Photo Credit: NAYS
One of my favorite topics to discuss in youth sports is the idea of having balanced teams. Making a youth-sports program successful and creating a league with as much parity as possible are probably two of the biggest challenges, but also can be the most rewarding.
Youth sports are supposed to be fun. Ever since the National Alliance for Youth Sports began asking the question back in 1981, the answer “to have fun” was always number one—not winning, but fun. I would argue that kids have far more fun in a highly competitive game that comes down to the wire and losing than winning by a blowout versus an inferior team. Give me a league where all the teams finish close to a .500 win percentage, and I will show you a league where kids have a lot of fun.
We Have A Problem
I’ll never forget the first time coaching my son in baseball. It was a T-ball league for kids under six. As with most leagues, the roster starts with your own child and then a child of one of your assistant coaches. And just like most leagues for young children, all the top players were being coached by their parents. There were two exceptions in this particular season of our league: