Winning, Losing, Praising
// 4.22.07 // Filed under: My Son, Parenting
It was the fourth (and last) inning in my son’s first Little League game of the season. His team, the Orioles, was down 5 to 0. Suddenly, they got a hit, a stolen base, another couple hits, then an awesome hit that was close to a home run. The score was 5 to 4!
There was a runner on 3rd base and L was up to bat. The Red Sox pitcher threw him a couple decent pitches and 4 balls. According to league rules for the first half of the season in A-ball, kids can pitch until 4 balls are thrown, then a coach steps in. PHAT Daddy (who is assistant coach) had to pitch.
To recap, the score was 5-4, there was a runner on 3rd, and L was up to bat with 2 strikes and PHAT Daddy pitching to him. I was a little tense. Just one hit and the runner might come home and tie the game. The kids were all cheering L on. But it didn’t happen. Strike three and the game was over.
I was ready for L to be upset. But he wasn’t. He joked with PHAT Daddy about the “bad” pitches he had thrown (and PHAT Daddy admitted it was a bit stressful pitching to his own kid in that situation) and chatted happily about all that happened during the game.
That night, I kept thinking about winning and losing. Why did I expect L to be upset? Did I think he should have been upset?
I want my kids to do their best all the time. I want them to understand how to be team players, but also know that if they work hard, they can be the best. I don’t have any qualms about teaching my children that some people are better at some things than others. And this seems to be an outlook that is frowned upon in today’s society.
Every kid on a team gets a trophy. Every child gets to be “student of the month” at least once. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that many corporations are hiring consultants to teach managers how to compliment employees — a direct result of a generation raised to expect lavish praise.
At some point, it became politically incorrect to push our kids to win. It’s more accepted to teach them that “it’s just fun to play the game.” It’s no longer OK to tell our children that they can be the best, because that would imply that someone else is not as good. (I happen to think that public schooling has something to do with this, but that’s another post.)
Did the coach tell the kids they were all awesome and it didn’t matter that they lost? No. He told them 5-4 was “nothing to be ashamed of” and that they made an awesome effort in that last inning. Then he called for an extra practice before the next game.
And that’s the message I want my kids to get: You win some, you lose some. But it’s better to win, so practice hard and do your best.
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26 Responses to “Winning, Losing, Praising”
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We deal with this a lot with our kids too, and I don’t understand the mixed messages today’s philosophies send. On one hand, kids are pushed to tears working so much academically to get some score on a test. But in sports, the message is everyone deserves to play and it’s all about fun. How can both be true? The one concept I hate the most is the “everyone makes the team, and everyone gets to play” rule. What happened to try-outs, especially when kids start hitting 11-12 and have some real skill? It was a big deal to make the team, and the kids who didn’t have the skill in one thing looked for something else where they were talented.
Can I tell you how many play-off games were lost because the uncoordinated kid whose parent looks at Little League as free babysitting stands in the outfield picking flowers and doesn’t even see the ball fly by him? Or the nervous girl who has been forced into playing softball for six years and is still afraid of the ball is up to bat? These kids must play three innings by the rules, but if there had been try-outs, they wouldn’t have come close to making the team. Now all the other kids who work hard and train have to deal with losing because kids with no skill must be played. It is frustrating for the better players to lose games all the time when they have solid players forced to sit on the bench so everyone has a chance. I am sure it is not emotionally fulfilling to be the kid who loses the game for the team again and again either.
I may not be correct, but I believe in doing things well , and there is a lot to be said for working hard for success.
I couldn’t agree more. Great post!
I liked your post, but completely disagree with the above comment. One of my sons wants to play ball, and I know that he is not going to catch the ball if it comes to him. He just doesn’t have the skill. So that means he should never get the chance? Please! Not everyone is born a great athlete, and it is JUST A GAME. And believe me, with 6 kids playing sports it is anything but babysitting. It is actually HELL to get everyone to pratices and games. HELL. I would rather they all stayed home and twiddled thier thumbs, but that wouldn’t be very good for them, now would it?
