Why Kobe’s last chapter was his best

Tom Farrey
Executive Director, Sports & Society Program

Let me tell you a story about Kobe Bryant that has not been shared before. It’s one that speaks, I think, to the true character of the man we just lost, all of us, in ways that can only be fully appreciated when a force of enormous creativity, drive and purpose comes to rest – and there is no more inertia, just waves of impact washing over us, each bigger than we anticipated at the start of the day.

Last August, we launched a major public awareness campaign called Don’t Retire, Kid. By we, I mean Project Play, our Aspen Institute initiative that aims to build healthy communities through sports with the help of many organizations that touch the lives of kids.

You may have seen the lead PSA. A 9-year-old boy announces at a press conference that he is “retiring from sports” because the adults have gone haywire. He got into this to have fun with his friends, and … well, you know the rest. Kobe needed to like the spot because he was going to launch the campaign for us, pro bono, on social media and ESPN.

“What do you think?” I asked him, in a room at ESPN’s LA studios.

“It’s OK,” he said, curtly, lips pursing with that familiar intensity.

Of the four languages Kobe spoke, body language was his loudest.

He wasn’t happy, and, having talked with him about the campaign for nearly a year, I knew why – the Mamba wanted a more aggressive script. He didn’t just want to wake up sports parents to the undue pressures they are putting on kids to perform. He wanted to punch them in the nose, these adults, many of whom were surely his fans.

Now, mind you, the script was already pretty direct. The truth it put on the table was uncomfortable, that we’re screwing it up for the next generation and that all of us – leagues, media, tech, athletes, coaches, schools, colleges and policymakers – need to be better stewards of the institution of youth sports. When the average kid quits sports by age 11, as our research shows, we collectively have a systemic problem.

As a trained journalist with a long history of trying to push truth into the jockosphere, I was thrilled that ESPN was prepared to run the spot hundreds, if not thousands, of times in the coming months.

He didn’t just want to wake up sports parents to the undue pressures they are putting on kids to perform. He wanted to punch them in the nose, these adults, many of whom were surely his fans.

Kobe wanted more edge, because to him it was personal. The first time we had lunch about Project Play, two years earlier, he told me about a game in which he was coaching his daughter Gianna’s team. The opposing coach was screaming at his players, berating them for mistakes. This went on the whole game, Kobe’s temper growing. He knew from being coached well that this isn’t coaching well. And he hated to see the girls on that team suffer from the emotional abuse.

During post-game handshakes, Kobe told me, he stopped the coach, looked directly into his eyes and, with the same quiet if intense fury once directed at NBA rivals – he demonstrated this for me – said, If you EVER act like that in another game in which I am coaching, you are going to have to deal with me. And trust me, you don’t want that.

At that moment, I knew Kobe was sincere about our project. I had never heard an athlete talk with such passion about sticking up for kids. Or ask as many sophisticated questions about our work.

“How do you approach the debate around participation trophies?”

“How do you mobilize organizations to change the game?”

“How do you tell your stories?”

Most pro athletes are one-way streets. You ask, they tell. Comes with the territory, a lifetime of being put on a pedestal in which you are treated as the center of the universe and nothing is as interesting as you. Here, in Kobe, I had one of the world’s true sports icons being curious about realms well beyond the arena, committed to learning, unafraid of the unchartered, and offering to give voice to the voiceless.

I didn’t have to sell him on anything. He was just in, eager to deploy his assets – his champion’s credibility, his social network, his advocacy, his international reach – to improve an institution that impacts the lives of youth. We chose Arnold Worldwide, the Boston-based agency that built Don’t Retire, Kid, based on his recommendation and that of his deft marketing chief, Molly Carter. Kobe moderated a panel with children at our Project Play Summit, to help tease out what kids want from a sports experience. For our Healthy Sport Index, he supplied a list of companion sports that basketball players can use to build skills and health (he also suggested meditation, to focus the mind).

Here, in Kobe, I had one of the world’s true sports icons being curious about realms well beyond the arena, committed to learning, unafraid of the unchartered, and offering to give voice to the voiceless.

My favorite athlete as a child was Roberto Clemente, for the style in which he played and his obvious care for others. His 1972 death from a plane crash while on a humanitarian mission left a hole in our hearts but opened up something to be filled as well by citizen-athletes, like Kobe using the modern tools of social change.

