Miasmatic Review

My son has commitment issues.

No, he doesn’t have a girlfriend. He’s playing NFL Flag Football. Last Saturday the coach had him playing linebacker and had him doing pass rushing. Since they don’t have an offensive line, he has to stay at least 7 yards back from where the ball is being hiked, and then he can blitz the Quarterback. He’s quick and agile on his feet, and was doing a good job of hurrying the QB. The problem is that about 2 feet from the guy he would slow down and not go for the flag. There was at least 4 different occasions that if he committed to grabbing the flag, he would have gotten a sack.

When I asked him why, he told me that he was worried that he’d make a mistake and the QB would make a big play. I tried explaining to him that by not going for the flag, he was allowing the Quarterback to still make a play. Those can easily turn into big plays too. Tonight, after breaking more concrete up, we ran some drills in the back yard. I had him work on grabbing the flag. Then we worked on short range sprinting, and finally we worked on pass blocking and catching. Hey if he can make the interception, that’s just as good!

I didn’t work him too long. The point is for him to have fun. Not to hate the game, I don’t want to be THAT dad. You know, the one that is at the games berating their kid because he didn’t follow through. At home they work on drills and practice 4 hours a night, besides the team practice. I’m sure we’ve all seen a dad like that. In fact I knew a kid in High School who’s dad was so bad that he wouldn’t let his son go out with his friends on the weekend. They had to practice. The guy was convinced his son was going to be the first kid from our High School to get recruited to Notre Dame. Unfortunately the kid ended up breaking his leg the second game of the season his senior year. The last I heard he never played football again, well at least not during college and definitely not in the pros.

That’s not how I want to be. I want to help Boopie and encourage him. Work with him to improve his game. What I don’t want to do is drive the fun or the love of playing out of him. When he gets older I don’t want him to resent me for making him practice all the time. We won’t practice tomorrow night, unless he asks. Wednesday he has his normal team practice, and after that we’ll crush more rock. Right now I just like watching him play. Seeing him have fun on the field is more important then him being the strongest player on the team. I’d rather keep it that way.

Oh, and I did cheese one father off at the game on Saturday. I was talking to another dad and we didn’t understand some of the rules. (Like no rushing from with in 5 yards of the end zone, etc) He made the comment along the lines of, “It’s so the kids don’t get hurt.” I responded with, “Yea, I guess that makes sense. I mean, it is flag football; it’s not like real football. This is the football you put your kid into because they are too frail to play tackle.” (Boopie is a small guy and would get killed in tackle. In fact many of the kids would get crushed playing tackle) One of THOSE fathers overheard what I said and got a little agitated. Apparently he didn’t like the fact his son was not a starting safety for the Bears.