Sharing two brief stories before this week’s essay. All three highlight what our job is and isn’t.
“Whatever it is you’re teaching him is working.”
That’s what a gentleman who appeared to be homeless said to me last Saturday. He was laying in the grass beyond the fence of a field where I was throwing my son BP.
“Thank you,” I said, helping Alex shag balls from the fence line and beyond it. “That’s kind of you.”
“I love how he uses the whole field,” the man said. “Are you his dad or his coach?”
That morning Alex asked if I would hit some grounders and fly balls and throw him BP. My first thought: I need to clean the garage and go to the market. But I’ve learned to say yes in these moments. That’s my job. I’m not his coach. I’m his dad.
I know enough about his swing to see when he’s locked in, or when he’s coming out of his base or pulling his head. I’ve gotten better at only sharing that info when he asks: “Dad, what did you see?”
Usually my job is easier: support him, encourage him, lean in when he wants to play catch or hit BP.
“I wish I could take credit for his swing, but I didn’t teach him to swing like that,” I said to the man in the grass. “I’m his dad.”
Next day, Sunday, Alex and his 12u team were facing a pitcher throwing mid-70s — first time they had seen that in a game. They were playing up in a 13u tournament and playing well, but this pitcher was on another level.
The first time Alex faced him he struck out. A few minutes later we ran into each other in the restroom.
“Dad, he’s throwing so fast,” he said.
“You’ve seen faster and crushed it,” I told him, leaving out that the only place that’s happened is off a machine, in a warehouse where he trains. “You’ve got this.”
My job wasn’t to coach him and give him something else to think about. It was simply to support him, remind him to trust his training, and get after it.
Next at-bat vs same pitcher: count is 2-1 and Alex crushes a low line drive into right field. Dad behind me, “He put some barrel on that.”
“Attaboy, Alex! Attaboy!” I said from the stands.
THIS WEEK’s ESSAY
I saw an exchange on Facebook recently that floored me because it's one of the sharpest examples I've seen of a parent and coach attacking each other, and losing sight of the 12-year-old caught in the middle. It reminded me why I write these essays, record reels, and coach parents: too many of us get these moments wrong — really wrong, sometimes — and kids pay for it.
Youth sports is supposed to be about the kids. You know, the ‘youth’ in youth sports. But some adults make it about themselves. Happens too often. When we change that, we change the experience for the kids and keep more of them in the game, which is what we all want.
The exchange I saw on Facebook started with a post from a mom whose son guest-played for a team in Cooperstown. The post was long. It was heartfelt and also tough to read. It shed light on a conflict that had been private but not fully resolved.
The coach saw the post and he did exactly what any crisis communications professional would advise his client not to do. He went off. He started by announcing he was going to quit, “fed up with parents and issues like this one,” he said. Then he attacked the parents. Then he criticized their son's game. Honestly, he did. And then, almost on cue, he defended himself.
I told you it was wild.
The kid who guest-played joined his new team in Cooperstown with an understanding that he would pitch and catch, the mom wrote. That mostly didn’t happen. During the tournament, the parents confronted the coach — not after a cooling-off period, not the next day, but right after a game — reportedly demanding to know the next day's lineup and threatening to pull their son from the team and fly home early after the coach said he didn't know yet who'd be playing.
The coach, by his own account, answered as best he could in the moment but also said he was annoyed. Among other things, he said it cost him the few minutes he had to visit with his wife before heading back to the bunkhouse with the boys.
There wasn’t much in the mom’s post about her son’s feelings. It was mostly about how her and her husband felt. Same goes for the coach. He mostly focused on himself.
It was like watching a fire spread, with no one doing any damage control.
Making things more awkward, it was clear these folks knew each other outside the Cooperstown bubble.
The coach built an unflattering public profile of her son. He shared the kid’s batting average, on-base percentage, passed balls, and stolen bases allowed — to explain why a 12-year-old boy did not earn more playing time in Cooperstown. He compared the kid’s mistakes to what other kids on his team did right, in the same paragraph where he lectured this mom and her husband for comparing their son to other players in a heated conversation the three of them had between games.
He told her demanding to know if their son would play the next day and threatening to take him home “isn’t the right thing to do.” Of course it’s not, but neither is attacking a parent and sharing stats about a 12-year-old on Facebook.
The comments were quickly deleted. The post wasn’t.
Nobody in this thread was protecting the kid. They were protecting themselves.
The parents skipped the 24-hour ‘cooling off’ rule — one of the oldest unwritten rules in youth sports, and they blew right through it mid-tournament, in the moment, at a place that’s supposed to be magical. Then mom took a private conflict and made it public in a passive-aggressive post I suspect she wanted the coach to see.
The coach took the bait. If he had taken the high road, this goes away. Instead, he answered pressure with pressure. He pointed to the kid’s stat line to argue the team deserved better options during bracket play. Win or go home, no room for sentiment.
This is what I mean when I say adults shape the experience for kids. This time: parents who couldn’t wait a day and a coach who couldn’t keep his cool. Both sides added pressure and made the game harder, on a stage that’s already difficult for some kids. And neither avoided the comparison trap — one of my 5 Moments That Shape Young Ballplayers.
Nobody here set out to hurt a kid. But angst, ego, and expectations turned a rough week of guest-playing into a public referendum on a 12-year-old’s batting average and on-base percentage. What kid wants that?
Bark loudly. Rant publicly. Defend at all costs. That’s all I saw when the only thing that might have fixed things was waiting a day or two and having a real conversation behind closed doors.
This game, even though it’s a kid’s game, can bring out the worst in adults, especially when you mix in long, hot days, and competing personalities. There’s drama on every team. Most of it isn’t a big deal. Some of it is.
It’s why I don’t think youth sports has a parent problem or a coach problem. It has an adult problem.
Nobody hands parents a manual for what to say when their kid is benched. Nobody hands coaches talking points covering what to say — and what not to say — when a parent corners them mid-tournament, exhausted, with phones, group chats, and social media all lurking in the background.
This coach eventually seemed to catch himself, urging parents not to coach from the stands, to let their kids struggle, to stop rescuing them from adversity, and to trust they'd come out better players and people for it.
True, but you can bet his message was lost on the parents of that 12-year-old boy. It didn’t have to be.
My wife likes to say, “You never regret taking the high road.” It’s good advice for parents and coaches.
Go Deeper
As a parent coach, I help you help your kid play loose, with confidence and joy. The game gets harder, and our relationships suffer, when we add pressure.
If you’ve gotten the car ride home wrong, caught yourself coaching from the stands, or gotten caught up in the comparison trap, you’re not alone. None of us want to get these moments wrong. The good news: it’s fixable, and it starts with two short guides you can use before your kid’s next game.
Grab your parent playbooks — $20
Want something more specific worked through — your kid, your situation? I do that too.
Email me your issue and I’ll get back to you within 24 hours — $50
Book a coaching session — $150/45 minutes
Lastly, every week I drop new reels on Instagram: @tonymanolatos. Some are related to my essays. Some aren’t. It’s a place for parents to connect with me and each other, to share stories that are funny or moving, do’s and don’ts, and more.
Great piece. The Cooperstown guest playing portal is wild. Guessing teams that are desperate for a player or two have to make promises. Or at least float expectations to parents. Lack of familiarity on both sides is a recipe for disaster.