Early Specialization in Sports: God Help Us

So the idea lately has been to specialize in a given sport as early as possible and to only play that sport 24/7 for an entire year. There are obviously negative mental and emotional consequences of doing so. Players often lose the passion for the game they love because they're forced to work at it every day in the rink or field. Passion for the game is what takes guys to the next level, not coercion. Then there are the financial consequences for families. 24/7 sports training is hard for many families, especially in this economy. Many of the companies out there over-charge by doing some exceptional brand-marketing. The rich kids then get to train all year and the poorer families either suffer by reducing consumption elsewhere in the household budget or simply have to forego the opportunities.

There is another negative consequence of 24/7 specialization in one sport. To make this point vivid, let's think of a normal looking young athlete. Let's take that normal looking athlete and train their chest and the front of their shoulders only. Every day we take them in the weight room and they do chest work. Soon, as you can imagine, this person starts to get a giant chest. Everyone can see how big his chest is. Others start to think "I should start training like that guy! Look how big his chest is!"

Do you know what's wrong here? We've trained this athlete to have a big chest, but no one notices his weak back or inadequate leg strength. His chest is clearly visible and obviously bigger. But his overall athleticism and strength is terrible. The big chest/weak back will result in hunching over, his or her shoulders will rotate inward, and a host of issues can result.

This is exactly what happens with athletes that specialize in one sport. They train the same set of muscles and in the same set of movements. Over time, those muscles become disproportionally strong relative to the muscles which aren't worked. Athletic movements, however, require synergy between muscles. The abs have to be strong enough for an athlete to cut well, the back strong enough to support the shoulders, the legs built enough to leverage the upper body strength, etc.

By playing several different sports, and especially at a young age, athletes learn a host of movements. They work their hamstrings in soccer, their eye/hand coordination in baseball, their speed in track and field, their leg strength in hockey, and their footwork in basketball. At some point, a refinement of skills in each sport is required. But that refinement must have a strong foundation, one that is grounded in multi-sport play, and diverse sports training.

Unfortunately, the parents and players will confuse correlation and causation. Parents will see the best players going into year round athletics and sport specialization and they will think that it is because of specialization that the kids are so kid. They will not realize it's simply a correlation. And the kids obviously won't realize either.