I learned of his passing shortly before I boarded a flight in Washington D.C, just as I was about to call my youngest child, Kellen, the boy holding a basketball aloft on the cover of my book, Game On: The All-American Race to Make Champions of Our Children. He’s 16 now, a soccer athlete who hasn’t played organized hoops since middle school but like his big brother Cole has always admired Kobe above all athletes. I apologized by text that I couldn’t call, with all the news coming in. He texted me back:

No problem, I have been reflecting on the impact he (Kobe) had on my life. His work ethic, determination, and what he did to give back to society. He was more than a basketball player to me and his legacy will forever live on. Hope you are doing well with this and we can talk later. Love Kellen.

With that, I cried so hard one of the contacts in my eyes fell out. I didn’t know that was possible. We learn something new every day. Including: Money isn’t the only way an athlete can change the world. LeBron represents the gold standard when it comes to athletes deploying dollars for good, and God bless him – we need more like him. Kobe donated in places too, but he also knew his lane. He sought culture change, building on the foundation, established over a long NBA career with just one team, of the personal characteristics he embodied.

He wasn’t perfect. He flashed ego and made errors that altered his life and that of others. A friend of mine likened him to Our Lady Di, flawed but beloved. But the better angels of his nature carried the day.

“Sport is the vehicle through which we change the world,” Kobe said in my interview with him in 2018. “The next generation is going to carry this world forward.”

That he died while traveling by helicopter to a youth basketball game, with his daughter and others he brought along for the ride, is not ironic. It is consistent with what he cared about: fatherhood, imagination, and youth sports as a tool of human development. My heart breaks at the horror he must have felt in those final moments, knowing the life of his child might end right there, at age 13, with no chance to flower further.

I am also sad for everything that lay ahead for Kobe, who at 41 was just getting started on his post-life mission. He was laying the groundwork to push so much good into the world, through his books, podcasts and other projects aimed at children. He had more to give Project Play. As a major donor to the construction of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, he was granted one free lifetime use of the facility. He offered that to us, for our annual Summit.

We will gather at a different venue in Washington D.C. this October, at a space and date to be announced in the coming weeks. And when we do, he will be appreciated. Not just for his contributions to Don’t Retire, Kid, now up for several international awards. Or the advice he shared with parents on our platforms. But for building a life that helped build that of others. For being an original, in service of the future.

“Dream Big, Live Epic,” he scrawled on one of our Summit boards.

Now it’s up to us to be as impatient as he was with progress.

Tom Farrey (@tomfarrey) is executive director of the Aspen Institute’s Sports & Society Program (@AspenInstSports), and a former ESPN journalist. Watch videos and learn about Kobe Bryant’s perspectives on youth sports, as well as other contributions to Project Play, here.

The story was originally posted here.

Aspen Institute Mexico creates its own Project Play for kids sports

Dieter Holtz

As a lifetime swimmer, from the starting blocks in Mexico City to the roster of Florida State University men’s swim team, I know firsthand the role sports play in shaping a child’s future — not just academically, but socially, and personally. So, I have spent many years back in my country as a strong advocate for physical activity improvements in the Mexican system.

In November, my colleagues and I presented the Aspen Institute Mexico’s very own “Playbook Mexico.” It’s the culmination of two years of research bringing together kids, parents, trainers, experts in the field, companies, brands, Olympic athletes, NGOs, the academic sector and government officials to identify nine barriers, and their possible solutions, that we face in developing and sustaining youth sport participation. The project was inspired by the framework and methodology of Project Play, which the Sports & Society Program has used to help stakeholders build healthy communities through sports in the US.

The launch event for our report was held at Universidad Anahuac Norte in Mexico City and was made up of a panel of leaders from the Aspen Institute Mexico, the US, contributors from the university’s faculty, as well as past and former Olympic athlete speakers, and a panel of kids. The audience consisted of parents, coaches, education and health professionals, brands such as Nike, media representatives, NGOs, academic experts and government officials.

The interest in our playbook follows the great need for solutions. Mexico, a nation of 126 million with 31.1% of the population below the age of 17, has one of the highest obesity rates in the world. One in three youth, ages 6 to 19, are overweight or obese, and more than half (51%) of the youth between ages 10 and 14 are physically inactive. Sports play a major role in addressing these problems, as the instinct of children is to play – but often in Mexico, they have no place to do so or are discouraged from participating.

We knew we had to identify barriers and develop strategies specific to Mexico, just as the Sports & Society Program developed a framework specific to the structure and culture of youth sports in the US. Below is what we came up with, all mapping to a vision of Mexico, where all children have the opportunity to be active through sports.

Barrier 1: Early discouraging experiences
Strategy 1: Let’s build up a good beginning
By asking kids what they want, and letting them play naturally, we can increase the probability of them staying in sports. Before age 10, if kids have positive experiences in an activity, they are more likely to continue it in the long run.

Barrier 2: Limited options, more of the same
Strategy 2: Motivate them to try new alternatives
We tend to stick to a few mainstream sports, or only those easily accessible, but we can be innovative with the space and tools we have in order to let kids try new things, or even make up a new game. This enhances kids’ abilities, prevents boredom, and allows them pick and choose what they’re good at or like the most.

Barrier 3: Lack of adults as healthy models
Strategy 3: Adults as role models
Often, the problem lies in the households where parents aren’t setting a healthy and active example for their kids. There is a strong correlation between parents that are involved in sports and activities and their kids doing the same.

Barrier 4: Insecure and inaccessible environments for children
Strategy 4: Create adequate public spaces for kids and their characteristics
29 out of 32 entities in Mexico point to lack of security as the main concern. It’s paramount that we have accessible and secure spaces to practice activities, and that the infrastructure is adequate for children (i.e. a basketball hoop scaled to kids’ heights vs. 2 meters tall).

Barrier 5: Deficiencies in educational plans and programs
Strategy 5: Make and design a plan
Mexico’s P.E. programs are quite limited in offering only 50 to 60 minutes a week of physical activity for children. Children between the ages of 5 and 12 should be doing 60 minutes of physical activity a day. Technology is a great avenue to develop apps and online platforms that contain games and activities for kids to play. Also, the education sector can restructure their educational plans to include more P.E. time for the kids during school hours.

Barrier 6: Exclusion and discrimination during sports practice
Strategy 6: The games know no differences
Mexico is among the most diverse countries in the world — with different ways of thinking, interests and cultures, all of which can lead to discrimination and exclusion. Unfortunately, kids with a disability or are part of a minority don’t have the same opportunities in school, sports, and socially. We encourage the implementation of more inclusive programs and teaching kids to be more inclusive. The media and parents play a big role in this change as well.

Barrier 7: Deficiencies in human resources
Strategy 7: Strengthen training programs
Trainers and P.E. teachers should instill self-sufficiency and confidence in children. Emotional support and interpersonal communication from such trainers and role models are key tools for kids to be motivated to participate and continue to be involved in sports over the long run. The development of apps, platforms, and social programs to certify more trainers, as well as the introduction of P.E. teachers in schools, is crucial.

Barrier 8: Deficiencies in the use of media
Strategy 8: Effective use and optimization of media
The support of mass media and new technologies in the diffusion of activities, events, and community opinion in sport is extremely important. The more we generate conversations about the importance of physical activity and a healthy lifestyle, as well as sports campaigns directed to kids and adults to educate them about the benefits, the more we can increase participation and combat the obesity epidemic in Mexico.

Barrier 9: Absence of evaluation, monitoring, and research in Mexico
Strategy 9: Strengthen research for the development of solutions 
We need to create a national evaluation system so that all schools can implement tests that are simple, reliable, and safe to create a control and parameter of advancement in the physical capabilities of children.

To surmount these barriers, it is vital that the key players in our society come together to work symbiotically in service of and for the future of our children. We need engagement from: government, schools, public health organizations, sport associations, businesses, parents, the social sector, the media, and technology organizations.

It is Aspen Mexico´s duty to promote this research and to help permeate these solutions throughout Mexico. In the coming years, we want to develop “local guides,” akin to the community-focused State of Play reports produced in the US, that build on our national report and can help leaders in different areas of the country increase childhood activity levels. Leaders in various cities and states have expressed interest in this goal. We also will work with the Sports & Society Program to adapt and distribute existing resources that may be of use here.

Progress will take time and investment. But we are confident that the work put in by all who contributed to the development of the Aspen Institute Mexico’s work will continue in the coming years, for which I am deeply grateful. This will result in significant changes in the lives of our youth and our society.

Our hope is that everyone who reads or hears about our effort will understand how vital it is that we come together and contribute in whatever capacity we can.

So, please, if you want to believe in the vision we share, reach out if you think you might be able to hop on board and help us implement these solutions.

