Scandal Exposed: Helpless Babies Redshirted!
In an shocking revelation, TSLP has learned that certain parents, mimicking the college practice of "redshirting" players to extend their athletic eligibility, have been redshirting their children. Yes, just like Peter Pan, certain selected American children can stay young forever, or at least for one year. Here's what I've learned: parents have been holding their children back at the start of the child's schooling. What they get from this plan or scheme is a child who is over-age for his grade, and who thus enjoys a mental and physical development greater than his right-age school chums. Why do parents do this? They want an advantage for their child in youth sports.
My sources? Many quiet conversations on the sidelines during numerous youth sports contests. "Gee," TSLP might wonder aloud to the proud parent screaming at the referee, "your child is just amazingly large. I've never seen a twelve-year old with facial hair!" Of course a moment's inquiry reveals the young stallion is a year or even a year and one-half older than the fearful competitors running from his shadow. How wrong is this?
1. Ever since college (Catholic school) I've tried to forget Kant, but man, what if everybody operated on this ethical principle, the one that says I'm going to cheat to get ahead? Yes, holding your kid back for athletic advantage is cheating. There's a reason sports are generally organized by grade: it's to make sure kids are playing against competitors roughly equal in size, musculature, and coordination. Of course there will be occasional and random natural variations, even within age groups. But there is almost guaranteed variation when older kids are playing against younger kids, and it's all in one direction. If every parent held his student back a year then the cheating parents would have to hold their young scholar back two. One day, middle schoolers will be able to drive themselves to practice.
2. I've personally witnessed a school team where the entire starting lineup consisted of boys who should have been in the next grade. I knew this because the team roster listed their birth dates. Even a year's difference can produce obvious physical differences, especially in pre-pubescent males. How is this any different from Danny Almonte, the boy who lied about his age, throwing no-hitters against younger boys in Little League competition?
3. Yes, I know, unlike Little League, the schools allow parents to hold back their child. All the parent has to say is that his child needs the extra year for "social development" or what have you and it's done. Yes, of course some kids might legitimately need delay. But let's not kid ourselves: in many cases, these parents are not looking at the little apple of their eye and saying that the little guy seems somewhat slow or unusually shy or something. No, these parents are looking at their little precocious darling and marvelling at his coordination and saying, hey, let's hold our little LeBron back a year so there will be no question he'll dominate play!
4. I know of parents (more than one set) who told me just months after their child was born that they planned to hold their child back. Quick diagnosis of developmental deficits? No. Quickly formed desire to raise a high-school sports star.
5. In some sports children are allowed to "play up," which means join a league consisting of higher-grade children. Some of these kids whose parents tell me (and everybody) that their child is playing up are the same parents who held this same kid back a grade. The story is all about how well this under-grade child is doing playing up, against the older kids (you know, the ones his age). Of course, the higher-grade league is full of other kids playing up. And the older kids who are actually in that higher grade? The best ones are in an even higher league, playing way up. So kids who play up aren't, really.
6. Are these parents proud when their older, bigger kids outplay younger children? Or slightly embarrassed?
7. Schools need to set birthday regulations for grades (they have) and then enforce them (they don't, not any more). Or at least organize the sporting contests according to age, not grade. If that were done, and fourteen-year-olds couldn't compete against children still in their twelfth year, then I bet suddenly little junior wouldn't appear so developmentally delayed to mom and dad. He'd get to school on time.
My sources? Many quiet conversations on the sidelines during numerous youth sports contests. "Gee," TSLP might wonder aloud to the proud parent screaming at the referee, "your child is just amazingly large. I've never seen a twelve-year old with facial hair!" Of course a moment's inquiry reveals the young stallion is a year or even a year and one-half older than the fearful competitors running from his shadow. How wrong is this?
1. Ever since college (Catholic school) I've tried to forget Kant, but man, what if everybody operated on this ethical principle, the one that says I'm going to cheat to get ahead? Yes, holding your kid back for athletic advantage is cheating. There's a reason sports are generally organized by grade: it's to make sure kids are playing against competitors roughly equal in size, musculature, and coordination. Of course there will be occasional and random natural variations, even within age groups. But there is almost guaranteed variation when older kids are playing against younger kids, and it's all in one direction. If every parent held his student back a year then the cheating parents would have to hold their young scholar back two. One day, middle schoolers will be able to drive themselves to practice.
2. I've personally witnessed a school team where the entire starting lineup consisted of boys who should have been in the next grade. I knew this because the team roster listed their birth dates. Even a year's difference can produce obvious physical differences, especially in pre-pubescent males. How is this any different from Danny Almonte, the boy who lied about his age, throwing no-hitters against younger boys in Little League competition?
3. Yes, I know, unlike Little League, the schools allow parents to hold back their child. All the parent has to say is that his child needs the extra year for "social development" or what have you and it's done. Yes, of course some kids might legitimately need delay. But let's not kid ourselves: in many cases, these parents are not looking at the little apple of their eye and saying that the little guy seems somewhat slow or unusually shy or something. No, these parents are looking at their little precocious darling and marvelling at his coordination and saying, hey, let's hold our little LeBron back a year so there will be no question he'll dominate play!
