Goalies & Parents at the Grade 9 & 10 Age Group

[The Wall33]

Cuban,

Thanks for the insights and articles. They generally confirm what I know from my gut to be true: kids are playing too much and too often and are getting burned out.

I see it all the time and I can easily relate. For 4 months I was in between jobs a few years ago. I started my own rental goalie business and was playing anywhere from 15 - 20 sessions (scrimmages & games) per week, often on the ice 4 or 5 times per day.

After awhile everything became a blur. There were no highs and no lows. It just didn't matter whether I won or lost because I knew that I'd be back on the ice within a few hours and the cycle would repeat itself. I came to hate hockey - it was merely a means to an end and when I started my new job and didn't play for awhile my love for the game returned, as did my passion to succeed.

I think the most telling comment (I'll paraphrase) was the one commenting that (at the elite levels) all the coaches are doing what everyone else is doing b/c they do not want to be perceived as losing an advantage. They also push the envelope further into the summer with the belief that an earlier start will equate to more success. If oranization A is doing it and they are our rivals then we had better do the same thing...

Unfortunately there is a conflict of interest with most of these coaches (I will include myself in this group too). Many of us make our living training players or goalies and if we suggest or enforce taking 3 or 4 months off during the summer we have no income stream. That's the dirty underside and probably why schedules are set like they are.

I hear coaches say it all the time... "Hockey is a 12 month per year sport... you gotta play all year if you want to succeed". I think that this may be true in some cases; there are kids that I (and others) train who actually can handle the work and do in fact excel, but they are the exceptions, the ones who already have D1 letters of intent or have the scouts fawning on them. The average kid, IMO, just gets burned out and loses his passion, which is unfortunate and is probably the root cause of the malaise I often witness.

Wellsie

[The Wall33]

Originally Posted by sbear41mb

I dont know if anybody as said this, but its most likely getting burned out.. and the fact of all the pressures around (girls, drinking, drugs, doing other things than practice). Im 19 and ive played hockey since i was 7. When i was in 10th grade, I was playing hockey every season, and even in the spring/summer too. I loved hockey, but i felt i needed a break from all the travel, playing everyday, etc. Next thing i know, going out friends, party, etc is put right in front of hockey. Thank god i still play hockey, and i feel like im falling in love with it as if it were day one, but i think if i didnt get into that stuff, i might have had a chance to go somewhere. it sucks, but thats life.

That was similar to my experience too. I started playing Jr. C at age 15 in the small town where I grew up and was exposed, for the first time, to girls, partying, booze, drugs and rock 'n roll. It was way more interesting than studying and working out to play hockey but it came at a price.

My natural talent (such as it was) allowed me to play until I was 19 at the Jr. B level (as an "All Star" lol) but I never took it serious enough to succeed past that, something I am acutely aware of in hindsight. When I went to university I was invited to try out for the varsity team but I never bothered, something I have always regretted.

Having said that, I sure did enjoy my time as a teenager, especially when compared to my friends playing Jr. A who had strict curfews and little time for freedom. The funny thing is, we are all now playing in the beer leagues which is the great equalizer!

[sloth2946]

Originally Posted by The Wall33

I think the most telling comment (I'll paraphrase) was the one commenting that (at the elite levels) all the coaches are doing what everyone else is doing b/c they do not want to be perceived as losing an advantage. They also push the envelope further into the summer with the belief that an earlier start will equate to more success. If oranization A is doing it and they are our rivals then we had better do the same thing...

Unfortunately there is a conflict of interest with most of these coaches (I will include myself in this group too). Many of us make our living training players or goalies and if we suggest or enforce taking 3 or 4 months off during the summer we have no income stream. That's the dirty underside and probably why schedules are set like they are.

I hear coaches say it all the time... "Hockey is a 12 month per year sport... you gotta play all year if you want to succeed". I think that this may be true in some cases; there are kids that I (and others) train who actually can handle the work and do in fact excel, but they are the exceptions, the ones who already have D1 letters of intent or have the scouts fawning on them. The average kid, IMO, just gets burned out and loses his passion, which is unfortunate and is probably the root cause of the malaise I often witness.

