Lots of parents put their children in club sports because the child likes to play—and if your children don’t play club sports, they will probably fall behind their peers. Is that a valid concern?

Because youngsters are starting earlier, they’re better at the age of 10 and 12 than they have ever been. Their skills are refined at an earlier age. But we also see them starting to leave sports at the ages of 12 and 13 because they’re burned out.

Early specialization, too, leads to earlier burnout—and to more injuries and tired joints by the time they get to college.

At the college level, we’re also seeing less of a competitive edge in our athletes. I think the reason is that teens used to play one or two games a week. Now, because of the club scenes, they’re playing two to three games a day. When you do that, losing isn’t a big deal because you still have two games scheduled later in the day. But when you play one game, you really pour yourself into it. As a result, today’s college athletes are more athletic and skilled but don’t have as much competitiveness and grit as college athletes used to.

For us, at a small college, the ideal student athlete has played two to three sports in high school and no—or very little—club sports. If they do that, they don’t have wear and tear on their body and are really just falling in love with their sport more and more as they go through high school.

I’m not the only one saying this. There are mountains of research proving that starting early is more likely to wreck than to jump-start a professional career or Division 1 scholarship.

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