From “Dad Gone Mad”: Soccer Dad Takes Matters Into His Own…Feet
Dad Gone Mad scribe Danny Evans gives us this tale of an over zealous soccer dad who, for reasons known only to himself, stepped over the line during his kid’s game. Seems that the Thunderbirds’ goalie was a bit distraught at having been scored on twice, and so the kid’s father decided to put his foot on the field, and subsequently in his mouth, in an effort to assist his son. (How many bad foot one-liners can I fit into this piece? Quite a few, my friends. Quite a few.)
Yet another example of how some parents jump in where they don’t belong. (O.K. I’ll stop.) The story is a bit sad; as a former soccer goalie myself, I feel the kid’s pain. But the dad in question needs to ask himself why he put his kid on the field in the first place; it seems obvious that the son wasn’t into it. Sadder still - some of the commentors ragging on the kid for crying. Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you, Centuri0n. And you call yourself a Christian. (Or if you don’t, Jesus H. Christ, you oughta, ’cause you lost me after the first two lines on your blog.)
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14 opinions for From “Dad Gone Mad”: Soccer Dad Takes Matters Into His Own…Feet
centuri0n
Nov 4, 2005 at 1:08 am
Yes, I am a Christian, and yes I “ragged on” the crying kid. Listen: I coach under-6 kids in soccer, and in the first practice of the year my wife takes the kids out on the field for 15 minutes while I talk to the parents, and I have a heart-to-heart with them about what we are trying to do out here.
We have 3 basic rules, apart from the laws of Soccer (that’s what the governing body calls ‘em, so don’t get all bowed up about it):
Parents cannot coach from the sideline, and they must stay off the field. If they want to coach, they should volunteer like we did. They can cheer (”Yay Timmy!”), they can root (”Go Thunder!”), and they can enjoy (”Good job! WOOO!”), but they cannot coach. It confuses the kids if their parents are coaching them from the sidelines. And going out onto the field is, without any doubt, a violation of the rules of the game. If a kid is down, that’s one thing — but in U6, a kid never goes down because he is hospital-hurt.
Parents cannot heckle the Ref. We are growing good sportsmen and sportswomen, and we are also growing good refs. The 14-year-old kid ref’ing the game is going to make mistakes, and we live with the results.
We are playing to learn to enjoy the game. The corollary to this is that if we cannot enjoy the game (poor sportsmanship, bad attitude, crying, failure to engage, etc.), we do not play. Specifically, if your child personally cannot enjoy the game, he or she will not play.
Any parent who doesn’t like those rules for our team is invited to ask the league for a trade to another team. I’m not going to fight with parents who don’t have time to volunteer to be coaches over how to coach. But I am also not going to ruin the season for kids and their parents who really want to play and have fun.
So yes, I am a Christian, and yes I do not abide cry-babies. The flip side is that we strive to win and we learn how to lose graciously. If you get trashed — and this year the only kid with experience on my team was my son, so we got trashed a lot — you learn how to take a beating, and you learn that losing sucks. If you don’t like losing (I personally don’t like losing), you learn to listen to the coach and improve your game.
Last thing: Jesus never taught anybody, “coddle the cry-babies”. What he taught them was “Has anyone by fussing in front of the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch?” Jesus didn’t abide cry-babies — He met real needs. So while it is true He healed the sick, He also didn’t listen to the whiners who then accused Him of breaking the sabbath law for healing a sick man on the sabbath.
That’s what kind of Christian I am. Hope that helps.
Candace J
Nov 4, 2005 at 7:08 am
Wow. I feel sorry for your kids.
Crying out of frustration is something A LOT of kids do.
My dad, however, tried to bully it out of me, using many of the same words you’re using now.
Guess what? I don’t much care to be around him.
I thought Jesus taught love and acceptance. I don’t really remember anything in the Bible about “cry-babies”. And in the passage you quoted, “fussing” clearly means narcissism.
Jason
Nov 4, 2005 at 7:47 am
Candace beat me to the punch. So, what she said, and two more thoughts.
One: Centurion - how would you feel if someone spoke about your son the way you did about this kid? Second, have you seen the movie “L.A. Confidential”? If so, remember the part where Bud White comes upon the guy beating up his wife and asks him, “Why don’t you dance with a man for a change?” Seems to me that would apply to a grown man like you, making fun of a little kid. And I guess we now know what kind of a Christian you are.
beverly
Nov 4, 2005 at 7:54 am
I agree with Candace, kids will and do cry. And winning is not the main reason kids join sports teams, they want to have fun! my brothers and I all played sports when we were younger and my parents NEVER made winning a reason for attending. it was to enjoy a fun game. I remember team-members’ parents getting all bent out of shape if we’d lose, but my parents always bought us pizza after our games, win or lose because they were proud of us, not because of the results of the game. kids don’t think they are losers unless you tell them so. when you make winning a top priority the game loses its fun.
centuri0n
Nov 4, 2005 at 8:55 am
Jason:
I wouldn’t feel much. If my son was crying because he was losing at sports, we’d stop playing sports. No reason to play sports if it’s going to make you cry. Do you think it is better to go out on the field and play for him? In what way is that better? In what way is that Christian?
I think making a kid play sports when he hates it is cruel — to him and to the others who have to watch a kid unsuited for competition act out like that. It is painful to watch a kid who doesn’t want to play be forced to play. Those of you who are lecturing me agree on that much: the question is only whether you think that it is better for some kid’s dad to go out on the field and play or if that dad should sit his son out so that this kid will either decide he wants to play or decide he likes something else better.
Case in point: I coached with a guy last year whose son was not ready to play. Emotionally and physically. We didn’t berate him; we didn’t yell at him; we didn’t “protect” him. We just sat him out, and he drank kool aid and chased butterflies. When he cried on the field, we subbed him out.
This year, that same kid is in the middle of the pack trying to get the ball. Why? Because we didn’t force him into situations and games he wasn’t ready for. No need to make him cry 10 times in 5 weeks: let him drink kool aid and not get in the way of kids who are ready.
That is how you “put on your big girl panties and deal with it”: you do what is right. Going out on the field and breaking the rules of the game in order to protect your son from losing one soccer game is absurd. It’s not fair to him, and it’s not fair to the other 21 kids on the field.
For all of the family counsellors who have given advice here, it turns out that what was said was actually posted on a blog, not hollered out at a game. And in the context of that blog where the author of that blog was saying the same thing I was, you have to ask yourself: “Do I have a sense of humor, or am I offended when someone makes a point through sarcasm?”
If you read the original post, and my response here, you’ll see that I said, “we strive to win and we learn how to lose graciously.” The best way to teach kids to want to win is to let them lose. And in that, losing is part of the game. It is its own best medicine. Losing is not the problem: crying because you’re getting beat is the problem, and running out on the field and playing your son’s position because he doesn’t know how to handle getting beat is the problem.
To all of you, I also say, “put on your big girl panties, and deal with it.” No child abuse was eacted in order to make any of these posts.
Jason
Nov 4, 2005 at 9:35 am
What I’m referring to, Centurian, is the comment “And your daughter, too.” It’s funny, in a “wow, how fucking pathetic - there are still guys out there who are so insecure that they feel that females are lower on the food chain than males” kind of way. Tell me you don’t coach a girl’s soccer team - that would just be too much. And I really, really hope you never have a daughter.
(BTW - as a former hockey, soccer, baseball, and rugby player, the coaches I truly respected and admired were the ones who walked the walk as well as talked the talk. You gotta ask yourself what your players would think of you if they read your comment.)
Stephen Morse
Nov 4, 2005 at 9:37 am
Centurion…. if you need an assistant coach count me in although I am not sure your uniform choice appeals to me (How would I explain those frilly-dillies to my 5 sons?)
As a past director of children’s sports and now as a pastor I am amazed at how childish parents can be. I hardly ever had problems with the children but the parents? Didn’t we graduate from the Junior High?
If any of my 5 sons or 4 daughters start crying on the field… I don’t want them there!
It’s just a game anyway!
centuri0n
Nov 4, 2005 at 10:13 am
Jason:
I just want to make sure I understand this last comment before I reply to you, since I obviously muffed it last time.
You think:
(1) Women are not more emotional than men — in the worst case they are equally emotional.
(2) foul language does a better job of making your point than sarcastic humor can.
(3) None of your coaches ever cracked a joke at a player to make a point.
(4) Men who don’t countenance emotional extortion on the sports field can’t be sufficient as fathers of girls.
Are those things true, or should I just let you say whatever you want to say in order to let you have the last word? I’d be happy to let you have the last word, as long as I am sure I understood what you said.
Jason
Nov 4, 2005 at 10:49 am
1) I think some are, some aren’t. It really has nothing to do with your apparent view of “female”, as both a word and a concept, being some sort of pejorative. (See? I can use two-dollar words too!)
2) No, I just like cuss words. They’re fun to type. Makes me feel naughty.
3) Sure, my coaches cracked jokes. But it’s funny - all of the winning coaches I played for never had to belittle players to motivate us.
4) See point 1.
centuri0n
Nov 4, 2005 at 11:47 am
In that case, since I did understand you:
(1) You either do no know a lot of women or do not know a lot of men. I don’t know which it is, but my suggestion is you get out more. Even Oprah admits that men are emotional golfballs and and women are emotional windmills. It’s the #1 complaint of women about men. But don’t cry: I’m sure they don’t feel that way about you.
(2) I suggest that taking offense to sarcasm and not to foul language is selective at best, backwards on face value, and self-ignorant at worst. Which is to say, “If logic was a pair of pants, yours would be on your head, backwards, and the fly would be down.” And see below, too.
