Keith Strudler: Travel Soccer

So I’m going to say two of the dirtiest words in the history of the American version of the English language. Travel soccer. If you’ve ever so much as sat in a minivan before, those words make you curl up in a fetal position. It’s like saying tax audit or prostate exam. They’re scary because they’re real.

For the uninitiated, travel soccer is a loose descriptor for what kids do when they decide to go beyond their local youth soccer league. You know, the one you see every Saturday morning, where there’s hundreds of kids wearing the same shirts in different colors, all with the name of a local business on the back. Most everyone comes from that particular town, or somewhere nearby, and they play a round-robin schedule until basically the weather changes, and it’s on to another sport or summer camp. Travel soccer is different. In travel soccer, kids tryout for one, or maybe two teams per age group, and that team represents the city, or town, or club, or whatever in regional competition. So instead of red vs blue, it’s this city vs another city. And instead of everyone getting put on a team and playing nearly the equal amount, you have to be selected for a team, and the better you are, the more playing time you’ll get. And instead of driving a mile or so to your local fields – and parents, this is the big one – now you’ll cart your family all over the region to play teams from all over. What was once a one hour ordeal will become an all-day affair.

There’s more differences, or course, including practice time and a codification of the word mandatory. Oh, and it’s also way more expensive, in case the extra gas and time-off from work didn’t cost you enough already. These are simply the differences in procedure and process. Then there’s the psychological and emotional differences. Like making winning and losing more important. Stressing outcome more than effort, not that the two can’t be linked. And moving from a more balanced lifestyle, say, where soccer is just one of many activities during the week, to a more focused one, where this game becomes a far higher priority.

Now, what I’ve said should make it fairly obvious that I have a perspective on this. Namely, I don’t think 10 and 11 and 12-year-old kids need to travel the state – or multiple states – in search of higher competition. I think this is largely the machination of adults – coaches, recruiters, parents, and anyone else that might benefit from determining at a very young age who the very best may be, even if that comes at the detriment of everyone else. I don’t think it’s good for the kids, and I certainly don’t think it’s good for families. And I’ve spent a lot of my academic career speaking with a lot of academics that reinforce that narrative.

Which leads me to my current dilemma. My oldest is 9, going on 10. And he really wants to try out for travel soccer. Sloan is pretty good, certainly not the best, but he’d likely make the team. And I hope this doesn’t offend anyone, either the listeners or my son, but he’d probably be a reserve and play far less than he does now. He’s not likely to be highly recruited by soccer scouts, and I can’t imagine he’d grow into a Division I soccer player. I’m not a defeatist – just a realist. And someone who’s spent much of his life watching sports and was a very average Division I cross country runner, I think I’ve got a decent perspective on this, which is something that alludes far too many parents. And I think Sloan knows this as well – which is a real credit to him.

So I’m in a real pickle. It’s easy for me to talk theory in the abstract. It’s much harder when it’s my kid, and I don’t want him to feel like my convictions ruin his reality. I want to tell him that not playing travel is better for him in the long run; that he’ll appreciate sports more; he’ll probably pay more attention to school; and he’ll be more well-rounded. And he doesn’t need some junior high soccer scout to tell him how important practice is. But I also hate telling him he can’t be with all his friends that are trying out for the team, whose parents are all getting ready to hit the road. It’s a lose-lose. Which is a shame, since sports for 10-year-olds should be nothing but a distinct joy.

I’m hoping we’ll find out that our city’s travel team plays on Sunday mornings, which would get in the way of Sunday School, which we’ve already decided is non-starter. Hopefully he’ll thank me after his Bar Mitzvah party a few years from now. Which, like travel soccer, is phrase that causes more than a few parents to want to run and hide.

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