Playing little league baseball or joining your first soccer team when you were 9 years old used to be fun, entry level experiences for children to experience the fun of learning how to play a particular sport. You used to try a recreational league for a season and then if you wanted to, could try a different sport the next season. Youth sports have changed dramatically over the past 20-30 years and now children are beginning to play organized team sports as young as 3 or 4 years old and choosing a sport to specialize in and play year round by the end of elementary school with special private coaching and using the best pitching machines and batting cages in the winter, for example. The level of intensity for kids athletics is the same as it was for high school and even some college athletes 25 years ago and this is causing several new problems.

One of the greatest differences is the age at which children are now signed up for sports. Not long ago, the youngest age typically, was about seven or eight years old to try soccer and ten or eleven years old to try basketball. Now it is 3 years old for soccer and kindergarten for basketball. Most of the kids at these young ages do not have neither the physical coordination nor the mental capacity to be able to get through an hour long sports event. Because of this, kids give up on a sport very young because it was too dificult for them.

Kids are also being told that they have to specialize and focus on one sport around the age of 10 years old in order to get a sports scholarship for college. This has increased stress related injuries in much younger kids as a result of overuse on their growing bodies. The overuse on the kids physically and mentally has created an entire generation of youth to completely burn out by the time they reach middle school or high school which is so sad.

This increased intensity of athletics at a younger age is also seen by the coaches and the parents too. There have been so many parents that got caught up in their children's games or competitions that they cause problems with their inappropriate behaviors and must be told to leave. Because of this, the majority of schools and youth leagues now require parents to sign a contract for acting in a well mannered way. Coaching has also become much more intense for kids. In the past a parent would volunteer to help coach a team and that was much appreciated. Today parents are hiring private coaches and personal trainers to get their child to to be the best athlete ever. The Financial investment parents put into their children's athletic pursuits is sky high.

Perhaps, people will realize that kids need to be kids and do not need the physical or mental stress that is being put on them athletically by their coaches and parents.