Play #1 – C: Conduct
If you don’t mind a bit of bluntness, the key theme for this play comes down to two words: Calm Down!
This applies to those obvious bad actors, like individuals who:
find joy in berating teenage referees
start nonsense with the opposing team’s fans
act like they are auditioning for a role in a sports-themed reality TV show that emphasizes the worst and most despicable characteristics of humanity
“If you are acting like this, it will traumatize your kid and they will remember it for the rest of their life,” said Mark Wade, a college basketball standout for the University of Michigan in the 1980s and a former professional player in Belgium.
But actually this chapter is for the parent who doesn’t realize that well-intended actions can actually be harmful.
Rethink your approach to cheering
“Imagine being asked to do something so difficult that most people fail three times more often than they succeed. Now imagine that the people you love most in the world are screaming at the top of their lungs at you while you’re trying to do this. Sound tough? Welcome to the world of youth sports.” 9
The above is wisdom from Mike Matheny, a former MLB catcher for 13 years, manager for the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals, and a youth travel baseball skipper.
Matheny explained how when he was a kid, there were never parents screaming like they are now. Several of his teammates and colleagues, some of whom made it to the Hall of Fame, said their parents never did this either. One of his pieces of advice is that parents should attend a game and politely support their child by calmly clapping.
We all have different personalities. There can be good reasons for some of us to express more excitement than others depending on the circumstances of the game. That said, remember it’s just a kid’s game. If you compared the noise and stress levels of some parents at a youth sporting event to a family evading a kidnapper, it would sound the same. Remember this next time you vocalize your “support” for your kids during their different youth sports activities.
Consider lowering the intensity level several notches and choose your words wisely!
Stop coaching your kid from the bleachers!
There was a young, talented nine-year-old kid I was coaching in recreational basketball. He tended to resort to ball-hog tendencies. I was trying to teach him to focus on shot selection: knowing when to pass versus shoot. One game, he was trapped by two defenders along the baseline, about 12 feet from the hoop. I instructed him to pass to an open teammate. His mom shouted from the bleachers: “Shoot it!” Sure enough, he shot it. The ball clanked off the side of the backboard and went out of bounds.
We see the scenario play out in youth sports across all ages. When this happens, the parent is overriding the coach’s authority and giving the kid terrible advice. It sends the wrong message.
Steve Kerr would agree with me. He won five NBA titles as a player and four as a head coach of Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors. In a talk for the Positive Coaching Alliance, he said: “Having coached my kids in junior high, I was blown away by how many parental coaches there were during the game. How can you play at 10 years old when you have 12 people yelling at you? You have the two coaches, your parents, and eight other parents. Kids are going to learn from playing, the coach, and the atmosphere. If you support them as parents, they are going to feel so much more comfortable. It is really profound the impact that my parents had on me by backing off and letting me play and figure things out.” 10
I wish the parents at a recent youth 8U travel baseball game had heeded such advice. Kids were coming to bat and being pelted with a barrage of advice just moments before a pitch was thrown. “Eye on the ball!” “Let’s go!” “Concentrate!” “Be ready to load.”
Frank Martin is the head basketball coach at the University of Massachusetts. He previously coached at the University of South Carolina and Kansas State University for many years. So he has more knowledge about the sport than 99.99% of youth basketball coaches and the fans attending the games.
Speaking at a press conference, he said: “I am probably the most animated coach you have ever seen. When I go watch my kids play, I don’t say boo. I don’t wave my arms. I don’t try to coach my kids.”
If his children ask him for advice, Martin responds by telling them to ask their coach. “I am not your coach. I am your dad. If you are being disrespected, then I am here. If you fail, good, deal with it. I will help you get up. But don’t come to me about coaching. I am a coach so why would I criticize someone trying to help you?”
Imagine if all of us novice basketball experts compared to Frank Martin said the same thing to our kids? Martin also questions the sanity of parents screaming at kids like they are professionals playing in the NBA Finals.
“We wonder why kids get confused, rebel, and don’t know how to listen. How can you listen when you have so many voices in your head at the same time?”
All of this applies to high school kids as well. At the same time Doc Rivers was coaching the Boston Celtics to the 2008 NBA title, his son Austin was a top-ranked high school star who would go on to play at Duke and in the NBA. Austin thought he should be getting more playing time and shared this concern with Doc. He was hoping that his well-known father would call the coach. Nope. That wasn’t going to happen. Despite his stature, Doc has never called one of his kids’ coaches.
