re: I Posted on the OT as well but: Inside the Mind of the High School Sports Parent in 2025

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“People don’t understand that this is not an avocation for us, it’s a vocation. It’s how we support our families.”

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That is pretty dumb at the high school level. If you are a high school coach, your top priority should not be winning. Your top priority should be to develop those kids. Not as short stops and left tackles, but as men.

Not every school is gonna win state. We have way too many coaches who see themselves as the next coming of Saban. Machiavellian attitudes towards winning just turns kids and parents off the game. But "win at all costs" seems to be the prevelant attitude among most coaches.

I would rather my kid be coached by a good man who teaches them all the benefits of team sports and never sniffs a state title, than an a-hole who doesnt care about the kids but wins every game.

High school sports are not that important. You won state? It doesnt matter one bit if you are a POS in life.

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The coach really doesn't have the ability to tell the kid who shoots 72 3 practice sessions in a row that were going to go ahead and put the kid who shot 82, 85 and 87 on the starting varsity team over you

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As a former D1 golfer, I can tell you that absolutely happens in college. Maybe not high school and certainly not to the extreme disparity in scores as your example, but it does happen.

I was on scholarship at UNC for 2 years. Transferred to UGA and was invited to walk on. Beat the #5 scholarship player like a drum all year long (to the tune of paying for all my beer and food out of his pocket) and never made the traveling squad. At least the coach was straight with me; he said his scholarship guys were traveling and that’s it. He recruited me in HS and knew I could play; it was the way it was.

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Have you actually seen this happen at a high school?

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Yes, I personally coach in a program like the one I've been describing.

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Create multiple freshmen, JV or varsity teams

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You can’t have multiple varsity teams and if you are having 4-6 sub varsity teams you are just creating a massive headache for yourself.

Yes it’s important for kids to belong to something and have a tribe but what makes a truly elite program special is the exclusivity that comes with it.

Football and track are non cut sports and are wonderful opportunities for every kid to belong to something

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That is pretty dumb at the high school level. If you are a high school coach, your top priority should not be winning. Your top priority should be to develop those kids. Not as short stops and left tackles, but as men.

Not every school is gonna win state. We have way too many coaches who see themselves as the next coming of Saban. Machiavellian attitudes towards winning just turns kids and parents off the game. But "win at all costs" seems to be the prevelant attitude among most coaches.

I would rather my kid be coached by a good man who teaches them all the benefits of team sports and never sniffs a state title, than an a-hole who doesnt care about the kids but wins every game.

High school sports are not that important. You won state? It doesnt matter one bit if you are a POS in life.

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that sounds cool, but coaches are hired and fired based off their winning percentage too....yall can talk all this shite, but in the end, the coach is playing the best players because his job depends on it

and you can be a good person and still priortize winning. Yall sound like a bunch of damn pussies

There is a happy medium, you know, and the guy I was talking about occupied it. He never sniffed a state title, only got to the state playoffs a few times, but he was enormously respected and after he died young of cancer, the school’s football field now bears his name.

I thought that attitude was refreshing and right on target and still do.

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The athletic program that I coach for creates enough teams to allow every athlete at the sub varsity level(if they come to practice every day, and follow the other rules and philosophies of the program), to have as equal as possible playing time with a goal of having kids on a roster for 133% of the number of players that play at a time. We even have a varsity B team for kids that would have gotten cut as seniors at any other school. They play against the varsity at lower level schools and actually so really well. So yes, it can be done actually. I have had a conversation with school leadership about requiring all or incentivizing some of the other athletic programs in the school to do the same. We would have kids come to the high school (private school, pay to play.but if a family can't afford it, we creatively find a way to make it happen for the betterment of the kid) solely because of that, and would have the healthiest culture in the entire country.

We have had an issue with a parent exactly one time in 15+ years.

Its a lot of work scheduling games, practices, getting good coaches that buy in, etc. but it is absolutely worth it and epitomizes what scholastic athletics is supposed to be about.

We won a state title with a senior starter that would have been cut by any other program as an underclassman.

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#1 in 99% of states you cant just have a second varsity team. you cant just add a team to the overall state athletic commission.

#2 99.99% of schools have 1 field..how do you propose even buy land for multiple fields when they are land locked like most schools are? where are these fund coming from even if private because 99% of families that go private are not going to be willing to pay more for more sub varsity teams

#3 how do you pay for more coaches when you can only have certain number of coaches and volunteers as it is? Teachers and especially coaches are completely underpaid as it is, now you want them to coach double the amount of teams?

what happened to competing? what happened to "I didnt start on varsity, so im going to spend 4+ hours a day all off season working my arse off to beat them out next year"?

now there are some really big schools in the DFW area in really prosperous suburbs that have 3 full fields and carry 40 on freshman, 40 on jv and 40 on varsity....but they have the money to have 3 full time staffs. and these are 6a schools with 3k+ students



the school in the OP is a 5a school in Louisiana in the poorest part of the state. All the shite you are talking about isnt even possible per the rules and even if it was, that part of the state has no way to pay for it at all.

Travel ball is a way to monetize parents who don’t understand that the odds are insanely low that Junior is going to get a Division Z scholarship, let alone play pro ball, but they still dream of Junior ultimately being able to support them so they can quit the jobs they hate and live lives of leisure.

I covered a high school baseball game one time and some kid was up to bat and Daddy was standing behind home plate giving him constant chattering instructions using the jargon you hear on those YouTube channels, it was obvious they’d been involved in some kind of private instruction to turn him into Ted Williams. If I had been the coach I’d have told Daddy to sit his arse in the stands and shut up, but Karma took care of it because the kid with all his styling never came close to getting a hit that day. And I’m sorry, I snickered under my breath at it.

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Travel ball is a way to monetize parents who don’t understand that the odds are insanely low that Junior is going to get a Division Z scholarship, let alone play pro ball, but they still dream of Junior ultimately being able to support them so they can quit the jobs they hate and live lives of leisure.

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the exact thing ignorant people say. non travel ball kids dont even make the HS teams in most areas, certainly not the good ones. and most "travel" ball teams dont even travel more than 40-50 miles max. 90% of teams in south LA don't ever travel more than an hour

the fact that most people are so stupid and out of touch that they think travel ball is about a college scholarship is insane. you do realize there are less than 10 rec leagues in the whole state for 13/14u right?

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I covered a high school baseball game one time and some kid was up to bat and Daddy was standing behind home plate giving him constant chattering instructions using the jargon you hear on those YouTube channels, it was obvious they’d been involved in some kind of private instruction to turn him into Ted Williams. If I had been the coach I’d have told Daddy to sit his arse in the stands and shut up, but Karma took care of it because the kid with all his styling never came close to getting a hit that day. And I’m sorry, I snickered under my breath at it.

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1) nobody knows the swing better than the father if they are involved but games arent the time to give mechanical ques for the most part

2) pretty much every HS kid that is worth a frick is taking private instruction and has been for years before HS.


are you really under the impression that HS kids jsut go to practice and that makes them good? the little 2 hour practice with 3 coaches and 40 kids? :rotflmao:



again, you are as out of touch as the parent in the OP. fricking luaghable

Struck a nerve?

I guess it’s also about parents’ egos.

Travel ball is a pestilence that is primarily about making money.