(3) I wonder: have you ever seen me belittle anyone I have ever coached? Prolly not. What you have done is assumed that I call all criers “girls” at sporting events and then berate them off the field — when what I have actually done is called one bad parent a wuss in a blog comment. Of course, I am sure you act exactly in real life as you do when you blog, which means you spend most of your day arguing with strangers about their inhumanly-cruel lifestyle after overhearing one sentence of a conversation as you walk by them in K-Mart. That must be very taxing — but I’m sure you feel better after a good cry.
(4) I wonder how many of your stellar coaches stopped the game every time one of your team-mates (or perhaps you personally) had an emotional crisis over their lousy performance? Any? No? So your point is what? Apparently none of them countenanced emotional extortion on the playing field, but you seem to find them quite manly men. It’s too bad, too, because if they culd have seen this side of you, I am sure they would have respected you a lot more. Here’s a kleenex.
And look at that! (this is the “see below” part) I was able to respond to all of your extremely astute remarks without using anything more than “G”-rated, 6th grade vocabulary, and I still made you much angrier than when you started berating me for something that happened in blog comments. Apparently, sarcasm is much more effective than foul language in making a point — and it is actually more fun to read! And nobody has to be a “naughty boy”!
Sorry that you are now so upset. Maybe swearing at the person next to you will make you feel better. And before you ask, “The words of a wise man’s mouth win him favor, but the lips of a fool consume him. The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness, and the end of his talk is evil madness.” I leave the paraphrae to your expansive vocabulary.
Jason
Nov 4, 2005 at 1:13 pm
Wow. Actually, C, I’m really not upset. Clearly we’re not cut from the same cloth, and we’ve already wasted a whole bunch of time and bandwidth on this, so I’ll bow my girly-man wussy Leftie non-Christian self out.
(Those of you who are disappointed in my withdrawal from this discussion, and might be wondering why I’m doing so, just hop on over to Centuri0n’s website. Because…wow.)
Candace J
Nov 5, 2005 at 7:48 am
The thing I think Centurion has forgotten, in the heat of this “discussion”, is that DGM was talking about a kid who was maybe 5 or 6 years old.
Kids that age are highly emotional. They’re just little kids, for crying out loud (no pun intended) and will often cry FROM FRUSTRATION, not because they “must hate the sport”. Hell, *I* cry from frustration and I’m–SURPRISE–a grown woman.
There’s nothing wrong with feeling frustration and letting that feeling show. Yes, if a kid hates a sport he or she shouldn’t play it. But what is wrong, seriously, with being frustrated about repeatedly missing goals?
Studies show, time and time again, that boy babies and boy children are FAR more emotional than girl babies and girl children. Every five-year-old boy I’ve ever known (and I’ve known dozens and dozens) cried more easily from frustration than five-year-old girls.
But I still stand by my assertion in the orginial DGM post comments that the father in question didn’t much care that his kid was missing goals, he cared that his kid was crying. And I don’t think he wanted to spare the kid’s feelings. I think he was emabarrassed by the show of emotion.
centuri0n
Nov 7, 2005 at 10:28 am
I coach 5 & 6 year olds. I will cut some slack here on this: 5 & 6 year olds should not be playing 11 on 11 soccer with goalies. 5 & 6 year olds should be playing (by US Soccer standards) 3 on 3 or 4-on-4 with a “dead zone” goalie box in front of the net — meaning that if the ball stops in the dead zone, it’s a goal kick. Nobody’s getting pummeled under those circumstances.
Nevertheless, if the kids are in a “live” league, the kids have to play live. You prep them in a lot of ways (ironically, none of them involving either boot camp or group hugs), and if they cry on the field when they get beat you take them off the field. It is not the end of the world that one is losing a soccer game, and one cannot win the soccer game if one is a puddle of runny boogers. But far worse than that is having a kid wind up — by accident or intention — as the crying clown in the center ring of the circus. Frustration is one thing; letting a kid embarass himself is 100% another.
I don’t know anybody who says, “I remember the time my Dad made me stay on the field of play after I broke down because we were getting slaughtered. It was the best day of my life.” I know a lot of people who say, “I remember that my Dad didn’t force me to play until I was ready, and that made all the difference.”
Mamacita
Nov 7, 2005 at 4:41 pm
Are we arguing here about whether or not a crying child should be allowed to stay in the game (no)
or whether or not a grown man should be taken to task for sticking his foot out and interfering where and when he had no business to do so (yes)
or whether perhaps adults are too damn involved in what ought to be a GAME, played by CHILDREN?
(Yes.) (And, Yes again.)
Jeepers, folks, if your child isn’t having fun, take him/her home. Don’t ruin the other children’s fun as well. It’s a GAME, not war.
I would not humiliate a child for the world, but it seems to me that a father who sticks his foot out into the playing field would be a lot more humiliating than being benched, removed from the field, hugged, and taken home.