“I am going to do my job as a parent,” he said. “There are far too many parents coaching in the stands and not allowing the coaches to coach.” 11
On the flip side, there are parents out there who feel it is their right to aggressively confront the coach following a difficult loss. Quincy Notre Dame (Illinois) volleyball coach Courtney Kvitle faced this when two parents entered the locker room, claiming she had quit on the team following the girls’ defeat in the Class 2A regional high school championship game. According to a news report, the situation escalated outside the locker room. A teacher and another coach had to intervene. “I felt threatened, and I felt violated. I felt I wasn’t protected as a coach,” said Kvitle. 12
In researching this topic, I did not find one single authority who suggested that kids need more coaching from the sidelines by their parents. Hmmmm. If you really do have knowledge and encouragement to impart on a team, then become a volunteer coach. But if you choose to be a fan, stay in your lane, please.
If I still haven’t convinced you to rethink coaching your kids from the stands, think about these questions:
1. Would it be helpful if while kids are in school and being taught a subject by their teachers in the classroom, we as parents stand out in the hallways and shout out our knowledge to make sure our kids are really learning? So as the teacher is explaining multiplication principles and your kid is practicing at the board, you can be overheard shouting: “Don’t forget to carry the first digit when multiplying 12 times 12!”
2. Would you like a barrage of “advice” as you go about your job? So let’s say you are a surgeon. As you are going about a procedure, you hear a chorus of people offering their “encouragement”: “Focus on your scalpel technique.” “A gentler touch, Doctor!” “You’ve got this!” Surely you’d perform better, right? Doesn’t every professional prefer unsolicited commentary from an enthusiastic peanut gallery?
Disclaimer: You should obviously become more actively involved when your child could be harmed by an abusive coach or teammate.
Leave the referees alone
Meet Brian Barlow, a pilot, soccer referee, and concerned parent based in Oklahoma. Barlow started Offside, an effort that addresses the issue of inappropriate behavior by parents on the sidelines of youth sports events. If you check out the Offside Facebook page, you will see hundreds of examples of parents verbally abusing referees and starting brawls.
The videos on Offside are viewed by thousands of people. The Facebook page description states: “A referee satire page built to shame bad parents & highlight referee life isn’t easy!” The initiative has generated significant media coverage, including on Good Morning America.
“The best outcome for the page is for clubs and organizations to know there is an initiative out there that is designed to hold people accountable for their actions and can truly help curb parental abuse,” Barlow said. 13
Over 64 percent of referees said they have had to eject spectators from youth games for bad behavior, according to a survey by the National Association of Sporting Officials. 14 The National Umpire Association says the number of baseball and softball umpires in the Babe Ruth youth baseball and softball league has been on the decline for years. A major reason is the abusive behavior that these individuals must endure. 15
Coaches can respectfully advocate for calls. It isn’t the parents’ place to be doing this, especially if it is done disrespectfully, as is often the case. I often observe parents who lack basic knowledge about the sport’s rules barking at referees. In one instance, a dad was harping on a referee for not awarding free throws after a foul. He clearly didn’t understand the differences between a shooting foul and a non-shooting foul.
Referees in youth sports don’t earn lots of money. And yes, there are some bad, untrained referees out there who miss calls. But rest assured that there aren’t corrupt schemes going on in which officials are in cahoots to ensure your kid is on the bad end of calls. Also remember that players, coaches, and fans mess up every game.
Nevertheless, many parents seem to believe it is their right to unload on these referees. The tone and intensity of parents’ pleas for sporting justice is astounding. Some sound like they are urgently pleading with a sleeping police officer to stop a murderer on the run. Verbally abusing officials from the sidelines is cruel, embarrassing, and unproductive and sets a terrible example for our kids.
We can’t have youth sports without game officials. Just imagine what it would be like if parents and coaches from opposing teams were the sole arbiters of sports legality? It is time we all treat umpires and referees with respect, even if we don’t agree with all their decisions.
Diffuse!
My mother and father live out of state and unfortunately aren’t able to watch my boys regularly play in their youth sports activities. Finally, we were able to coordinate their visit at a time when the kids had recreational basketball games.
Unfortunately, it ended in an ugly way. Two 10-year-old kids were tussling under the basket toward the end of the game. The boys started jawing at one another. The referee observed this and made them shake hands and apologize just before the final buzzer.
The peace was short-lived. Moments after the game ended, the dads of the two boys confronted each other. A league administrator needed to break them up as the fathers pushed one another. Vociferous swearing could be clearly heard across the gym in the presence of dozens of kids.
Both dads might have thought they were defending their respective sons. After all, isn’t it the primary responsibility of a parent to defend their child from harm? Maybe you feel inclined to intervene if your bundle of joy is involved in overly physical play. Or perhaps you’ve felt inclined to come to your kid’s defense if there’s dirty play from the opposition.
Most sports have a certain degree of physicality involved. It comes with the territory. If you don’t like that reality, choose a different activity.
