing club soccer and AAU basketball during lacrosse season, and two of them got injured playing with their club team which impacted our school lacrosse team.

Soccer might be the worst in this regard. They don’t ever stop. There is summer club, spring club, fall school, and winter indoor seasons along with year round “training.” I had a soccer girl last year who would literally leave my practice and go straight to club soccer practice for another 90-120 mins of practice. And she played soccer every weekend... so she was practicing lacrosse and soccer 2-3 days a week, playing lacrosse games 2-3 days a week, and playing soccer 2-3 days a week. She literally never had an “off” day from mid February to late May.
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Curious: What kind of college scholarship did she receive?
 
yakyak said:
Training would have been a better word for practice in this thread. Kids are over trained.

Parents do not realize that talent rules all. You can train and train and train and have a wonderful career. But if your not talented, you may miss opportunities experiencing other activities since you train so much. Of course, the combination of talent and training is when you can really do some things in your sport.

Said another way, your not turning D3 talent into D1 scholarships training 365. Why not accept your D3 talent, and do other things?

Again, its great that kids now love (do they really) training. But there giving up a lot, for not a lot of potential future value.

Over training is real, and it stinks.
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Yes, yes, yes!
 
thavoice said:
I am going to go the other way on this whole "too much practice" and speak in terms of youth baseball. At that level, there is too little practice and too many games.
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100% agree. Should have 2 or more practices a week and maybe 3 games. The younger the kids...the more practice
 
Mr. Slippery said:
Football isn't alone. Basketball seems to be getting worse all the time as well.

Soccer, swimming, and volleyball are a pain due to non-school-sponsored club activities (indoor and outdoor club soccer, club swim practices before school, and JO volleyball). As the coach of a girls spring sport, I go through phases of which of those 3 sports I hate the most, haha. A couple years ago, our school softball team couldn't schedule games on certain weekends because of major JO volleyball tournaments that would've wiped out half the roster including the entire battery.
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Swimming in Ohio is a little different because it one of the few sports where one can practice with your club during the season (it is encouraged actually). When the school swimming season is over (actually pretty short), one needs to complete the club commitment (States, regionals/zones, nationals). Anyway, there can be a big conflict with school baseball and softball. But this is not like club soccer and volleyball which are playing an additional off season. Swimming is just completing its season. My kids came to an agreement with their baseball/softball coach and worked out a compromise. Different states have different high school seasons. There really isn't an off season.
 
cincifbfan said:
There are so many terrible injuries in all sports now that could be prevented, and they are mostly due to over training, with 1 sport in particular.
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I'm not understanding you at all. Could you give us an example of the type of terrible injury caused by over training?
 
chs1971 said:
I'm not understanding you at all. Could you give us an example of the type of terrible injury caused by over training?
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Tommy John surgery in baseball, broken growth plates due to extreme training at too young an age, knee and hip issues in soccer players, back and shoulder issues in swimmers, basketball players that play a year wind up with knee and ankle problems since they are on the hard court all the time, spine/posture issues in golfers due to the extreme twisting motion, stress fractures in back and legs in all sports due to over training. The list goes on. Orthopedists know what sports these kids are playing when they walk in the door based off of their injuries alone. Again, you are not supposed to play same sport all year around, cross training is key! All of these could be prevented. Also, your body as an adult needs off days to recuperate, kids need even more recuperation time, and too often we are not giving it to them, then we wonder why there are surgeries, physical therapists, medical devices such as knee braces that all follow. We are going to see in 30+ years when all of these kids are senior citizens that they will have even more complicated issues regarding their joints/limbs.
 
thavoice said:
Here is the thing about having kids miss SB or BB games in the summer.

You can complain about it, which it does suck, and cancel/not schedule games or call up some younger kids possibly to get some invaluable experience.

I know when I was coaching HS baseball in the summer we had kids missing for various things in the summer and yeah at times you take your lumps, but at the end of the day we got some of the backups more PT, or younger kids, more experience.

The one place I was at I had 4 guys missing every Monday, 3 different ones on Wednesday for an open freaking gym basketball. One weekend got wiped out because they went to some team camp but that next Mon/Wed those kids all showed up for baseball. I assumed they had off from hoops because they just were at a tournament until I got a nasty voice mail from their hoops coach that they skipped basketball for a baseball game. Truth be told, the kids said they were sick of playing basketball in the summer (and their hoops program is pretty good).

At the end of the day the record may not be the greatest, but the program can be better off.
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In the case of my school's softball team, the alternative was not being able to play. The softball roster didn't have enough non-JO volleyball players on it to make it work.
 
cincifbfan said:
Tommy John surgery in baseball, ..., knee and hip issues in soccer players, back and shoulder issues in swimmers, basketball players that play a year wind up with knee and ankle problems since they are on the hard court all the time, spine/posture issues in golfers due to the extreme twisting motion, stress fractures in back and legs in all sports due to over training. The list goes on.
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None of these are training injuries though. Seems odd that you would blame them on over training.
 
