Don't disagree with anything you said for the most part. And if one believes that middle school sports is only preparation for high school sports, then how you described it is the only way you can approach it. I'm just not sure it's the ONLY way to look at it though. It's a tough question no doubt, and for a coach who tries to walk the line of being competitive and trying to get everyone (who is deserving) playing time in games...lets just say it's a very delicate balancing act.

 

Let me ask you your opinion on something PP, and anyone else who wants to chime in.

 

Situation: 7th grade ms basketball team. Overall team/class is fairly down in talent, struggle to win games, struggle at the pg and C spots especially. Have 16 kids on the 7th grade team. Coach brings in the 6th grade pg and C to play up on 7th grade team, and though they might not start (yet), they get the starter minutes. Yes, the 6th graders are better than the 7th graders at those two spots. Yes, tey make the team a little better, but still not really winning games. Question: Should the 6th graders play up or should the 7th grade coach use what he's got and try to develop them?

 

What were the intentions of the move up? To try and make the 7th grade team better or to challenge the talented 6th graders that weren't being challenged at their level.

This should be called Mandatory Coaching Time.

 

This system really works if your coach, coaches every child the same.

 

Make it a competetive enviroment with fun and confidence built in.

I was old school about this issue. After years of trying to find a system that works for all kids, this works the best.

Zero parent issues.

Here's the issue, if you are preparing kids for high school, you better be playing more than 5 guys and winning may not be the primary goal. Some of your A players may not play that sport at the next level because they are forced to choose one sport over another. So, you need to keep developing all kids.

Let's take a look at every football team in the state of Kentucky. On everyone of those teams, you have kids that work their tails off for a starting job. You also have the kids that work hard but just aren't as good as the starter. They

Might be rewarded as a rotator. Then you have the players who don't do anything at all. The ones that stand around during practice, the ones that say they're too lazy to practice. If everyone gets playing time, including the "lazy ones" I think some things will stir up between the hard working starters and the lazy snobs. IMO if I were a starter and a lazy snob got to play, I would get pretty mad. Being a former three year starter for a 1A program, there isn't much players on the team. When I played, I did everything I could to keep my position.

 

Now, if you play a game and get a running clock going, then yes, everyone should get the opportunity to play. This is the time to reward the rotators and young kids for their contributions to scout team. But if it was a right knit game and my coach puts a lazy snob in, I would have a problem with it. You get out of it with what you put in it. If it were easy, everyone would start.

^ Welcome to BGP, Little Ram! :thumb:

^ Welcome to BGP' date=' Little Ram! :thumb:[/quote']

 

Thank you!

CincySportsFan is dead on.

 

Middle school athletics should be first and foremost about development. You can have quality play AND development of ALL kids. It's not mutually exclusive. All middle schools have an A team for basketball. If you're good enough to make the A team you should get minutes every game. I've done it with very good 8th grade teams. Heck, I've lost games in the regular season where I could have won had I played the best players when it got tight. I wanted my other guys to get that exposure and experience. We were better for it in the long run.

 

I watched the Conner 6th grade girls team last year. They were loaded with talent. However, the coach decided he was going to establish his reputation as a "great coach" by playing a short bench and blowing teams out. His 12th girl could play. However, winning was his priority. That's insane. The guy should not be allowed to coach middle school teams.

 

If I'm a high school coach I tell all of my middle school coaches to get minutes for everyone so they all get better. Selfishly I don't want some gung-ho "look at me" coach running off players that might help me in the future as varsity players.

 

This has nothing to do with "participation trophies" or "lets all get ribbons." That's pure nonsense and shows some of you guys type without thinking.

Ask people in Clay County if they feel middle school sports changed the basketball culture there. For the longest time, there were only grade schools that went up to 8th grade. Lots of kids getting lots of playing time, competing against one another in highly competitive grade school games. If I'm not mistaken, there might have even been a 7th grade team and 8th grade team at each school, with the younger kids playing on B teams or something similar.

 

Middle school opens in the mid-1990's. IIRC, the first class to graduate our high school where every kid went to the middle school was 1998. Clay County's last real shot at winning state was probably 1994. Last back to back trips to State were 1998 & 1999. Lots of people back home don't think that's a coincidence. It has nothing to do with the coaching, because our middle school teams had pretty good coaches, but more to do with the number of kids the high school ended up getting to pick from under the new system.

Let me add one comment:

 

You can't do this for middle school football. Too many kids to get in.

 

Middle school football should go to a 5th quarter.

Let me add one comment:

 

 

 

Middle school football should go to a 5th quarter.