Dieter Holtz is CEO of Upfield and a board member of The Aspen Institute of Mexico, one of 11 countries where the Institute has affiliates. The project manager for Project Play in Mexico is Tatiana Vertiz, who can be reached at tatianav@aspeninstitutemexico.org. Learn more about how Project Play has begun helping other countries build healthier kids and communities here.

The story was originally posted here.

Romania deploys Project Play to get more kids active in sports

Tom Farrey
Executive Director, Sports & Society Program

Among the few buildings in the world larger than the Pentagon, the Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest is so colossal, so dense and byzantine in its layout, people here say that only the occupant who commissioned it, the late dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, knew how to navigate all its marbled hallways.

Who knew one hallway would someday lead to Project Play?

That day, to be exact, was Sept. 26, 2019, when about 130 leaders found their way to a large ballroom two levels up to participate in the Joacă Pentru Viaţă Summit, or the Play for Life Summit. The goal: Rethink the delivery of sport for youth in the former Eastern Bloc country, to get more of them involved.

The president of the Romanian Olympic and Sports Committee was there. So were top politicians, the acting Sports Minister, officials from the Ministry of Education, and Olympic medalists. The day began with a video message from reigning Wimbledon champion Simona Halep, who offered her congratulations to the Aspen Institute Romania, host of the event.

“There’s nothing better for kids than to be encouraged, at first through play, towards exercise, sports and a healthy and productive adult life,” said Halep, the country’s most celebrated athlete. “Not all of today’s kids will end up winning a Grand Slam or Olympic medal, but they will be representing a competitive generation, ready to face life successfully. Good luck to the Play for Life Summit. I am with you!”

Over the past year, Aspen Romania has used our Project Play framework to convene leaders with the aim of developing a national plan for getting more children active through sports. While Project Play was created for U.S. purposes, two of the 11 countries where the Aspen Institute has international affiliates – Aspen Mexico will release its plan in November – are now partnering with their Olympic committees to create strategies to build healthier children and communities through sports.

These are their programs, and we support them where we can.

In Bucharest, that meant sharing the process our Sports & Society Program and its partners have used to build Project Play as an engine of progress in the U.S. It’s our Theory of Change, if you will, for Romanian leaders to borrow from as needed.

Step One: Organize the Thought

Launched in 2013, Project Play spent the first two years convening leaders – 300 of them at roundtables where we posed questions on a range of youth sport topics. We took a lot of notes, surfaced the best ideas, then packaged the best of them into what became our seminal report, Sport for All, Play for Life: A Playbook to Get Every Kid in the Game, with its eight strategies for the eight sectors that touch the lives of children.

The document was a critical step in laying a foundation for collective impact. It helped define what good looks like in youth sports, and the areas of opportunity for stakeholders. It created the conditions for the energy and money in youth sports – a $17 billion industry, at a minimum – to move less at cross-purposes. While programs that serve low-income youth could use more support, investments need to align with the needs of children and the research around how to build an athlete for life.

As with any country, Romania will need to develop a plan that recognizes its unique assets, limitations, culture and history. In the U.S., for instance, “Train All Coaches” is a key strategy, in recognition that most youth coaches are volunteers who are winging it. In Romania, where government-supported sport clubs provide programs, nearly all coaches are paid, educated and certified.

The training that many of them receive, however, is focused on identifying promising children and developing them into elite athletes – a holdover from the old Soviet-era system. The challenge now is how to train them in competencies like teaching social and emotional skills through sports, in all youth.

Step Two: Organize the Organizations

It’s hard to trigger systems-level change without getting the organizations at the center of that system to develop policies, practices and programs that map to the shared vision. In the U.S., we use a variety of tools to encourage cooperation and action: Project Play 2020 and Project Play Champions, which mobilizes industry leaders and non-profits; our community projects; and the annual Project Play Summit, where last month 550 leaders gathered for two days of panels and workshops.

Romania is well on its way to getting all the right organizations at the table. A key partner is the Romanian Olympic and Sport Committee, whose president, Mihai Covaliu, called for a reboot of the Romanian sport system at the Play for Life Summit.

For a while, Romania was able to rely on the old, authoritarian system to achieve results on the world stage. Romania won 26 medals at the 2000 Olympics, a decade after Ceausescu was executed, ending communist rule. Its female gymnasts dominated the 1990s, building on the legacy of Nadia Comaneci and the authoritarian coach Bela Karolyi in the 1970s.

By the 2016 Rio Olympics, Romania’s medal count had fallen to just four, across all sports. None were in gymnastics, and in Tokyo next year, as in Rio, the women’s team did not qualify.