I love soccer, everyone knows that it’s just a game and “rec” soccer is for fun; the intense players play for the travel league. To sum up why our local rec soccer league is so great, here is a quote from the rule book: “3 GOAL RULE. If a team leads by more than 3 goals, they are to provide one or more of their best players to the opposing team to balance the competition.” Yup, it’s just a game. I’m glad the soccer officials get it.
Kerry, I can see your point about rec leagues. If it’s a free league and the purpose is “just fun,” then by all means anyone should be able to play. But I’m paying $100+ bucks a season for my son to play Little League and I’d like him to get more out of it than “just playing the game.” HE wants more out of it, too. It’s not “just a game” to everyone.
And I have to honestly say that even in a rec league, I don’t see how forcing a team’s best players to switch sides teaches the kids anything about sportsmanship or competition.
Really? Because I think it does just that. Every year I invite all our friends to the soccer fields to celebrate my birthday. All are welcome to play, from my friends 4 year old to another’s husband for whom his life depends upon a win. We try our best to make teams even, and when they are not, we switch them, because it isn’t any fun to be creamated, and eventually it isn’t fun to creamate.
And I am paying for my kids to play. If so many parents feel that their kids need more competition then there should be a “travel league” for baseball like there is in soccer. To be honest, my husband and I were just discussing to night how football and baseball seem very cut thoat. It isn’t about having fun. Kids are being pushed, coaches yell, and it’s all about the win. My oldest is 11, and not one of my kids are playing any of their sports for the win. They all want to play new sports, try new things, meet new people, and learn new skills. They are just kids, little kids who want to play a game.
Shannon, you wrote:
“Did the coach tell the kids they were all awesome and it didnâÂÂt matter that they lost? No. He told them 5-4 was âÂÂnothing to be ashamed ofâ and that they made an awesome effort in that last inning. Then he called for an extra practice before the next game.”
If it was “nothing to be ashamed of” — which I think he meant as a compliment along with “awesome effort”, why the need for an extra practice? His words don’t seem to match his actions. Isn’t he saying that they DO need extra work (so they can win next time)?
Sadly, that IS what it’s all about even at the youngest levels…the kids know it early on. Rec or travel doesn’t matter & at all levels we pay (and a lot) for our kids to try lots of different sports & activities and we should. And, there should be a place for everyone. Winning DOES feel better than losing but you can learn a lot from both.
I learned over many years and many sports, that youth sports are not “play” and “just for fun”. No such thing any more. And that’s one reason why 70% of kids drop out of sports by age 13 — they start too early and it gets too intense too soon. They simply stop getting the good benefits sports can bring and just burn out.
Provocative post!
Shannon, I think the fact that your son wasn’t upset at the end of the game pretty much says it all: the adults usually care more about winning and losing than the kids do.
I think sports leagues for children, especially under age 10, should be instructional leagues that focus on helping *all* the children learn how to play, develop new motor skills, and understand the real meaning of teamwork, cooperation, fairness, and sportsmanship. And it should be FUN. You don’t have to win to have fun. (Which is not to say that winning isn’t fun. It is. But it’s not the most important thing, not by a long shot. I’d put it last on the list.)
I would never suggest to either of my kids that because — by the ripe old age of 7, 8, or 9 — they’re not naturally “good” at math or reading or spelling or science that they should forget those subjects and just let the “good” kids do them. I wouldn’t do that for “academic” skills, then why would I do it for physical skills? Or musical skills?
Why should we allow adults to sort children into the “good” athletes and the “bad” athletes at a tender age? Why would anyone want to decide for someone else’s child that he or she is not and never will be good at something? And why would parents want that for their children?
To be honest, I’m kind of surprised to hear homeschoolers advocating letting adults put young kids in boxes like that. I thought (most) homeschoolers advocated letting kids learn and develop at their own pace.
Lastly, I have never seen a free sports league. Even the ones run by the town recreation department charge a fee. So no parent is getting “free babysitting” by signing his/her kids up to play sports. Joining a sports league is a commitment for both the parent and child. And at the very least, since every parent pays the same fee, every single child should get the same playing time when the game starts.