 

Clyde....rethink this. :lol:

I read a study recently about adolecent coping skills, or the lack there of. To sum it up, children are not able to cope with failure because they don't experience enough of it as they mature. Meaning, the world doesn't give a flip about your feelings, and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there if you let it! Failure teaches perserverence and work ethic. We learn through failure, we do our kids an injustice when we help with everything, allow them to succeed without earning it, and teach them the world is fair. Who in the sam heck said life was FAIR!!!???? They have to learn that at an early age, otherwise they WILL fail, and NOT get back up. Within that same study it was mentioned that this current generation, overall, will be the first to NOT do better than their parents. I don't blame the kids for this, it's our fault as adults for allowing it to happen.

Here's my thought on it. I know this is talking about middle school, but I'm going to take it a step further, and go back to elementary school too. But, basically it boils down to this...at what point in time do you want to choose your high school varsity athletes? Because when you start taking kids just so that you can have someone your "stars" can practice against, you're setting in motion the perennial benchwarmers' attitude of "why bother?" Sure they may stick with it for a few years, just for the sake of the camaraderie, or the prestige of "being on the team". But, after awhile, it's going to get old. And as they get older and older, there's going to be more an more "distractions" that are going to pull them away from athletics. And that's why you'll see these 6'4" kids walking down the halls of the high school that are not playing basketball. And it's because their growth spurt didn't happen until 8th grade, and by that time they've become bored with the sport because they haven't seen any significant playing time since 2nd grade.

 

Things are completely different than when I was in school 25-30 years ago. There's more competition for kids' time now. And if athletics wants to maintain it's spot as a priority for kids, it's going to have to "give" them something in return. And running wind sprints, or shooting free throws, or being practice fodder for the #1's, just isn't going to cut it anymore. You've got to make them feel involved in something important...and that's the game.

 

And what really hurts, is if you have multiple elementary schools in the same district. Say, for instance, you have three elementary schools...each fielding a 12 member basketball team. When they move to the 6th grade, under a single middle school, now there's 36 kids trying out for maybe 15 spots. So, 21 are going to get cut. That's an awful lot of pressure on the 6th grade coach to properly evaluate talent for the next 6 years. And now, you're going to turn around and whittle that number down even further to just the 6 or 7 "stars" in that grade level who get the bulk of the playing time?

 

I agree that it shouldn't carry over into high school...but, at the lower levels, I think every school district would be better off if it not only got, but kept, more kids involved. And the longer you can do that, the more beneficial it will be at the high school level. JMO.

 

Agree agree agree agree agree and did I say I agree?

Spot on with my feelings.

 

Attrition is going to happen. Kids are going to realize that a sport or sports arent for them at some point, but let it be when they are high school.

 

Middle school football kills this IMO. Highlands has it figured out.

I think there's a difference between "equal playing time" and "development". I haven't seen anyone on this thread that strikes me as an "equal playing time" person. I have seen a lot of good responses about "development" over "let's do whatever we need to so we can win this middle school game" though.

I read a study recently about adolecent coping skills, or the lack there of. To sum it up, children are not able to cope with failure because they don't experience enough of it as they mature. Meaning, the world doesn't give a flip about your feelings, and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there if you let it! Failure teaches perserverence and work ethic. We learn through failure, we do our kids an injustice when we help with everything, allow them to succeed without earning it, and teach them the world is fair. Who in the sam heck said life was FAIR!!!???? They have to learn that at an early age, otherwise they WILL fail, and NOT get back up. Within that same study it was mentioned that this current generation, overall, will be the first to NOT do better than their parents. I don't blame the kids for this, it's our fault as adults for allowing it to happen.

 

 

Then let's carry this logic out. Start having A teams in 1st grade. Kids getting cut can get a head start on learning life's tough lessons.

Ask people in Clay County if they feel middle school sports changed the basketball culture there. For the longest time, there were only grade schools that went up to 8th grade. Lots of kids getting lots of playing time, competing against one another in highly competitive grade school games. If I'm not mistaken, there might have even been a 7th grade team and 8th grade team at each school, with the younger kids playing on B teams or something similar.

 

Middle school opens in the mid-1990's. IIRC, the first class to graduate our high school where every kid went to the middle school was 1998. Clay County's last real shot at winning state was probably 1994. Last back to back trips to State were 1998 & 1999. Lots of people back home don't think that's a coincidence. It has nothing to do with the coaching, because our middle school teams had pretty good coaches, but more to do with the number of kids the high school ended up getting to pick from under the new system.

 

I know the same thing has happened to a couple football programs over the years. County schools where the 4 or 5 K-8 community schools all had 7th-8th teams to go along with the 1sr/2nd, 3rd/4th, 5th/6th. For years, there were in upwards of 25-35 freshmen rolling in (that was on average, some years it hit 40)....then came the ONE middle school with ONE team and then numbers started falling off drastically and so has this high school football program since then. We arent talking about a 6A school either.