Ask Amy: Sports Dad Strikes Out at Little League

[cereta]

Dear Amy: My husband is a very competitive guy.

He is usually a dedicated, loving and fun father, but when we go to our son’s Little League games, another side comes out.

My husband is the loud one on the sidelines — pacing, swearing and turning red; he micromanages our son, and shouts belittling comments at him and other kids on our team.

He argues with the umpires, and complains about the coaches.

It is embarrassing and hurtful for our son, and I don’t envy the coach.

My husband has coached a few of my son’s teams, as well, and he has been ejected from games during those seasons.

I’ve tried asking him to be calmer. I have urged him to try to see things from our son’s perspective, but his reply is that you should always demand 100 percent from people.

He says that he’s a lot better than his own dad, who never showed up for anything. How can I get him to see that this behavior is unacceptable and actually harming or son?

— Exhausted

Dear Exhausted: Your husband claims that he is “better” than his own father was, but how is getting ejected from a game better than not showing up for the game? Either way, Dad is not at the game!

If your son screamed, yelled, threw tantrums on the field, and got ejected, would your husband endorse this behavior? I doubt it.

I shared your question with Tina Syer, of the Positive Coaching Alliance (positivecoach.org), a national nonprofit organization dedicated to training parents and coaches to have positive and pro-social experiences on the field.

She responds, “Sports parents too often lose sight of the big picture in youth sports, which are ideal for teaching life lessons that can help kids develop and achieve in all aspects of their lives. ‘Exhausted’ should persuade her husband to focus on the long-term effects of his behavior.”

Syer, who coaches one of her sons’ baseball teams, says, "Learning to compete and give 100 percent is important, and the way to ensure your son takes those life lessons is by providing unconditional love and support, regardless of performance, and by helping him process the youth sports experience.

"Berating him, coaches, officials or others only serves to humiliate the child — chasing him from the sport — and to drive a wedge between him and his father, potentially for the rest of their lives. Research, and the top sport psychologists working with pro athletes, has found that negativity degrades performance."

Syer and I agree that shooting a video of your husband freaking out might shock him into changing.

Don’t ask him to change; lovingly demand that he apply his famous 100 percent effort to changing.

Comments

[cereta]

I am having flashbacks to Trophy Kids (excellent documentary if you can stand it emotionally, and it's really tough in places).

I think the filming is good advice. Sadly, it doesn't always work, but it's worth a go.

I hope that the various leagues LW's kid is enrolled in follow a growing trend of taking a hard line with this kind of behavior (why they would allow him to coach after being repeatedly ejected from a game is beyond me, unless they are really hard up for volunteers); I really think that's the only solution to the immediate problem of game behavior.

The larger problem of parents who treat their kids like crap over sports? Man, I wish I had an answer.

[the_rck]

Most of these sports groups are desperate for coaches. For Cordelia, there was a point at which I considered volunteering to coach soccer because we had a dozen kids and couldn't find a coach. Fortunately, the PE teacher at Cordelia's school coached high school soccer and got a couple of his students to coach (I think that there's a community service requirement for high school graduation, and this counted). They were juniors in high school, I believe, and I'm quite sure that Rec & Ed wouldn't have accepted them if there had been any other options.

Well, it probably helped that the PE teacher was widely known and respected. His recommendation carried a vast amount of weight. We lost him to cancer about a year later, and his name is on a lot of stuff throughout the school district.

[the_rck]

My step-father had horrible experiences with Little League in this respect in the 1960s, so he was never willing to have my half-brother participate in sports because he was sure it would be traumatizing.

When my sister played soccer, my step-father's main happy thing about it was that none of the parents knew the rules (it was the early 1980s) and so couldn't scream at their kids so much.

[pensnest]

negativity degrades performance

When I was at college, I learned to row. I have fond memories of a head of the river race my father attended, hurtling along the towpath on my small-wheeled bike. As he was a large man, over 6' tall and about 16 stone, this was a sight to see.

Some dialogue from that race.

Coach: Work, you sods! Work!

Me(thinks): I am bloody working. Can't work any harder.

Dad: You're doing really well! Come on! Come on! Just a bit more! You can do it! Looking good!

Me(thinks): Yes, I can do it.

Guess which one produced the best results?


IOW, the father in this problem is a disgrace.

[tielan]

We had a dad at hockey who yelled at his daughter (the goalie of the team I was coaching last year) who was just 12. Someone - one of the women who knew him from outside hockey - had a word with him about his language, and he seems to have calmed down some. (I hope so, because this year he's apparently coaching the team I coached year...)

I always took a moment to check on the girl, encourage her, tell her she did good. Because nobody needs that kind of putdown, whether among other people, or in a one-to-one "you screwed up and imma yell at you about it".

Demanding 100% is one thing; demanding 100% and then throwing a shitfit when their 100% is only 10% Olympic Selection level is pretty assholish IMO.

My suggestion for this is to encourage the son (if he's willing) to tell the father that he doesn't want him at the son's games. Mediate if necessary, but let the child speak of his hurt and his shame about his father's behaviour.