SportsLetter

A Heads-up from the NFL

The NFL has produced a poster that it hopes will alert players to the long-term effects of concussions.   It will be hung in every locker room in the league. 

The poster (also as a brochure to be given to players), provides a "sobering new warning [that] could affect not just the behavior of current N.F.L. players and youth athletes, but also how retired players’ claims of cognitive decline are handled under the disability plan operated jointly by the league and the players union," according to a New York Times article.

Commented Baltimore Ravens center Matt Birk, “To put it out there in writing in locker rooms, at least it’s publicly acknowledging that, ‘Hey, this is real.’ There’s risks in everything you do, and this one is real. You can’t sweep it under the rug anymore.”

History suggests that changes in attitudes at the professional level often influence policies and protocols at the youth level.  Perhaps someday this poster will be seen in every high school locker room in America.

Calling time out in youth sports

In the never-ending battle between time-consuming youth sports and rapidly diminishing opportunities for family activities, some families are dialing back on sport commitments for their kids, writes Sue Shellenbarger in the Wall Street Journal:

Youth sports have big benefits for kids. Research links participation to better grades and self esteem, long-term improvements in education and employment and lower obesity rates.

But the escalating time, travel and financial demands of many competitive youth teams are pushing some parents over the edge. Many are pushing back, dropping teams mid-season, barring year-round competition for their children or refusing to make their kids available for holiday or vacation-time play.

Shellenbarger joins a chorus of calls for sanity in youth sports’ war against time; most notably Regan McMahon’s, whose 2005 book “Revolution in the Bleachers” also discussed the lack of downtime that busy families have.

Some kids start their “careers” as early as pre-school, and there is increased pressure on kids to specialize in one sport, often resulting in year-round seasons.  It’s not surprising families are spending less time together.

And for what?

Some parents willingly join "the youth sports arms race" because they hope their children will earn college scholarships or pro careers, says Douglas Abrams, a University of Missouri law professor and a youth hockey coach for 42 years. In reality, these prospects are "infinitesimal," he says.

Only about 3% to 6% of high school basketball, football, baseball and soccer players make it to a college team, the National Collegiate Athletic Association says. Only about 2% of high-school athletes are awarded college athletic scholarships. Far more money is available for academic scholarships. And only about 1% to 9% of college athletes make it to the pros, the NCAA says.

Maybe the time has come to skip yet another holiday weekend tournament and take the kids to beach.

Quick tip from AYSO on soccer concussions

John Ouellette is American Youth Soccer Organization's (AYSO) National Coach and technical director.  He also has an "Ask the Coach" column on the AYSO website.

Today's question concerned concussions:

July 20, 2010

Question: My son had a concussion last season, can I let him play this season?

Answer: The question really is should you let him play before he's been medically cleared. The answer is absolutely no. I don't care if it was yesterday, last season or last year. Until your son has been medically cleared from the concussion to go back and play, please don't let him play. However there is a general rule for all coaches, if you have players that have head-to-head contact or run into a goal post and you need to take them out of the game or a practice situation, do not put them back in. Send them home; get them medically cleared and then when they come back, make sure they've been medically cleared. Just remember, you never diagnose or treat, you only prevent. Most head cases you cannot prevent. Make sure they come back with a medical release, not just the parents say so.

Click here to see other coaching questions and answers from Ouellette:  http://www.ayso.org/resources/coach_res/ask_the_coach.aspx

Soccer in the USA: You like me! You really like me!

Anyone who pays attention to soccer in the U.S. knows that there are soccer haters in the U.S. media who every four years during World Cup roll out the usual rant about soccer being nothing more than a kids’ game in this country.  Although millions of American youngsters have played soccer for the past two decades, critics love to tell us that those young players never become fans of the adult, professional game.  It’s not only sportswriter-dinosaurs who denigrate the game.  Academics regularly weigh in with commentaries about the soccer’s inability to capture the “cultural space” of American sport, and the claim that soccer in the U.S. is the preserve of “recent emigré enclaves” and “rich white kids and women.”

Soccer’s defenders often have countered by saying that if the mainstream media, especially English-language media, would only treat the sport with the same respect that they afford baseball, football and basketball, that the commercial potential of soccer would become evident.  Well guess what?  ESPN and ABC gave the 2010 World Cup the full star treatment and enjoyed a 41% viewer increase over the 2006 World Cup ratings.  ABC’s English-language broadcast of the World Cup final drew an average audience of 15.5 million viewers.  Univision’s Spanish-language broadcast drew an additional 8.8 million people - a pretty big “enclave.”  All together 24.3 million watched the broadcast of the Spain-Netherlands game.  That is more people than watched any game of the 2009 World Series on Fox and Fox Sports en Espanol.

Variety reports:

ESPN brass attribute the rise in World Cup viewership among English-lingo auds to the changing complexion of the U.S. population, particularly the growth of immigrant and second-generation Hispanic and Asian populations with deeper cultural ties to the sport. And number crunchers have also noted growing interest in soccer across younger male and femme demographics, as viewers who grew up playing the game take an interest in the quadrennial world championship.

Attracting more viewers than the so-called national pastime is not bad for a sport that Americans allegedly will not embrace. Second-generation immigrants, not recent emigrés, seem to be driving the numbers upward.  And, it’s obvious that millions of young adults who grew up playing the sport are eager to watch World Cup.

The 2010 World Cup ratings in the U.S. have made it impossible to deny the broad appeal of soccer’s premier event.  It will be interesting to track the development of American spectator interest in the domestic MLS, and top foreign leagues in Europe and Latin America.

With two hits, dad sure to be out at home

Once again, folks, it's just a game.  The need to be reminded of that comes a little too late for a baseball dad/coach in Enola, Pennsylvania, who has been accused -- and arrested! -- for striking a nine-year-old player on his team who had been ejected from a game.  The twist is that the player was his own son!
 
