To the Parent’s of Children with “Tough” Coaches:
I’m the wife of an overzealous, extremely passionate baseball coach. My husband is a former minor leaguer with years of professional playing experience from a young age through minor leagues with the Reds and Braves organizations. He has tenacity, determination, and extreme passion for the sport. He has a dozen parents paying him for private baseball lessons weekly and receives texts thanking him for his help because he’s taught their kids a LOVE of the game and determination and respect. Their kids are excelling because he pushes them to give their best. He expects his players’ attention and expects them to give their best effort on the field. And he expects it from a young age!
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This should be printed and posted on the wall of every school building or workplace for that matter. Some so called adults still have not learned this lesson. You said it perfectly now if only parents would read it and comprehend the words. Life is tough and kids need to learn that you need to do the best that you can. Be considerate and respectful and be able to deal with disappointment. This is not a perfect world but life is truly what you make it.
Hi Lorena!! I’m so glad you agree 🙂 I appreciate your comments!!
Wow! Awesome!! I agree 100%! As a coaches wife, I can totally relate!! Thanks for sharing!!
Abbey…Thank You.
There may not be thousands of comments attached, but believe me when I say that your words are appreciated. A “million thank yous” for writing this.
Coach Frank Melgoza
Diamond Girlz Fastpitch Softball
Thanks for your support, Frank!
Couldn’t agree more as a coach I yell as loud as I cheer. I have no problem high fiving and dancing but also pointing and saying that was horrible. I find parents who cant take the straight forward do it right type coach are usually unsuccessful in life.
I just came across this article. I agree completely and wanted to add a point. As kids get older, they learn to hide failure and shame. And fear of failure can be crippling. If the first time our children encounter a demanding, critical superior (teacher, coach, boss, client) is only after adolescence, they can’t handle it. They don’t have the tools to process how to deal with these types of people and criticism and how to hear criticism and how to get back on the proverbial horse. If we needlessly reward, praise, and compliment our children to build their self-esteem, it will crumble upon the first real test.
When all the parents on my daughter’s U10 soccer team (years ago) complained incessantly about the demanding coach – I couldn’t have disagreed more. What better opportunity would I have as a parent than this coach, at her age, to teach my daughter how to contextualize the screaming, how to hear what the coach wants, how to not take it personally, how to learn from it. We used to joke that the coach had two personalities: “papa bear” and “banshee.” She learned to put her head down and work harder when he was mad or demanding and learned to appreciate him because he only wanted the best for his players. She learned while he might be critical of her soccer playing on that day, in that play – he didn’t love/like her personally any less. She learned to appreciate that his demands and expectations were high because he believed she/they could do it and appreciated that he wanted her to be the best that she could be.
Life is full of daily failures and mistakes. If we teach our kids that they are just that and not indictments of them personally, that they can brush off mistakes and learn from them, we are giving them a great gift. The demand for niceness over competency has a cost. While I love that my kids play sports, it is the competency in working on teams that you refer to, the ability to adjust play under the conditions, the learning to lose, the learning that hard work pays off – that’s why I travel all over the country so my kids can play a game…. it certainly isn’t for the goals or to visit every Olive Garden in America.
Lastly, I don’t think this is part of the “political correctness” movement or the new “Me Too” movement. This is part of the self-esteem movement. Political correctness isn’t about being nice to everyone – it is about recognizing people’s identities. While your husband/coach may be tough and demanding, I bet he knows every single kid’s name. He doesn’t refer to them as “hey you” or call them “hey, slow guy.” He doesn’t call the gay kid a “fag.” That’s political correctness.
I’m a first year head Coach of Little League Minor AA team. I’m a tough Coach but my kids have out learned, out played, and out preformed in all aspects of the game. We are currently 7 and 0 and my parents have been a nightmare. I come from a family with 45 years of generational experience in coaching little league baseball and I’ve passed down what was taught to me. I was going to call it quits until I read this, now I’m just going to send it out in an Email to our parents.