Should kid athletes be prevented to not score?

Huh.

I was recently watching a soccer game before my daughter's, boys younger than her. One of them is the younger brother of a classmate of hers who I know is an amazing athlete. Turns out that the younger brother is also amazing. I watched about 10 minutes and in that time he scored four goals, pretty much effortlessly, and nobody seemed surprised. I don't know what the final score was but from reactions it looked like he'd already scored many, many goals.

That rubbed me a bit wrong -- he should be in another league, or he should just dial things down a bit. (Honestly, re: "effortlessly," I think he probably already had dialed things down a bit.)

If a single player is that dominant then nobody else really gets the soccer experience. And at age 11, I think that's still important. (Amazingboy's teammates looked bored and listless, even though they were apparently winning by a vast amount. They didn't do much but pass the ball to him, or kind of kick it in a general way and wait for him to go get it, which he was able to do most of the time.)

That's more my concern than the opposing players being discouraged.

I've definitely seen that on sozlet's teams too -- she's never played with a super-dominant player, but there is always a best player of course and I've noticed that in every sport, she and her teammates step up and play better when the star isn't there.

But not sure where to draw the line or how to enforce it.

those kids need to bump up an age group or two until they find a competitive balance.

then it's a win for everyone.

Yeah - I think that is a better solution for all around. Bump up or play on a more competitive league. It doesn't do the stronger player much good to play against and with weaker players - it isn't helping him get better if anything it will make him worse than his potential. And the other kids need the opportunity to develop.

That is even better than limiting goals/scores.

I know on our travel softball - we are limited in runs per inning. To me, as a parent, that is good or else we could be there all night.

I also look at this as a coach's responsibility. Not just in the respect of one player, but if your team is dominating - put in the lesser players that usually don't get to play as much. I figure it makes you a stronger team overall in that if your stronger player(s) can't be there, your lesser ones will be that much stronger when they are needed and when they are put in.

I'd agree with the move him up a league if it was anything other than football.

Mo plays on a team with 10 and 11 year olds. He sometimes practices with a team that his friend's dad coaches that is made up of 12-13 year olds. Those kids are much bigger and hit much harder. They also have several more years of experience and the kids that aren't as good have been winnowed out. Size really matters in football.

And it isn't always easy to take a kid out of the game. There aren't as many football leagues as there are for other sports and some teams have only a few extra kids and some of those kids won't/can't carry the ball.

I think they've reached a pretty reasonable solution if only in that nobody enjoys watching a really lopsided game.

I think I'm more in agreement with the author of the article. If you play with a team full of 'meh' you're only going to be able to rise slightly above 'meh'. If you play on a team/league with a phenom, you have to push yourself that much harder to stand out.

If the goal is improvement, let the kid play as much as he can and challenge the others to catch up to him. If the goal is simply 'winning' then yeah, heel chop the kid and watch a potential rising star be punished (because let's not kid ourselves, that's exactly what is happening) for being too good at the sport he's playing. That teaches an AWESOME lesson to the kids.

even in football.

Barry Sanders was always the smallest guy on the field...

I'm not against this - especially considering the next age up this rule does not exist.

Like I stated first it depends on age and competitiveness of the teams.

For example if a league is a learning league - then running up the score and equal playing time makes sense as the goal of the league is to teach the skills of the game.

If however, the goal of the league is competitive play then I would not agree with it- again depending on age appropriateness.

I've experienced both.

I was also wondering if perhaps because of remote location, there isn't an option of say playing club or AAU where you have more competitive teams...

Yes - I think you hit the negative part of this on the nail. You are almost punishing or discouraging playing at your best by this sort of rule - however, the kid is handling as well as you can - and next year fortunately he will not be held back by such rules - so maybe this is more an age-appropriate sort of thing?

As you stated about teaching other teams to play harder. I do this with my daughter. For example, tomorrow morning her team is playing against D1 and number 1 in the state and on the east coast. Her team not so good - D2 and 4th in the state. I tell her this is your chance to get better - you only get better by playing against strong teams - if you only play easy teams you will never get better.

I asked Mr. B how this stuff was handled in Mo's league and he said they put the onus on the coach to not run up the score -- that if they run the score up over a certain number of points (21?) that the coach gets suspended for a week.

The coaches combat this with the type of plays they call if their team starts getting too far ahead. They call difficult plays where the team has an opportunity to advance but little chance of scoring.

The kids aren't necessarily aware of this strategy so they continue to play hard.

I think this sounds like a really good way to handle such situations.

Any other sport than football, I'd say move them up.

Cycloptichorn

yes I agree - it helps develop their skills practicing a difficult skill without beating the heck outta the other team.

I just remember one game my daughter was in - now granted this is aau so it is more competitive so their is no rule on this...but they were playing against a Division 1 team, they were Division 2 so right there - a disadvantage according to skill level - but my daughter's team had only 5 players - just happened to be a time/day when more than half her team could not make the game. The team they were playing against immediately began to press - they didn't have a chance as the girls couldn't recover running so hard.

To me this would make sense for the other coach to try out new plays - to me that benefits both teams - my daughter being the point guard and thus having to run so much - had to request a time out at one point because she felt ready to puke.

Before any one says suck it up = She actually did puke during a game last week and continued playing the entire game.

Maybe also hockey - with checking being part of the sport -