I know Lavar ball is the extreme. But I am or have coached and trained kids whose parents who really lived through them. Is there a fine line of wanting the best for their child and/or living through them to see the success that they never got?
DO ALL PARENTS SECRETLY LIVE VICARIOUSLY THROUGH THERE CHILDREN IN SPORTS?
- Thread starter Justabasketballfan
- Start date
I think it's a fine line especially for those parents who played the game throughout their collegiate and professional careers. I look at it like raising a child...most try to raise their kids to be better people than them, parenting from own personal experiences. In sports there's similar concepts again teaching from your experiences in the game, helping to maximize their potential and giving supportive guidance. Most importantly let a coach coach and allow the player to love the game!
So I hear what everybody is saying. And yes allowing kids to be coached and to learn to love the game is all well in good. It right now everybody is saying what I think people want to say. But let’s take Lavar ball’s tactic. Whatever you say about him as far as his mouth he has brought the world to take a look at his son. So the question would be would we really be talking about his son in this manner if it wasn’t for his father having whether you look at it as negative or positive comments? Now let’s look at it on the lower level. You have trained your child and for some reason the coach doesn’t know your child can play or what they could bring to that team they are on. Your child is getting frustrated and is thinking about quitting. But you do the parent thing in the beginning of the season by telling your child “no just be patient in the process, the coach will see your talent and get you in the game” but your child continues to sit or not have the opportunity. Now fast forward year two. Your child is a whole lot better but this time you want to get ahead of this by telling the coach “look, my child can play. You have to give a serious look at them or I can find another team.” Now looking at it from parents point of view, I can understand the promotion that is needed to give your child a fighting chance at a fair shot for time on the team. But from a coaches stand point who doesn’t know what you have been through with other coaches I can understand that- that could be looked as being negative because now your child has something to prove and could give a chance to find anything wrong with your child just justify that they are not as good as the parent says they are. And then I’ve seen where the parent goes out to prove that there child can play by making their own AAU team with their child as the center piece. That also generates plenty of conflict with in the basketball ranks. And then this parent promotion continues all the way through high and maybe college. And then the parent somehow convinces everyone that there child is a top NBA prospect and is looking to go to a certain team or he won’t play in the league…this sounds familiar to anybody? It should- you have heard this story with Kobe Bryant, Venus and Serina Williams, payton and eli manning, john elway, and many others who have dictated their careers. I’m not a fan. But when you look at the trials that someone has been going through in order for coaches and various other nay-sayers to get out of their own way to look at a kid that is truly talented, it makes parents do rash things in order for that to happen. Yes it worked out for the Kobe’s of the world. But I am so old school where the play of an athlete will dictate the talent. Yes it may take while for the others to notice but I think the journey to understand what you have to do to get better prove you belong makes it worth the while. I don’t know. what the right way is. But I understand
I don't know if you can compare Kobe or the Williams sisters they both came from different situations than Lavar Ball and his sons. Kobe's dad didn't have to promote his son because his talent was evident he didn't need self-promotion. The Williams sister were trying to break in to a sport, that while had some past minority participation was and still is for the most part an exclusively non-minority upper class sport that holds most of their top tier matches at exclusive clubs just like golf. Their dad saw that his daughters would be treated unfairly and or not get all the opportunities to highlight their skills.
Lavar Ball's angle is marketing and building a brand for himself and his son more than basketball itself, think the Kardashians. He is just using basketball as his vehicle since his sons have some talent in this particular sport. They're looking to cash in on his BBB "Big Ballers Brand" rather than being the best basketball players ever. So by using his son's success now rather than later, because he knows if his sons flame out, which they will, he already got the maximum exposure from their success already.
Now for the parent aspect I'm going through this right now, how to make sure your kid is getting treated fairly but at the same time let them grow and enjoy the game. Sometimes parents have to suck it up, swallow their pride and realize they had their time and let their kids grow and work thinks out by themselves like I've learned. A tough lesson but I'm so glad where we're at now that both parent is having fun watching and player is having fun playing.
Lavar Ball's angle is marketing and building a brand for himself and his son more than basketball itself, think the Kardashians. He is just using basketball as his vehicle since his sons have some talent in this particular sport. They're looking to cash in on his BBB "Big Ballers Brand" rather than being the best basketball players ever. So by using his son's success now rather than later, because he knows if his sons flame out, which they will, he already got the maximum exposure from their success already.
Now for the parent aspect I'm going through this right now, how to make sure your kid is getting treated fairly but at the same time let them grow and enjoy the game. Sometimes parents have to suck it up, swallow their pride and realize they had their time and let their kids grow and work thinks out by themselves like I've learned. A tough lesson but I'm so glad where we're at now that both parent is having fun watching and player is having fun playing.
Last edited:
Thanks simmonj4618, you are one of the rare few that has gained and understanding of this. But it’s really tough trying to explain it to parent that has no idea of how high school, and college works. One parent told me that there child was a D1 player. And I said really. So I went to see this play. They were freshman at the time and was sitting the bench for Jv. I had to tell the parent that your child had some improving to do in order to be called or looked at as D1. I tried to tell the parent that your view of D1 may not be correct and that your child has continue to improve in order to get to that level. But it is hard for them to get that out of their heads. A lot of the education has to be done with the parents more so than anything. Whether there oblivious on subject or if they just fully believe in their child.
