COULD YOU DO IT?

An average family of four spends approximately $70,000 or more over seven years to train one child in a recreational sports league. That isn’t including travel, food, hotel stay, etc. for the rest of the family that supports the player.  That isn’t close to what is included in this analysis for one child to pursue a dream of playing at the next level. What could a family do with that amount of money? It’s an incredible investment financially. Add that to the emotional and psychological costs it has on the athletic participants? What about the amount of time it takes to train, travel and observe your kid or kids to even play in these recreational sports? I believe those costs are incredibly high to everyone involved. In many instances, there are even greater financial investments that a family undertakes and you have to ask, “what kind of return are these families getting from this increasingly growing financial investment?”.  Does it affect their ability to get a collegiate education without loans if they don’t get an athletic scholarship? What percentage of those kids playing recreational ball are actually going to college? Is some of the frustration within a game, where there is a missed traveling violation, related to the amount of time and investment spent? I believe it can be.  The level of stress and burden pushing our kids to become professional athletes before the age of 12 and the pressure has to be released somewhere and given to someone. Unfortunately, it feels as if the officials are the easy scapegoat.  

 Now, look at this intertwined with the fact that most officials are underpaid and not all are the best educated in the rules but make every effort to be? Do farents (fan-parents) know the rules? Do coaches know the rules? Question – what color is the rule book that applies to the sport your kid is playing? Could you ref a game your child participates in? This is where I want to introduce the show, ‘you say you want to ref, let’s do it!’ It could be interesting to let a couple of parents volunteer from the stands, give them a jersey and a whistle and have them call the game. This obviously would be done for its comedic value, but it is a show that I want to be produced one day. I believe everyone could enjoy it - what do you think?