A day doesn't go by where I don't get emailed, a post shared on Facebook, or a link posted on Twitter referencing the "evils" and "dangers" of only playing one sport and early specialization - all usually come from well-meaning experts, most far beyond a level of expertise in their field that I will likely ever achieve in my own.
I'm not saying they're completely wrong, but I think in some ways they may be flawed or at the very least don't take in the whole picture. I guess I'm first left to wonder at what point did playing one sport automatically become "early specialization"?
In our facility, we have baseball players that "only" play baseball in high school, players who travel extensively, and who have pitching and hitting lessons. You know what else they do? One of them is a black belt, some LOVE basketball (they show up 30min before their group training time to shoot and work on their game, or like yesterday when they stayed and played for an hour after their workout) - and all of them while "only" playing and "specializing" in baseball routinely take MONTHS off from throwing and hitting.
We also have many girls' lacrosse players that "only" play lacrosse. One loves to play the oboe and plays in the school band, she and many others LOVE to play basketball, soccer, and football (yes I said football), a few others enjoy dance (if we're talking about injury risk, I can tell you I have far more concern here than for one-sport athletes), others teach dance, and still others tutor and volunteer in their off-season. Not every form of "play" and love for a sport or activity looks the same from kid to kid. It is possible to enjoy to "play" even if it doesn't conveniently fit into an organized, adult-structured system or a three-sport athlete mold that it seems every article now pushes and every national team survey purports that their players once were.
My fear with all of the talk of the dangers of early specialization is that we automatically assume that the kids that only "play" one sport ONLY do that sport in ALL of their free time. It's also a legitimate concern that we are pushing kids to participate in sports that may ruin their sports experience because they actually don't enjoy the sport or they become apathetic towards a sport or team, or that we have them going in a sport every month of the year (ummm where's the "recovery" in the 3-sport scenario?!).
I've always taken the same stance if asked by any of our kids about a particular sport and if they should play it outside of their preferred sports season. When asked I simply say "Do you want to play? Do you like it?" If a kid hates soccer, but they think or their parents think they have to play to be "healthy", is that really what we're now trying to do? If a kid doesn't like it and doesn't want to play, what are we even talking about?!
Additionally, isn't it possible the injury statistics related to sports specialization may be flawed? What were the injured athletes doing as far as their training and preparation is concerned?
Were they doing a CrossFit or antiquated bodybuilding program that we know increase the likelihood of injury or at the very least are inappropriate/ineffective for athletic development? Or were they participating in a well-designed sports functional training regimen taking all movements and facets of their development into consideration?
I'm not saying early specialization doesn't exist and I'm not saying that it doesn't come with a set of inherent risk factors where it occurs. However, I also believe it's getting dangerously mislabeled to the kid that "only" plays one sport, all while still loving and playing with friends a bunch of sports they really enjoy - and all while ignoring far too many other risk factors for injury. Yes there are dangers for the kid who plays soccer 12 months a year.
I'm just saying that maybe, just maybe that kid also plays a ton of basketball with friends... and neighborhood street hockey... and dances... and is in the school band. And just as an aside, we had our first two ACL tears in 15 years last year... 24 hours apart... One was a 3-sport athlete, the other played only one sport... No I do not believe that the number of sports a kid CHOOSES to play for their school has anything to do with whether or not they will ultimately become injured or successful.
Pat Britton
BASC, Inc.
315-657-8227
pat@brittonathletics.com
www.BrittonAthletics.com