Wellsie

This is the slippery slope here that, and no offense, guys like you have to walk. You know deep down that kids need the time off to recoup and recover both physically and mentally, yet to keep the revenue coming....you can't do that.

Yes, there are kids who can go year round and ANYONE who says that you need to be playing 12 months out of the year has never played competitive hockey, and you should run from.

Hockey is not a 12 month sport, no sport is a 12 month sport if you choose to excel at it. There have been a couple recent studies that I have read, but cannot find right now that indicate that if you play a sport year round starting at an early age, you will peak around the 15-16 range. In fact it was a Russian study that showed the drop off in peak skill at that age group for the kids who simply specialized at an early age. Gotta love Communism where you can do that.

The gist of it was that ..... wait.....just found it.

Here it is...read this study and you will NEVER advocate year round training in any specific sport again. In fact, push this study to every parent you see and know and push them to read it and understand it.

http://www.elitefts.com/documents/TomMyslinski.pdf

PS: Pay particular attention to the summary chart on page 6.

[Goaliedad]

I think youth sports have become so demanding, so specialized, and so high pressure that many of the kids are dropping out at first opportunity. My kids have played every sport growing up and each sport tries to drag you into more training, more classes, more tournaments ($$$). Understandably, the only sports they have stuck with are skateboarding and surfing. I think this is because they can do it when they want to. I think they should raise the draft ages to 20. This would make for more development time and catch the players who got lost at 13 through 16. I crack up when I go to the gym and see tons of guys in their early 20's who are bigger and more athletic than most pro athletes. These guys developed late. There are enough former hockey players to field an AHL team. I have a 19 year old who is just getting his size and strength at 19. I have also seen fathers in the gym pushing their 13 to 16 year olds to lift weights and get big. It's painfully obvious to everyone but the fathers that their son's aren't physically ready to respond to heavy training. I feel awful when I see the looks on the kids faces when the fathers are trying to bully them into lifting bigger weights. Incredible pressure. It seem that everyone buys into this.

[spidergoalie]

I'm not sure I can add much to sports, but teaching music...and teaching in general, grade 9 is almost always the worst year for behavior.
I think it is simply a developmental thing, but of course it is also each kid carving out who they are, and for whatever reason at that age they seem to go out on a limb in that quest more than before or after.
I find this is faaaaaaaaar more prononunced in girls than boys too.

[jf-laflaire]

I have not yet had the extensive coaching experience others have had with this age group, as mine is usually in the group slightly above it (grade 11 & 12 to even 20 years old). I do notice from looking back at guys I played with a number of talented kids who fell off the map completely.

There was a goalie a year older than me in my minor hockey association who is still the most talented goalie I have ever seen live at the grade 10 age (14 to 15). He had two junior B teams asking him to play for them. He was fantastic, really athletic, good skater, puckhandler and so forth... his problem... his attitude. He had a chip on his shoulder, but this came from some troubles at home. His parents separated & father was really hard on him in hockey. He really loved baseball & was a fanstastic ball player at this time as well. Well he went nowhere in hockey beyond AAA. He plays in the beer league I used to play in. You can see he has talant, but his style now is so outdated that he looks out of place sometimes. I had him come out & skate with the ex-university & ex-pro guys (pickup) & he really had a hard time. I just thought about how good he was at his age... someone should have told him & said, "hey kid you've got something here... lets work it out."

Now when I see kids at this age I really try to let them know what opportunity they have & what they may lose.

But really the issue seems to be over-training these days. I always played soccer (goalkeeper) in the summers right through to my final playing days with the Squires & UHL. Actually prior to me playing at that level I was playing varsity soccer. Playing against other pro goalies I often get complimented by the pros on my athletic ability & reflexes... something I feel continues to develop nowadays partially because of my soccer (I play indoor only now in the winters).