That’s true. Competitive games when one is a child is a good template for later life.
Lori writes: “Why would anyone want to decide for someone elseâÂÂs child that he or she is not and never will be good at something?”
Lori, you also mentioned that you find it funny that homeschoolers are advocating putting kids in boxes. I find it funny when non-homeschoolers say hs’ers don’t “live in the real world,” and yet they say ALL kids should get an equal chance to participate in everything. How is that “real world?” With many things, there comes a time when a person must EARN their place, whether it be a sport, a club, a hobby, or a job. 3, 4, 5 years old is certainly not the time. But I think when a child has advanced in something like Little League (which IS serious business to many, i.e. the Little League World Series) that the age of 9 or 10 is old enough for them understand that hey, maybe they just don’t have the talent. They can still play for fun in a rec league, or practice hard so they make the team the next year. Or they might try something else and find a great talent!
No one is saying adults should decide that a child will *never* be good at something. Wasn’t it Michael Jordan who didn’t make the cut for his high school basketball team? That didn’t deter him. That’s the lesson I want my kids to learn, not the lesson that everyone is “owed” a spot.
I see nothing wrong with teaching kids that life IS about the win.
I guess you summed up the big difference in your last sentence. I donâÂÂt think itâÂÂs about the win, and from my perspective, people who do think itâÂÂs all about the win donâÂÂt always seem like happy people. It is about a game. Designed to be fun. And you canâÂÂt always win. Like I mentioned earlier, when we get people together to play soccer, (or softball, or baseball, or touch football) no one even remembers what team won or what the score is, because we are playing to have fun. A ten year old IS a child in my opinion and is still at an age for which sports should be fun. By high school and certainly by college it should be more competitive, but really, we are talking about little kids here.
The fact is, with recreational sports any child whose parents fork over the fee is entitled to a spot on the team. I donâÂÂt see much value in a 4 or 5 year old playing organized sports. At that point it is most often the parents pushing the child to compete. These are probably the same parents who donâÂÂt want the 8-10 year olds who are just starting an interest in the sport to play because they arenâÂÂt as good as the kids who have been groomed for 5 years. No kidding.
I am honestly shocked by how strongly people feel that only the best players should get to play the game. (GAME being the operative word!)
Kerry, how is it that life is not about the win? Maybe you misunderstood my statement. I mean, if you want to progress in life (better job, more satisfaction, success, happiness with your accomplishments) then don’t you have to have drive and ambition?
I find it funny when non-homeschoolers say hsâÂÂers donâÂÂt âÂÂlive in the real world,â and yet they say ALL kids should get an equal chance to participate in everything. How is that âÂÂreal world?âÂÂ
I’ve never said that homeschoolers don’t live in the real world. I’m a homeschooling (and school choice) advocate.
Like Kerry, I don’t think that life is about the win. I think life is about finding out who you are and then living a life that fulfills you. For some that will mean professional success and monetary rewards, and for others it will mean something completely different.
But that doesn’t mean kids can’t ever compete. But the importance of winning, in my opinion, should take a back seat to learning and just having a good time.
I don’t think we need to teach children how to compete. Competition already permeates every aspect of our society — kids will absorb it by osmosis.
Yes, drive and ambition are great things to have in life, but not everyone has those qualities and it doesn’t make them loosers.
Not everyone can be the best (how I would interpret the win in this case) and that doesn’t mean that they aren’t good enough or should just give up. Not every salesperson is going to be number one all the time, that doesn’t mean they suck. Trying hard and doing your absolute best may not earn you an A, but that doesn’t diminish what you did. Am I making any sense? I am very tired and should not be posting, but anyway…
The point is that to me and to my children, baseball is a game. We want to play, well, to play and to have fun. If the team wins, that’s great, but to us it isn’t the point. We are there to meet people, learn new skills, and have fun. I honestly think that is what sports at this age group should be about. I understand that to you it is something different, so why not gather up a bunch of people who feel the same way and start an exclusive team to compete at a different level? I didn’t get that impression from your original post.
