Youth Sports

Try to refocus your energy on the effort your kid is putting in, how they treat their teammates/opponents, how they respond to their coaches, etc.

It’s not that the result of the game doesn’t matter; its that the result of the game matters far, far less than any of the above.

I can tell you this much, I had 2 kids I coached where the parents told me they either were moving on because their kid was better, or wanted to get better kids to replace some of the current kids. Only to see the first get labeled by the second as not good enough, then the second not to finish HS ball. That's the short version, the first ones looked down on others, only to have another look down on them later.

The moral of the story is worry about your kid enjoying the little bit of time they have as a kid and enjoy it.

Prepubescent sports is a killer for parents who have never been exposed to competitive HS sports either as an observer, or as a parent. They will believe a bracket game in a 12U tournament is a make or break for their kid's future success.

I keep the focus on my kid's effort and performance. Volunteer refs across all sports make bad calls regularly. Other kids are not reliable, may be great one game and completely distracted another. I don't let my younger kids complain about refs or teammates. With my older son, I'll let him vent a little, but bring it back around to what can be done to overcome that. I also try to tie it back to real life and having to overcome unfair situations and working with people that put in different levels of effort.

Everybody should umpire or referee one season of any sport. It really changes your perspective. It’s would be easier to umpire an MLB game with crisp plays than 10 year olds where everyone is bobbling the ball and bouncing it to first base.

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You have to always remember and remind yourself that the officials/referees/umpires are not even high school level. They make mistakes and miss calls often.

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What about the lady who has to make the game about herself? Every travel is a production and everything is a huge show when they have to make a call.

There are bad apples everywhere in every aspect of life.

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but I do get irrationally angry at missed calls

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Once you accept that they are mostly volunteers or individuals getting paid very little, and without them your kids would not be able to play sports, it gets easier.

This saying is so old school. My sister suns her butthole

You have to do them with your kids to teach them sportsmanship and teamwork. But man does a lot of it suck as a parent these days.

I mean even spazzing over any game is crazy. Even high school games are hard to enjoy now with all the parents that think they would be better coaches/refs. It’s gotta be embarrassing to have you parents screaming from the bleachers. Just enjoy the games and if little Johnny makes it to the pros great if not it’ll be okay.