As far as what I feel this syndrome is about, pure natural selection IMO. If kids love hockey that much they'd realize it gets them women, booze & other stuff... how many hockey players do you know have/had a fantastic social life while in junior? So I dunno how much that affect can be diminished.

I think too that if a kid is not responsive, you can only let them know what is out there... if they don't want it then that's their problem. When I was that age I would have killed for an opporunity like some others had... I worked for mine.

As an interesting tidbit, I ran into a guy I played A hockey with for years (had not seen him in about 8 years!). He was surprised to know how far I'd advanced in hockey & clearly stated I was the only one out of anyone on that team who made it that far past junior C. I was shocked but that is what the attrition rate seems to be. I was very disciplined as a kid, but came from immigrant parents who did not push at all. That might have been the difference... self motivation. If you're not self-motivated then forget it, you're done.

[The Wall33]

Originally Posted by sloth2946

This is the slippery slope here that, and no offense, guys like you have to walk. You know deep down that kids need the time off to recoup and recover both physically and mentally, yet to keep the revenue coming....you can't do that.

Yes, there are kids who can go year round and ANYONE who says that you need to be playing 12 months out of the year has never played competitive hockey, and you should run from.

Hockey is not a 12 month sport, no sport is a 12 month sport if you choose to excel at it. There have been a couple recent studies that I have read, but cannot find right now that indicate that if you play a sport year round starting at an early age, you will peak around the 15-16 range. In fact it was a Russian study that showed the drop off in peak skill at that age group for the kids who simply specialized at an early age. Gotta love Communism where you can do that.

The gist of it was that ..... wait.....just found it.

Here it is...read this study and you will NEVER advocate year round training in any specific sport again. In fact, push this study to every parent you see and know and push them to read it and understand it.

http://www.elitefts.com/documents/TomMyslinski.pdf

PS: Pay particular attention to the summary chart on page 6.

Actually, I do tell all 'my kids' to take time off and play complimentary sports, especially in the Spring, right after the season ends. Fortunately, from a revenue stream viewpoint, it doesn't matter what I say: the parents (they mean well) will still sign their kids up for all the extra training because 'everyone else does it too'.

There is a deeply ingrained culture around training and the 'time to rest and heal' portion is often overlooked. I'm always amazed when I hear that NHL players (often) take the entire summer off of skates... it seems illogical but they are resting their bodies, healing and giving their mind time away from the sport they owe so much to...

Wellsie

PS: Thanks for the article Rob, it's a great read.

[Goaliedad]

Time off and away is how we assimulate the experience and grow as well as recharge the batteries. Unfounately in hockey there is an obsession with getting to the next level. I have learned that time off is just as important as time on.

[Courage1]

For me it was burnout, plain and simple. By the time I hit my junior year of high school, I had been playing hockey for ten years. 6-7 of those years were AAA all year round. When I hit that age I had people giving me good advice about what to do to get to the next level. I mulled it over for a while and realized I was so sick of hockey that I didnt want to play at all.

Its more than likely that I had peaked at that point, and that playing at the highest levels was unlikely (I was hearing D3 was my future). At that age you need to step up your efforts to remain competitive, and I had given all that I had emotionally and mentally. I didnt set foot in a rink for 10 years without regret. I hated it. Its not until now at age 30 that I've found the fun of it again. I think when you get to decision time for a lot of these kids, it hasnt been fun for years. Yet they are asked to decide whether they want to make hockey their life. Its an adult decision being made by somebody who isnt (or at least in my case) an adult. I chose sports that I was still having fun with after that......

[sloth2946]

Originally Posted by The Wall33

Actually, I do tell all 'my kids' to take time off and play complimentary sports, especially in the Spring, right after the season ends. Fortunately, from a revenue stream viewpoint, it doesn't matter what I say: the parents (they mean well) will still sign their kids up for all the extra training because 'everyone else does it too'.