Police charged Ray Boudreau of Enola, Pa. after he allegedly struck his son twice with a closed fist at a game last Monday. Boudreau's lawyer Brian Perry says the boy had been ejected for throwing his helmet after being called out at third base.

Perry admits the dad handled the situation poorly, but claims he hit his son on the back.

After that "father-son moment," according to court papers the umpire and scorekeeper called police, who later arrested the coach at his home.

Game on!

Playing video games may lead to increased participation in "actual sports" amongst kids, according to research by ESSEC, one of France’s premier business schools, and reported on by a number of gaming sources.

Kids, in this case, mostly means boys, and according to Chicago Video Game Examiner, the study states that:

38 per cent of boys under the age of 21 who play sports games on active video game consoles practice their favorite virtual sport in real life and 75 per cent of video gamers participate in some kind of real sport. The more they play active video sports games, the more likely adolescents are to practice sports.

ESSEC Marketing head Thierry Lardinoit says:

"Video games are frequently demonized. We now know that these fears are unfounded. While it is difficult to fight against the consumption of video games, which has become more and more widespread among youth, we can use this consumption to further the realistic goal of encouraging physical activity among adolescents. There is a strong correlation between playing video games and participating in real sports. Watching television is a threat to physical activity. Video games are not, however.”

Coaches do make a difference

The Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune ran an article last week about Charde Houston of the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx and her efforts to establish a leadership program for young girls in the city.  The program is called Project Y.O.U. (Youth.  Opportunities. Unlimited.), and right now Houston is working with girls who are residents of Perspectives, Inc. “a multiservice agency based in St. Louis Park offering transitional housing, mental health services and parent education.’’

From the article:

Project Y.O.U. includes weekly art and writing activities and discussions about peer pressure, beauty, nutrition, safe sex and self-esteem. Houston offers Y.O.U. "bucks" to encourage participation, has plans for speakers and off-site trips and will ask each girl to pick one college and apply for a scholarship.

Houston is ambitious; she wants Y.O.U. to become a nationwide program.  And the impetus comes from her past:

From age 13 to 17, Houston was at the mercy of others, as was her homeless family. Coaches and friends stepped in to make sure Houston got to basketball practice, to school, to bed. "If I have any control over my destiny, it will not be this life," she told herself. "I stayed in the gym every day, listening to my coaches, being encouraged."

Now she wants to return the favor.

Are you a good cross country teammate?

The 4th of July is behind us; the heat of summer is upon us.  It must be time to start thinking about cross country for the fall.

The latest issue of Marc Bloom's Harrier XC magazine has an article about being a better high school cross country teammate.  Titled "Better Teammate, Better Runner: how they go together in building a win-win situation," the article has suggestions by cross country coaches for creating better teams:

Group Ownership: the team runs and trains as a unit and takes responsibility for monitoring workouts and summer training sessions

Mentor Runners: Top runners are paired with "lesser" talent

Knocking on the Door: The times of top runners are listed in red; the next group in blue with the time needed to become part of the top group

Push and Pull: As runners overtake opponents during competition they try to help pull teammates behind them and push those ahead

Captain Courageous: The coach selects the captain of the team; one who will encourage without bullying and hold teammates accountable

It also has a list of ten things a young runner can do to become a better teammate:

1. Offer to help younger, newer runners

2.  Help to keep immature runners in line

3.  Encourage others to train hard

4.  Group with teammates over the summer

5.  Always compete with team scoring in mind

6.  Serve as a role model of good sportsmanship

7.  Show a positive attitude in tough conditions

8.  Listen closely to all coaching instructions

9.  Share insights and ideas with team members

10.  Treat slower runners with equal respect

To supplement or not to supplement?

Earlier this week the Times Herald-Record, servicing New York's Hudson Valley, had an interesting article about the pros and cons of supplement use by young athletes.
 
Wait!  There are pros?
 
Well, according to Dr. Jose Antonio, yes, there are.  "It helps with strength and power, speed and recovery," he says of the creatine he gives his softball-playing 9-year-old twin daughters.  Dr. Antonio, who lives in South Florida, is the co-founder of the International Society of Sports Nutrition, recognized, he says, "as the only not-for-profit academic-based society dedicated to sports nutrition and growing the science of applied nutrition.''  He credits years of misinformation by people who don't understand the science for giving supplements like creatine a bad reputation:  "There are at least 200 studies that show creatine to be safe,'' Antonio says.
 
Dr. William Rose, a Middletown pediatrician, has doubts.  All three of Dr. Rose's college-athlete sons have tried supplements:
 
"I just never could get it into their heads,'' says Rose, a pediatrician for 31 years. "They thought it was going to help build muscle mass. I never saw a study show that it improved muscle mass more than just eating protein.''
 
And Rose feels there is the potential for kidney damage from use of creatine and other supplements that require constant hydration:
 
"If you are dehydrated and there's a higher concentration of amino acids in the bloodstream, the kidneys have to filter it out,'' Rose says. "There's more potential to do damage'' if kidneys have to work harder to filter it out. "There are energy drinks out there that have caffeine or too much sugar that are pretty harmful,'' Rose says.
 
Dr. Antonio emphasizes that creatine has been on the market for some 20 years, and suggests that if there were harmful long-term effects, they would have been exposed by now.  "There is no evidence it's harmful,'' he says. "In fact it's quite safe.''
 
The Times Herald-Record continues the debate with a series of special reports on the topic.  They can be found here, along with the article cited above: http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100630/SPORTS/6300365

And speaking of supplements, the Tour de France starts tomorrow.  Enjoy!