Recently I have talked to some other mothers about the clique/cut throat behavior in baseball and football in particular, and everyone seems to agree that it’s just a game and should be fun and instructional at this point.
I agree to disagree and I’ll stop beating a dead horse
, but my kid is still going to play, and he isn’t going to catch the ball. And for the record, both my husband and I do work with all the kids in whatever sport they happen to be playing. We are very involved with our kids, not just dropping them off and certainly not picking daisys. I’m “that mother” who knows every kids name and yells encouraging things to them the entire game.
I think everybody here is missing the point, and I say this as someone that has coached youth baseball every year since about 1999. Most of those years I also coached basketball. Focusing on winning the game is silly with youth sports because you are teaching them to focus on things they can’t control. With rare exceptions, individual kids don’t have much impact on the outcome of team games, especially in baseball. The focus should be on teaching the fundamentals of the game. If you do that the wins tend to come naturally anyway. Particularly at the coach pitch age, the “win” is not the score of the game, it’s the fact that Billy actually ran to the correct base this time or that the shortstop fielded the grounder cleanly and got the runner at second. Winning anything is the result of doing lots of little things correctly, and the job of a youth coach is to focus on teaching the little things that will put the kids in the position to enjoy victories. Focusing on the victory is putting the cart before the horse.
Of course, even when you do everything exactly right, you still don’t always win. That’s real world and a lesson kids need to get from sports.
Parents put way more emphasis on the final score than the kids do. Even when I’ve had kids crying after a close loss 2 minutes later they were over it and were far more worried about the contents of the snack cooler.
Yes, these comment threads sometimes get way off on a tangent. My post was intended to say that I want my kids to do their best and to care about the outcome of anything they participate in. I don’t think that the ONLY thing a kid should focus on in sports is winning. Of course there are other lessons to learn. I just meant that it’s OK for them to care about winning, instead of telling them “it doesn’t matter.” Because I think it does matter.
I certainly didn’t mean to imply that those who aren’t “best” are losers. But those who don’t TRY are losers. Yes, life is about finding what fulfills you. I think the ones that really lose are those who just “go through the motions” and do what others tell them to do (and often expect society to make a place for them and take care of them). I think it does a child a disservice to raise them to expect that they can be a part of anything without hard work or talent.
Yes, it’s a bit of leap to get from Little League to my statements above. But it’s all related to how children are being brought up these days and what society wants our kids to think of themselves and their place in the world.
I’m the author of a team building book for kids and coaches and find the passions in the comments interesting. I guess looking here, it’s easy to see how one set of bleachers can so easily hold a parent who is cursing at kids for striking out and another who is encouraging all of the kids to simply do their best.
I do feel though, that kids at the elementary level are simply learning. They are learning the rules and nuances of the game, they are learning about the responsibility of being on a team, and they are learning whether or not they LIKE the game. *Those that are not interested will have been weeded out by the time the kids reach high school level or the all-star league.*
Most importantly, though, kids are – or should be – learning about teamwork and *doing their best*. On a team, every player matters (just as this is so in the workforce today). Coaches should be helping those kids learn the skills needed and giving them the opportunity to fully try out the game. Playing only the best players is better saved for higher levels of play.
An unskilled kid likely feels terrible about bench warming. The skilled kids are probably thrilled at the extra playing time. But what an opportunity this would be to teach these kids compassion and that every player is part of the team!
This reminds me of a Principal Skinner quote from the Simpsons. Frustrated because nothing he said was right (or at least PC), he conceded,
“All I know is that no one is better than anyone else, and everyone is the best at everything.”
And also, a line from The Incredibles:
“If everybody’s special, then no one is.”
Carli – It also makes me think of the line from The Neverending Story: “People with no hope are easier to control.”
But that’s another post entirely.
I don’t see anything in Shannon’s post that suggests she thinks team sports shouldn’t be fun or instructional. Or that kids who have less interest, talent, or experience should simply “forget” about baseball or be banned from trying out the game. But I agree that a child should not simply be entitled to a place on a baseball team any more than a child should be entitled to a role in a play or a seat in the local orchestra.