There is a deeply ingrained culture around training and the 'time to rest and heal' portion is often overlooked. I'm always amazed when I hear that NHL players (often) take the entire summer off of skates... it seems illogical but they are resting their bodies, healing and giving their mind time away from the sport they owe so much to...

Wellsie

PS: Thanks for the article Rob, it's a great read.

FWIW I wasn't insinuating that you were encouraging the kids to practice and drill all year, rather not actively refusing service is more the point. One would be a fool to turn down money, especially when people are throwing it at you.

It's a hard quandary...kind of like my job...If I design systems and infrastructure well enough, we can do more work with less people....

It is a stupid culture we live in, where everyone feels this insatiable need to keep up with the Joneses. Might explain how we've fallen in this economic mess, but that is a different topic.

[Goaliedad]

Originally Posted by sloth2946

It is a stupid culture we live in, where everyone feels this insatiable need to keep up with the Joneses. Might explain how we've fallen in this economic mess, but that is a different topic.

I noticed that it's not about keeping up with the Jones but more about being so far ahead of them that they are humiliated. Extremes times, extreme measures.
Everything has to be over the top.

[andy]

some of its the distractions of high school or deciding to focus on another sport. something that hasnt been mentioned here is age. many of your better performers in the lower grades were older. just a few months older in 6th or 7th grade makes a difference. as they get older the younger kids catch up. and older kids that always played with a size, strength and coordination advantages are playing second banana.
i also think some goalies have advantages when it comes to training. the young goalie with a decent butterfly can shut down a lot of shooters that cant place their shots

[LuckOfTheGoalie]

Originally Posted by HeadSave38

I think you've all got it dead on. I'm 16 and a Junior in high school. I've only played for about a year and a half, while the other goalie on my team has been playing for about 8 years. My life revolves around hockey and I'll do whatever it takes to gain my coach's respect, but the other kid doesn't want to play. He actually said the other day "I hate hockey" . I couldn't fathom even the most miniscule dislike for the game, yet somehow he hates playing. Now, I think it might be that his dad is making him play, so there may be some credit to his not wanting to play. His dad is our assistant coach and all 3 of his sons play goal (the oldest playing juniors). I was never an athlete, but I knew i wanted to play hockey, so when i started at 14 I caught the bug late and it's stuck.
I'm not an overly social person beyond my one group of friends at school and my team, and I'm not one to go out and party on friday night. I'd rather chill at home and watch any hockey game that might be on tv while I browse the internet for info on anything that might improve my game. Don't even try to talk to me when the Flyers are on. Drinking, partying, etc. just isn't my thing, so maybe I have an advantage over others that may be more susceptible to that pressure.
As for cars and girls, I know i'll be driving my brother's old truck in january when I get my license, so I'm not worried about that. Also, I don't currently have a girlfriend, because I do, like everyone, enjoy having money. I do have a job, but the only thing I really ever want money for is hockey equipment!
Politics is the only thing that's ever gotten me down, because before my sophomore year I tried out for my high school team and they cut me because I was the only extra and the kids I was better than, one was a junior and the other had played for them the year before. It didn't turn me off though, because that was my drive to come back the next year and play for another team and make them regret that decision. In an ironic twist, my coach now was a coach for my HS when that happened.

The kids that stop playing may be talented, but the ones that keep playing are the ones that are truly committed to the game and getting better so they can play their best.

oh my god you just told my whole hockey career right there, just started at 14 and im more commited than any other person playing for like 8 years and is on the team. Im actually better than some of the kids playing for awhile, i guess its natural . Anyway ya, parties, keeping up with the crowd, hot as hell girls, and keeping up my good grades are a real big distraction to me but i try to get a little bit of all of it ... and I'm a huge FLYERS fan!!!