The biggest issue I've seen over my 15 year tenure as a high school swim coach and assistant AD when it comes to this stuff is coaches, more specifically what we call "adjunct coaches". Those that are not employed by the building nor the district itself. Normally they have an allegiance to the sport and not the school / athletic dept so they more than other coaches don't normally push other athletic options to kids / convince their athletes that a college scholarship awaits them if they just put all their efforts into that sport, even if they are a 9th grader on jv. This is not to say in house coaches aren't guilty as well. We had / have a strength and conditioning coach who just this last November told one of our stud football players not to go out for basketball and instead continue to only focus on football. He was mildly reprimanded by our AD, which is to say he was told not to say things like that in ear shot of the asst. basketball coach. Parents are part of the issue too. Uninformed and uneducated parents who themselves more often than not did not play sports even in high school are easy pickings for a club coach or any coach period looking to secure their child to their sport and only their sport. As someone who did 3 sports all 4 years in high school (football, swimming, baseball) it's been and will continue to be my nature to tell a kid to do or try something else. This has bitten me a few times where i tell a swimmer to go try lacrosse in the spring only to lose them then to that sport. It happens.

I'll close with the best advice I ever received was from my own dad when I was thinking about quitting football to do fall hitting league my junior year. He sat me down and said "son you're NOT getting drafted by the Yankees. Trust me. It ain't gonna happen. If it were you wouldn't have spent 2 seasons on a high school JV baseball team. Keep playing football, keep swimming, because you'll appreciate it later in life." end of father / son chat. A VERY honest but also a VERY real conversation. Something that EVERY kid needs to hear.
 
chs1971 said:
No they do not. And as you say, they are a result from over use, not over training.
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If someone trains too much then they are overusing those same muscles. You can't have overuse injuries if you are not over training.

Again, that's why cross training is paramount to athletes.
 
chs1971 said:
My wife had surgery for a torn rotator cuff. She does no training. How is that possible?

You are committed to a position which is nonsense.

I'm done.
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Not all rotator cuff tears are the result of overuse/training. It happens sometimes.
 
chs1971 said:
None of these are training injuries though. Seems odd that you would blame them on over training.
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Those are definitely over training injuries. its just like the brakes on a car, a belts on a motor, an ink pen, a bat a glove, a pair of shoes. the more you use them the sooner they break down and need to be replaced.
 
As a long time coach in Ohio and now retired and living in SC, let me add a few points. Once the SC championships are over, kids in our district and our neighboring district have lifting before school and may register for football class the 1st two periods of the day. There are informal meetings during the lunch hour two-three times per week. Spring ball was added to that schedule starting May 1st for 15 days. Kids were placed in conflict as their spring sports reached the Ohio district, regional and state levels of the tournaments. Many opt for spring ball. Now that school is out, the conditioning sessions run two and a half hours and include 45 minutes of position or group practice. Workouts go five days a week. This does not include the 7-on-7 competitions which often follow the morning conditioning workouts or the trips to the many recruiting camps and college camps in June. Basketball and LaCrosse has a similar schedule in the evenings. Travel baseball and Legion baseball dominate the weekends. If a player needs a job, the pressure to miss work is huge. Heaven help a player whose family wants to leave the area for a vacation. I often wonder when kids get to be kids.

In Ohio, if there is some cooperation among the teams with their conditioning programs, I do not thing the 10 day rule is too much. It really depends upon when the 10 days are used and how flexible/cooperative the Basketball, Baseball, LaCrosse, Wrestling and Football coaches are.
 
Mackinbiner said:
General aging and degeneration can lead to a tear. Also, a fall.
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Nobody gets a torn rotator cuff from being old. Degeneration occurs from overuse/over training or a disease. Falls and trauma can injure anything, that's not what we are talking about. We are talking about people having life-altering and debilitating injuries from over training young people. These people should no better but do not. It should be considered abuse because you are taking advantage of kids for either monetary gain, or some messed up psychological issue where adults are trying to relive their own glory days or are projecting onto their kids because they weren't good enough themselves.
 
I agree that it is an interesting quote to start this thread but, what coach said it? I would think that the more success they have had, the more the quote would mean something to people. That would go a long way in deciding if it fits your particular team.

Big fan of multiple sports...different muscles and all that ( less burnout and less likely to have repetitive injury problems ).

There are some coaches that are happy with any weightlifting and some that want you to follow the guidelines of their sport and not another so, wish there was more cooperation for the kids to not have to make the football coach and baseball coach both happy when lifting.

I'm all for looking at better ways but, whether it is as a team or on your own, a certain amount of work needs to get done.
 
Some students play sports to help them with other ( more favorite ) sports. Some may do it just to do something ( maybe it would keep them from getting a part-time job or getting out of chores at home ). Or, peer pressure or to impress a person of the opposite sex.