Little League is an organization that supports the learning, practice, and enjoyment of a competitive game. Anyone can have fun playing catch, batting some balls, or throwing together a casual baseball game in the backyard, much as anyone can have fun plunking around on a piano. But despite some parents’ efforts to evade this obvious truth (though absolutely every Little Leaguer I’ve ever met knows it), the primary goal in an organized game of baseball is what it is: to score more runs home than the opposing team (just as the primary goal of an organized orchestra is not to have fun, but to perform harmonious music correctly and well). Such goals require effort, skill, practice, and dedication from team members. [And yes, there are smaller goals for individual players on a Little League team -- hitting the ball, running the right way, pitching through the strike zone, making a good throw, paying attention in the field, learning the rules, etc. But all these are goals only because they contribute to achieving the primary one.]
Wanting one’s child to earn his way into success in a team sport (or any endeavor) is not the same as being “cut-throat”, nor does it translate into pressuring kids to perform or ridiculing them for errors or weaknesses. One can support and guide the efforts and interests of one’s child and still convey the idea that merit matters. Since I know Shannon personally, I happen to know she doesn’t push her son to practice or perfect his baseball skills; she’s recognized his interest in learning to play the game well and allows him to make his own choices regarding how much time, effort, and dedication to put into this pursuit. But she’s not going to tell him (or act as if) it doesn’t matter how much time, effort, and dedication he puts into it, that he is somehow entitled to go as far in baseball as he wants even if he can’t catch a ball.
As for the rule Kerry regards so highly in her rec soccer league… if nobody cares about the score, why are they even keeping it? Ironically, the rule itself requires players to keep score… and even requires them to publicly acknowledge and label the “best” player(s)! And if winning barely matters (if at all), Kerry, why on earth isn’t it any fun to be cremated? What difference could that possibly make to somebody playing only to “meet people, learn new skills, and have fun”? No, this rule isn’t about keeping the game “fun”; it’s about ensuring that everyone — regardless of interest, dedication, effort, and talent — can reap equal success. It’s forced welfare, a hand-out, an evasion of what success actually requires. And it teaches players that they’re somehow entitled to the benefits of others’ interest, dedication, effort, and talent. I’m with Shannon; that’s not a lesson I want my kids to internalize.
My oldest son plays AYSO soccer as will his brother in the fall when he is old enough. I will have paid the same exact amount of money as every other parent, and yes my child does deserve equal playing time. Are people here suggesting that even rec sports for children six to eight years old should require tryouts? Are you saying that I should keep my son out of soccer because sometimes he prefers to stop playing for a moment to be goofy with his friends?
I know that this isn’t what you are saying, but it is what I feel I’m hearing. To suggest that youth sports isn’t about winning is not also suggesting that winning doesn’t matter or that losing doesn’t hurt.
Life is not all about winning, and neither should youth sports be all about winning. In the drive to win, too many children are overlooked or are made to feel inferior. If we concentrate too much on getting our kids to win, then we lose so many opportunities for learning basic skills and having fun. The drive to win drives all the fun out of the game for too many children. As many of us are homeschoolers, we should recognize that our children bloom in their own way and their own time. The child picking flowers in the outfield today may be made to feel ashamed and may never play the game again, all because at seven years old someone denigrated him for making a team of children lose. This same child, given the time and care and understanding we so often espouse may go one to become a great pro player one day, or maybe he will just take the lessons he learned from youth sports, the lessons learned about teamwork and striving for your best, and take that in a whole other direction.
As a youth soccer coach, I will never coach my teams to win. I will coach them to learn the basics and to do their very best. They want to win without me having to hammer them to want to win, and if I do my job, if I give them my best as a coach and learn how to get the best out of each individual player/child, then we will win. We may not win each game, but we will win in life as we strive to do our best in whatever we do, a lesson learned in youth sports.
Who is looking out for the interests of the more talented kids? Or is everyone okay with their efforts often coming to nought because they can’t count on the weaker players to meaningfully contribute to the team? If a kid hustles for a leadoff triple, doesn’t s/he deserve better than to be followed by three sure outs?