[foodsample]

Originally Posted by HeadSave38

I think you've all got it dead on. I'm 16 and a Junior in high school. I've only played for about a year and a half, while the other goalie on my team has been playing for about 8 years. My life revolves around hockey and I'll do whatever it takes to gain my coach's respect, but the other kid doesn't want to play. He actually said the other day "I hate hockey" . I couldn't fathom even the most miniscule dislike for the game, yet somehow he hates playing. Now, I think it might be that his dad is making him play, so there may be some credit to his not wanting to play. His dad is our assistant coach and all 3 of his sons play goal (the oldest playing juniors). I was never an athlete, but I knew i wanted to play hockey, so when i started at 14 I caught the bug late and it's stuck.
I'm not an overly social person beyond my one group of friends at school and my team, and I'm not one to go out and party on friday night. I'd rather chill at home and watch any hockey game that might be on tv while I browse the internet for info on anything that might improve my game. Don't even try to talk to me when the Flyers are on. Drinking, partying, etc. just isn't my thing, so maybe I have an advantage over others that may be more susceptible to that pressure.
As for cars and girls, I know i'll be driving my brother's old truck in january when I get my license, so I'm not worried about that. Also, I don't currently have a girlfriend, because I do, like everyone, enjoy having money. I do have a job, but the only thing I really ever want money for is hockey equipment!
Politics is the only thing that's ever gotten me down, because before my sophomore year I tried out for my high school team and they cut me because I was the only extra and the kids I was better than, one was a junior and the other had played for them the year before. It didn't turn me off though, because that was my drive to come back the next year and play for another team and make them regret that decision. In an ironic twist, my coach now was a coach for my HS when that happened.

The kids that stop playing may be talented, but the ones that keep playing are the ones that are truly committed to the game and getting better so they can play their best.

I must say my story is incredibly similar to yours, I started playing at a very late age of 15, but always have had 3x the love for the game than anyone else I know.

I think where it all started was back when I livedi n Costa Rica, I never had a brother, so I idled my sisters boyfriend like one (I know its a little wierd, but its true). He played roller hockey, and his dad ran a league down there. And one day he was like "Ok I am going to take you to go play hockey tomorrow" and he gave me all the pads Id need to play out. I thought it was the coolest thing to wear all those pads, and instantly fell in love with the game. There was a hockey team in my school, run by the same dude that ran the roller hockey league ... and one day he showed us this video of the 2001 colorado avalanche. Watching how well they played, was just mind blowing! Since I didn't realize how much faster paced u get on ice compared to roller at the time. Then my coach told me "No matter how good your team is, it isn't anything without a great goalie" (Or something along that lines) and along with my fascination for the huge goalie equipment they get to wear, I started to kindle a interest in the position. It wasn't for another 3-4 years when I moved back to USA (to Miami) and started playing Ice hockey for the first time, and joined an Inhouse bantam team (at the age of 15) that my coach offered to anyone interested a set of borrow goalie gear.

I had such a deep love to the game, it was like I was scarred by my experiences of playing it in my earlier years. It was like I was addicted to it the way you see people addicted to video games, except I justifyed it that if I was going to be addicted to something, it would not only not be bad, but could benefit me if it was hockey. I go so into it, trying to get extra ice, and extra ice to play goal that I got burnt out. Along with my parents not wanting to spend money on it, I decided to quit .. only to reasses myself a week later and start playing again. After about half a year, I had saved up and bought most of my gear and the hockey director asked me if I wanted to travel with the local Junior team to Atlanta since their back-up goalie couldn't make it, and they didn't want to dress a player in that position. After that, I sorta got to go to practices with the Juniors .. and started seeing a goalie coach from Jon Elkin's. Now at 16, I AM a goaltender for the Miami Toros Junior team, and am looking at a starting position next season. Although I really would like to I really don't even care if I make a college team now tho, cuz I plan on playing Adult league until I am like 80, and die a heart attack on the ice or something.

[LuckOfTheGoalie]

Originally Posted by foodsample

Although I really would like to I really don't even care if I make a college team now tho, cuz I plan on playing Adult league until I am like 80, and die a heart attack on the ice or something.

damn straight