4. I know of parents (more than one set) who told me just months after their child was born that they planned to hold their child back. Quick diagnosis of developmental deficits? No. Quickly formed desire to raise a high-school sports star.
5. In some sports children are allowed to "play up," which means join a league consisting of higher-grade children. Some of these kids whose parents tell me (and everybody) that their child is playing up are the same parents who held this same kid back a grade. The story is all about how well this under-grade child is doing playing up, against the older kids (you know, the ones his age). Of course, the higher-grade league is full of other kids playing up. And the older kids who are actually in that higher grade? The best ones are in an even higher league, playing way up. So kids who play up aren't, really.
6. Are these parents proud when their older, bigger kids outplay younger children? Or slightly embarrassed?
7. Schools need to set birthday regulations for grades (they have) and then enforce them (they don't, not any more). Or at least organize the sporting contests according to age, not grade. If that were done, and fourteen-year-olds couldn't compete against children still in their twelfth year, then I bet suddenly little junior wouldn't appear so developmentally delayed to mom and dad. He'd get to school on time.
posted by TSLP at 11/10/2006
Comments on "Scandal Exposed: Helpless Babies Redshirted!"
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Tom Scott said ... (7:33 AM) :
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Tom Scott said ... (11:22 AM) :
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TSLP said ... (11:00 AM) :
post a commentIn my experience, MOST sports-minded parents hold back their boys if they have a late spring or summer birthday. It's very rare among non-sports parents.
In baseball, soccer, hockey, swimming, tennis... and every sport except football and basketball, they go by actual age group and the really good kids "play up" to get better competitition. In basketball and football, parents hold their kids back so they can "play down" and dominate younger kids.
Football just goes by grade, but youth basketball for some reason makes a pretense of having "age groups" while allowing "grade exemptions". That is, a kid who's almost 12 can play in a "10 and under" AAU division if he's been held back.
For example, Bobby just finished 4th grade and is 9 years old, turning 10 on August 31. Jimmy also just finished 4th grade but is 11 and will be 12 on September 1. That is, Jimmy is two years older than Bobby and has been held back one or two years in school (depending on the state). Yet they both play in the “10 and under” division. Bobby is 9 and cannot play in the “9 and under” while Jimmy is nearly 12 and can play in the “10 and under” because he’s been held back. There’s not much difference between a 31 year old and a 33 year old, but there’s a big difference between a 9 year old and an 11 year old. For girls the age cutoff is 8 months earlier and this really isn’t an issue.
What if Bobby offered to take an academic test and if he does bad enough he can play in 10 and under? Or what if he promises to skip class and flunk this year?
"Johnny, we really need you to stop going to class and flunk so you'll be eligible for basketball".
Isn't this opposite of the student-athlete concept?
The fact is that the youth basketball system supports redshirting because it is run by parents who hold their kids back academically so they'll be relatively better in sports (and by youth coaches who recruit those kids). Going to actual age groups would negate the advantage that gives them.
Redshirting successes:
O.J. Mayo. The 19 year old high schooler, born within a week of 2nd year NBA player Andrew Bynum, received national publicity for playing varsity as a 14 year old 7th grader. If he was in 9th grade I don't think he'd get the publicity.
Clausen. Forget his first name, but the Notre Dame quarterback of the future turned 19 in early Sept of his high school senior year.
Tyler Hansbrough. The North Carolina basketball sophmore is 21 and still gets kudos for being so good when so "young". He also won an AAU 10 and under national championship when he was nearly 12.
John David Booty. The USC quarterback got publicity for leaving high school a year "early" to go to USC. In fact, he was 18.5 years old his junior year because he'd redshirted 5th grade to get ahead in football.
And on and on. If you check your local youth league superstars, I bet most have been held back.
I don’t condemn parents holding their kids back, I need to say that there’s no shame in holding a kid back if he needs it. And furthermore, there’s little downside to it – the boy will be among more physically and emotionally mature in his class, which will lead to being on the top in most aspects of school status. So I don’t think is “wrong” or anything.
But I still don’t get why they get to play sports against younger kids. I’ve been told it’s to keep school teams together, but that doesn’t really apply until 8th grade. And why is going by age okay for hockey, soccer, and baseball, but not for basketball or football?
I wrote "What if Bobby offered to take an academic test and if he does bad enough he can play in 10 and under?"
That should read "9 and under".
Tom, I think the practice is wrong in this sense: schools create a rule on class assignments based on birth dates, then ignore their rule in favor of those "sports-minded" parents who are in the know and who delay their child's entry in order to gain academic and athletic advantages. Parents who follow the rules are left at a disadvantage, and correctly feel they've been duped. If the "real rule" is that kids with spring or summer birthdates get delayed, then schools should announce that rule, so everyone's on the same page.
My other comment to your very thoughtful post is just an expression of astonishment that media/parents/fans get caught up in the grade, not the age, when assessing an athlete's precociousness. We say, "Wow, he's so good and only a freshman," when we should say, "He's good, as we would expect of a rising junior." The common assumption is that grade is commensurable with a certain age; apparently the common practice of sports-minded parents is not widely known.
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