My Eyes are Different

This turned into a very long post. So, unless you have about ten or fifteen minutes, you may wish to skim or skip. Sorry. Soap box day.

Yesterday my son played in what was without a doubt the most miserable of the ten games his team has played this season. Surprisingly, he actually had fun, which was good. I did not. But then my perspective was different. I was the scorekeeper - or, rather, I was supposed to be.

We arrived early and saw the last five minutes of the game which preceded Son's. We were disappointed with the referees. This is an "in-house" league, which means no one gets paid to do anything (except the custodial staff, who are responsible for the building). The coaches are mothers and fathers who donate time and energy. The referees are ordered there by the High School Varsity Basketball Coach, who has more than a little influence in the program. So the referees are teenagers who have had no training whatsoever in the task they have been assigned. Still, there are two pairs who actually do a better than average job. Son's team has been fortunate to have one of them in four of the previous seven games played. Not so today. And what do you do? They're just kids themselves. You let them muck up and hope it all balances out. Meanwhile, you remind yourself that there is no money, power, or prestige involved here. It's not supposed to matter who wins. (If I had my way, they wouldn't even be keeping score, but that's another issue.)

Anyway, I had brought the little 35mm camera to the game in hopes of getting some action pictures of Son and some of his teammates. I picked a place near one end of the court and sat down. Then Son's coach came by and greeted Spouse and me. He said he wanted me near him during the game. (I'm a horrible coach, but a good observer.) So I moved to the players' bench. There I learned the coach of the opposing team intended to run the scoreboard. Not wanting to deprive him of coaching, I said I would do the scoreboard - but someone would have to show me how, as this controller was different than at the other school. (This would be my third stint at the job.) He assured me it was exactly the same. He lied.

So the game begins and Son's team is playing like they're asleep. One of their better players is playing hurt, and two others are trying to do everything by themselves on offense. No one was playing defense - except Son, who loves to play defense. The team was falling behind, and Son was playing harder and harder and harder.

Meanwhile, the opposing coach chose to sit at the scorer's table instead of on the bench with his players, and he keeps having to show me how to do certain things. The reason? I can't get it out of my head that he said it's supposed to work like the other scoring controller. Finally, he comes just short of calling me stupid by pointing out that there are actually directions at hand which I have not looked at (because he told me I didn't need them). I figure out what's wrong and from that point on, I'm fine. But from that point on he had absolutely no faith in me and kept interfering with my job by doing some of it himself. (I almost got up and left, but people don't like it when I get angry, so I kept my cool and let him disrupt my job.)

At Son's age, the players play eight five minute periods. It was during the third period when Son's accelerating drive caught up to him. I saw his team go down the court and suddenly he wasn't running. He was walking. He turned and I saw his face. Spouse was at my elbow and I turned and said, "Something is wrong with Son." There was only about thirty seconds left in the period, but suddenly Son turned and tried running off the court toward the rest rooms. He didn't make it. I saw him spit up. But he kept going and was soon out of sight. Only I and perhaps three other adults saw him.

So now the coaches are sending out players to being Period Four. I get up and tell everyone there is water on the floor. So now everyone is standing around waiting. I ask the coach at the table if someone went to get towels to clean it up. He said only a custodian who has been trained in dealing with these kinds of spills can clean it up, and no one can find the custodian. It would take a half hour before they did. Son's coach used the time to good measure. He came and asked me what I thought was going wrong, and I gave him three pointers. Then he went and talked to the team.

When the game finally resumed, Son's team played equally to the other. Unfortunately, they were already losing before the break, so playing equal wasn't enough. They had to play better.

They had played this team a few weeks ago and lost by a single point when the other team's best player made one of two free throws. Son's team stole the ball five times in the final minute of play, but were never able to make the basket and win. This time, the opposing coach decided his team was going to be just as aggressive as Son's. They were worse. And the referees - remember the teenagers? - were horrible. Every time there was a jump ball they gave it to the other team. Every time the ball went out of bounds they gave it to the other team. I saw parents staring at each other wide-mouthed as the other team got the ball over and over and over again. And then, all of a sudden, that stopped. They called things equally. In fact, they may even have favored Son's team. But there was less than ten minutes left.