At times, there may be a dirty play in which your kid is impacted. The best way to defend your kid in these instances is to diffuse, diffuse, and diffuse! We can teach our kids more about how to handle conflict by turning down the temperature in these situations. Don’t further ignite tense moments. Escalating the situation could actually lead to further violence that brings greater harm to your kid. The car ride home can be an opportunity to calmly discuss the life lessons that come with an individual who is trying to cheat or play dirty.
These dads opted for the latter. They obviously made the situation worse. Their embarrassing actions resulted in league suspensions. In the process, they set a terrible example to their kids and everyone else in the gym that day. I guarantee that the kids will remember their fathers’ actions for the rest of their lives.
“I never remember a situation like this when you kids played sports,” said my mom to me as we walked out of the gym.
“Welcome to youth sports in 2024,” I responded.
YOU are being watched, too!
Wrapping up this chapter, remember that your actions are being observed. Obviously, your kids and their peers can hear you.
My buddy Max Durbois coached his son’s U10 All-Star team in Connecticut in the summer of 2022. The team won the state championship and went on to claim the East Coast region title. The coaches were congratulating the players in the dugout when suddenly they were interrupted by a dad who didn’t feel his kid was being played correctly. This dad decided to unleash his wrath on the coaches in the presence of all the kids. The expletive-filled tirade took place literally minutes after the team’s remarkable achievement. Max and his fellow coaches put in hundreds of hours into coaching. They gave up summer vacations and altered their work schedules. Their pay: $0.
In another instance, I was watching a youth seven- and eight-year-old recreational basketball game. There was an instance where some physical contact was made between two kids. It appeared inadvertent. At a timeout, somehow one of the kids involved ended up in the bleachers to speak with his parents.
“Next time he makes contact with you, stick up for yourself and elbow him. Let him know you are there,” said the dad. The mom echoed a similar message. These two people didn’t think anyone noticed their “advice.” I did and their words now live in this book!
Your actions might just happen to be in the background as a fellow parent records the action. You don’t want your bad moments to go viral on social media. Imagine how some of those parents featured on the Facebook Offside videos must feel.
If your kids are playing at a very high level, college coaches could be evaluating you as well. Mike Bray, head basketball coach at Notre Dame from 2000 to 2023, stated: “There is no question that we evaluate parents with the prospects. I think it is fair to say that we backed off offering a scholarship because I wasn’t sure I could communicate in the right way with the parents. I watch family reactions in the stands when I am recruiting and I talk to parents just as much as I do the prospect.”
Former professional basketball player Mark Wade, who coached at Division II Saginaw Valley State University, concurs. During recruiting trips, alarm bells would go off when they heard parents screaming at their kids to shoot.
“We wanted to see parents who were supportive and not interfering,” he said. “We certainly discussed as coaches that a particular kid may be very talented, but it wouldn’t be worth the trouble of dealing with the difficult parents.”
If you are one of those individuals who has a hard time controlling your emotions at a youth sporting event, do yourself a favor. Ask a friend to record you for a few minutes. Then watch it the next day, preferably in a sober state. There is a good chance you will be horrified to see how foolish you look and sound.
Questions to consider
1. Are your words and actions from the stands creating a positive and supportive environment for young athletes?
2. Imagine if your actions in the stands were being recorded by someone for the entire game. If the video was uploaded to YouTube, would you be proud of the content? Would you share it?
3. Would a major college coach be more likely to recruit your kid after observing your actions as a youth sports parent?
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9 Matheny, Mike. The Matheny Manifesto: A Young Manager's Old-School Views on Success in Sports and Life. New York: Crown Publishing, 2017. Kindle.
10 "Basketball Coach Steve Kerr's Advice To Sports Parents," Positive Coaching Alliance, YouTube, Uploaded December 8, 2014.
11 “Doc Rivers on Sports Parenting,” YouTube, Positive Coaching Alliance, Uploaded August 12, 2011.
12 Adam, David. “I Felt Threatened and I Felt Violated: QND Coach Berated in Locker Room by Parents after Regional Title Match Loss," Muddy River Sports, October 27, 2023. https://muddyriversports.com/top-stories/sports-spotlight/i-felt-threatened-and-i-felt-violated-qnd-coach-berated-in-locker-room-by-parents-after-regional-title-match-loss/20231027063500/.
13 McCarthy, Kelly. “Referee shames ill-behaved parents in videos that show act of sportsmanship," Good Morning America, July 19, 2018. https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/living/story/referee-shames-ill-behaved-parents-videos-show-act-56683957.
14 “17,000 referees reveal the real problem with sportsmanship in youth sports,” TrueSport, February 28, 2018. https://truesport.org/a-good-sport/17000-referees-problem-sportsmanship-youth-sports/.
15 Yurkevich,Vanessa. "America has an umpire shortage. Unruly parents aren’t helping," CNN.com, May 18, 2023. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/18/business/umpire-shortage-parent-behavior/index.html.