This quote could be well intentioned or like someone hinted, a coach that doesn't want to work as hard. You have to decide which way to take it.
 
As a father and a coach, my gripe is with Football, Basketball and Soccer. In Cross Country and Track & Field, coaches give kids an off season program and those that want to be successful either follow the program or participate in other sports. Soccer, Football and Basketball coaches seem to really micromanage kids and prefer that they are exclusive to those sports. I know in track & field, we will get kids as seniors come out and love it and wish they had done it all 4 years.

I've seen coaches that hold it against kids if they do not go to open gym. Non mandatory is really mandatory.

Football people expect that everyone support football, but don't feel they need to support other sports.

I had a daughter that was terribly treated by soccer and basketball coaches and a son that was not treated well by football coaches. State champion runner and state qualifying wrestler. Hard working kids that put the work in when no one else was around to improve in every sport they did.

My daughter is just a competitor in anything she does. She went an extra year and a half to get her drivers license because she was not willing to miss any practice time. But god forbid she miss open gym in August when she had Cross Country practice and Soccer going on. That did not go over well with the coach. When basketball season started, they had a scrimmage and she took the ball and dribbled with her weak hand the full length of the court with pressure on her. She was not strong at that the season before. I asked her when she worked on that and she said over the summer. Even I never saw her doing it. She led the team in foul shooting percentage and was the best defender on the team. Coach took her interest in other sports as a lack of dedication to Basketball. Same sort of thing with Soccer. Minimal playing time. Would rather lose without her than win with her.

Son was average size through middle school. Did not grow taller in high school. He loved wrestling and put a ton of time into it. Lost interest in baseball, but still loved football. Did not really have a position in High School, so he made himself a very good long snapper. Football coaches thought he should put more time in the weight room. Essentially punished him for making wrestling his #1 sport. Didn't care that he made himself into the best long snapper on the team and eventually didn't dress him for games and ran him off. They lost games because his replacement was not very good. His best friend that both my son and I tried to work with to make better even after my son had stopped playing . Didn't matter that my son put more time in the weight room than nearly anyone else. It wasn't football weight room time. If they aren't managing it, it isn't getting done apparently.

The coaches have become more important than the sport.

I'll be honest, did not miss going to football games. The terrible sportsmanship in the stands yelling at the refs all game is not my thing. Soccer is nearly as bad and basketball is just a constant parents sitting in the stands complaining about the coach (including me at times)

As a coach, I encourage kids to do multiple sports, but I expect them to show for all practices and games when in my season. Three unexcused practices and you are off the team. (Any excuse works) miss a meet and you can't earn a letter. As soon as season is over, see you next season and I will help you in anyway possible. If you are a football player, we can structure your in season and off season programs to compliment your football stuff. It's not very hard.
 
Mackinbiner said:
Here's an interesting quote from an Ohio varsity football coach concerning ten camp days being allowed -

"Honestly, across the board in all our sports, we practice too much with our kids, It's become more of a, to me at least, we're looking at them like they're college athletes or professional athletes because of the time that we're spending across the board in all sports. As a football coach, I would like just to have five camp days in the summer to do some things with the kids, then get into two-a-days and start practicing."

I wonder if this coach has taken any heat for these comments. Or, do others agree?
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I can tell you one thing . He could never coach football in Steubenville. #365
 
I feel pretty confident in saying the vast majority of programs are using way more than the 10 days they are allotted. Passing scrimmages have already started. You gotta practice before you can go to a passing scrimmage. It is out of control. Too much time. Kids can no longer be kids.
 
I don't think the 10 days of team work specifically in the summer is overtraining. it provides an opportunity for coaches to teach systems and how practice is run so that when august first hits the team is not starting from square one, this is especially true during a coaching change. I do not also think that organized lifting in the summer is inherently a problem. The issue arises when optional becomes unofficially mandatory and kids are punished for a couple of misses. I chose to miss things like some of my summer baseball games to attend football events but it was my choice. I had a teammate who was clearly more interested in pursuing baseball but was still committed to the football team. he missed several football activities and it never became an issue because everybody understood he was baseball first.
 
Football does require a lot of time and practice but many coaches are taking this to the next level. You do not need to have 8 hr practices to be a good team. In fact those super long practices will equate to kids that hate the coaches and start to hate the sport. Practice smarter not harder.
 
SouthWestOhio said:
Football does require a lot of time and practice but many coaches are taking this to the next level. You do not need to have 8 hr practices to be a good team. In fact those super long practices will equate to kids that hate the coaches and start to hate the sport. Practice smarter not harder.
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I think this also holds true as the season progresses. Early in the season it makes sense to continue to have longer practices daily after school. But as the season progresses it may be more beneficial to shorten practices to try to have a fresher team come Friday. Obviously some of this is going to depend on how different your weekly opponent is from what you have previously seen.
 
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