Regarding the score at this time, I cannot honestly tell you. The coach kept interfering with the controller, and suddenly I have people coming up to me and telling me the score is wrong. Everyone had an opinion, but they didn't agree. I settled on a compromise. Instead of Son's team losing by six (like the opposing coach said), or only losing by two (like Son's coach said), I put Son's team down by four. Nobody was really happy, but the arguing stopped. After that the opposing coach was too busy telling his players to "play rough". I heard him. I couldn't believe. Well, yes I could. That's the problem.

But playing "rough" worked against the other team. With less than a minute to go Son's team tied the game. Then, with just thirty seconds to go, one of the ten best players in the league (this is the opinion of other parents and coaches, folks) went to the free-throw line to shoot two. Son.

As he prepared to make his first attempt I sensed from his motion that he was getting sick again. He had played very hard. He missed. Then he took a deep breath, followed his routine, and swished the ball through the rim to give his team their first lead of the game. Then he ran off the court to the bathroom. He made it this time. The other team raced down the court, but there just wasn't enough time for them. Their coach kept looking at the controller, but I huddled over it. Time expired and Son's team had won. And Son had scored the winning basket!Just a little prejudiced. [grin] - [whoops of exubarance]

The teams this year seem to be closer in ability than other years, which is good. The one year I coached I had such a good crop of players the average span of victory was twenty points. They held one team to five baskets. The last year I coached I had a team with exactly two good players: Son and one other. We lost every game. The one game in which the other good player didn't show up Son scored all of the points: seven.

I still disagree with this concept of keeping score for young people who aren't even teenagers. This is too young to be "weeding out" good players from bad. There are no "good and bad" players at this age. There is simply different progressions of development. We keep teaching boys and girls that they "can't do this" and "can't do that" until, before they are even a teenager, they are convinced of a host of things they "can't" do.

Many parents who children develop faster physically believe - wrongly - that their children are special because of it. But what they, and most of these league organizers, fail to recognize is that the little boy or girl who can't do anything in third grade may just be your best player in eighth grade - except they have already quit because you told them they suck. I wonder how many people know that Michael Jordan wasn't good enough to play seventh grade basketball for his school?

Virtually everyone knows what to say about sportsmanship and the purpose of these games. But then you watch their behavior and decisions when the games are actually played and you realize they don't believe a word in their mouth. The year my team went 8-0 I was happy for my players, but sick about the thrashing other players had to endure. And of course I didn't feel any better the year my team failed to win a game. It isn't just the kids who poke fun at losing teams.

If I won the lottery, I would start a business. I already know the man I would hire to run it. (People don't like me, so I would handle the background work.) He has the same dream. We would build a facility in which the young people could come and learn the skills of basketball and baseball, but with the focus on individual improvement instead of team victories. What do I mean? I mean we purchase, or invent, equipment to teach things like rebounding, dribbling, hitting, catching, and running. We would take benchmark readings at the beginning of the season and periodically test players throughout. We would let them play games, but not keep score. Let them do that. (They will, but they will all be wrong. But ultimately, they will all think they won. [smiles]) What each individual player will see on their tests is - not how well they are doing compared to the "best" or "worst" - but how well they are doing "today" as opposed to "yesterday" or "last week".

It is this sense of progression which makes people feel good about themselves. Especially with young people. (And young at heart.) I've seen it with some of the "horrible" players I have coached. One boy wanted to quit. I encouraged him to stick it out. Now he's a sometimes dominant force in games. His body is catching up to his brain. (For some kids it's the other way around, and when parents indulge them, the brains never catch up. Just look at the professional atheletes of today.)

What people - young people in particular - need are confidence building skills in whatever. Maybe it's sports. Maybe it's mathematics. Maybe it's music, art or fishing or whatever. Help people discover that they have it within them to be better today than yesterday and they will be forever grateful to you. They will also be better people than they would otherwise be.

But other people don't seem to see what I see.

There must be something wrong with my eyes.