Good coaches can and do balance the somewhat mutually exclusive goals of equal participation and the drive to win, but too many people treat ambition as at best a necessary evil and at worst a destructive impulse. If the strong players are given the message that other kids’ weaknesses deserve more consideration than their strengths, what will be their incentive to continue to try their best? (And if I weren’t going to sleep right now, would I rewrite this comment so that fewer than 4 of my 5 sentences were rhetorical questions?)
Whether or not the talented kid scores has absolutely no bearing on his ability or worth as a baseball player. He is not being cheated out of anything if he is stranded on 3rd. There is no world series bonus check in youth baseball. If the kid’s ego is that tied up in beating down the opponent you have a parenting issue, not a coaching issue.
I got back late, but I wanted to clarify something. I have older kids…12 and 15. I agree that young children (under 10) should be given the opportunity to play and learn the skills. However, when you join a league a game turns into a sport. A game is an informal situation, and it is unfair to confuse the two. If your child needs help with basic skills, sign them up with an instructional program with they YMCA to learn those skills.
My son, at 14, decided he wanted to play soccer for the first time in a league. It would have been unfair for me to put him on a team with kids who have been learning the game and playing for 8+ years , for both he and the other kids as their skill level would be far above his understanding and ability.
Kids need to learn to be honest about their abilities. You need no more evidence that society is crying out for this than to watch the auditions of “American Idol.” How many of those kids had parents telling them they were great? There is a huge difference between enjoying something and being skilled at it, and there is a place for both. But in a competitive team atmosphere, the focus is on competition and success. To say someone has a right to play on those teams despite having no skill is unfair to all, including your child.
If so many parents don’t think winning is everything, why is that we see on the news parents going to the extreme at sports contests. I would have to say most parents care about whether their kids win or lose. I personally, don’t think that’s terrible. I do agree with Shannon that they should play to win and do their best. I’d say maybe only the first 2-3 yrs depending on age should focus primarily on learning. By the time they are 7 or 8, they can understand that they need to do their best and that winning is one of the objects of the game. If they are on a team sport, it is not fair to their teammates if they are not putting forth their best effort. This doesn’t mean that losing is bad, it’s another learning experience. I think it’s when we equate losing with being bad that there are problems. That’s when cheating starts happening because we NEED to WIN. Losing should let us know that if we want to win, we need to work harder.
I also agree that at some level, children need to learn that they aren’t good enough to make the team. I was talking to a coach a couple of weeks back and he made a lot of sense to me. He said this business of not cutting players is hurting all sports. If players that aren’t going to see playing time are cut, they have the opportunity to try out other sports. They may find that they are more successful at something else. They also realize that if they really want to make that team, then they need to work harder.
Great post! As someone who grew up playing sports, I hate to see kids taught today that winning doesn’t matter. When did winning become such a bad thing? As you said, you win some & you lose some. The important thing to keep in mind is that if you hate to lose, practice harder to get better. Once you enter the “real world”, everybody is certainly not placed at the same level of “it’s ok to lose”. Try selling that to someone whose job is sales!
Hello folks, isn’t there a place in the middle here?
Winning is wonderful. It’s more fun than losing. Should every hate themselves because they lost? No! Is it a great chance to see what you might need to work on, sure! It can encourage everyone to work a little harder — nothing like a little competition to keep you on your toes.
Everyone should not get a trophy. Because shouldn’t ridicule the losers. It’s okay to lose. It’s more fun to win.
On rec teams, everyone should get to play. However, the better players are going to get to play more. In soccer, everyone had to play at least half the game. The stellar players played the whole game. If we were 3 goals ahead, everyone played whatever position we wanted to.
I want the parents to yell! Not yelling bad things… but help coach me. Encourage me! Tell me what I’m supposed to be doing! I started playing soccer as a 7 year old girl. I never even watch soccer, except my brother’s games. It helped if someone shouted that I should drop back. Or pass forward. Or look out for that guy who is in position to score.
How is this hard?