“Too few of our children know how to run, jump and play,” said Covaliu, a former Olympic champion fencer. “We need to fix that. Mass sport sits at the base of all sport success.”

Step Three: Organize the Gatekeepers

That would be the parents, ultimately the most influential agents in the lives of children. In the U.S., our surveys show that more than 9 of 10 parents appreciate the value of sports and want their child to have positive, sustained experience. But they’re often lost on how to guide their child, leading to high attrition rates. It’s why Project Play 2020 launched the Don’t Retire Kid campaign in August, to drive them to solutions.

Romania faces a different challenge, according to leaders – parents withholding their child from sport activity. Some just don’t appreciate the value of physical activity, sending their children to school with medical notes exempting them from P.E. Others worry about introducing them to sport clubs where coaches demand performance from kids at too early of an age.

“We need to let the children enjoy playing and see what flows from that,” said Ciprian Paraschiv, development manager at the Romanian Football Federation. “As the Pope said last year, ‘Every child has a right not to be a champion.’”

It is impressive to see what Romanian leaders are already putting in place, in support its new vision. A tournament comprised of middle school teams, supported by the Olympic committee. A festival in Bucharest in June where thousands of kids got to sample 40 sports, collect stamps at each station, and connect with local clubs. Downloadable decks of playing cards that coaches can use to talk productively with kids.

Aspen Romania has asked if its staff can translate some of our tools, such as the Project Play Parent Checklists. Here you go. Happy to share, where feasible. Hope it’s useful.

Can’t say any of this was in Project Play’s Theory of Change. Certainly not Romania, 22 hours away by flight from my home in California.

But we’re beyond thrilled to see the framework travels well.

Tom Farrey is executive director of the Aspen Institute’s Sports & Society Program, home of Project Play. He can be followed on Twitter at @TomFarrey and reached at Tom.Farrey@aspeninstiute.org.

Learn more about the Joacă Pentru Viaţă Summit here.

Basketball’s Chris Webber: Pressure on kids to make the NBA is “scary”

Jon Solomon
Editorial Director, Sports & Society Program

This year’s Project Play Summit was an away game, venturing away from Washington D.C. for the first time in its five-year history. Detroit welcomed the convening with more than 500 leaders at the intersection of youth, sport and health – the largest turnout in the Summit’s history. The Summit hashtags, #DontRetireKid and #ProjectPlay, were the top two trending items in Detroit. Through two days of panels, workshops and activation announcements, participants discussed barriers to get all kids equitable access to sports and physical activity, and shared activations that are happening to create solutions.

At the Aspen Institute’s 2019 Project Play Summit, former NBA and University of Michigan star Chris Webber implored parents of youth basketball players to become more involved — and more aware of the pressures of youth sports — so their child enjoys a positive experience.

“I think growing up in my time was easier because the culture allowed it to be different,” Webber said. “I can’t imagine the pressure of being 12 years old and being told you can make it to the NBA and believing it, [when] you don’t have the skills but a coach told you that to keep you around. That’s scary.”

Webber spoke on a panel in Detroit that honored the 25th anniversary of the documentary film Hoop Dreams, and explored the pressures and opportunities in youth basketball today. This year’s Project Play Summit was the largest in the event’s five-year history with more than 500 attendees, and marks the first time the Summit left Washington D.C.

At the time of Hoop Dreams, Webber was the country’s highest-rated recruit, having been identified as a top prodigy when he was only 11 years old. But Webber had the advantage of being raised by “a village” in Detroit – his parents, high school coach, AAU coach, police officers at Detroit PAL, and older local players who made it ahead of him. “It was really more of a community culture,” he said. “It was not about the coaches, it was about the people who are the coaches.”

Today, Webber said, youth basketball coaches frequently gain their status simply because they are associated with a talented player. In reality, the coach may be a bad influence on the child.

“This is not a secret club — these [youth basketball] coaches are not as good you think they are,” Webber said. “Go back to your high school days and go to a guy that may have been a jerk. He’s still a jerk today, but coaching your kid. They’re teaching your kid how to communicate, how to problem solve (poorly).”

ESPN.com recently documented America’s “youth basketball crisis,” in which kids are playing too many games and entering the NBA with broken bodies. In recent years, the NBA and USA Basketball created youth development guidelines for the sport and developed a coaching license. Webber said these tools should empower parents to know what a good basketball experience looks like.

“The No. 1 8-year-old kid is not going to the NBA. So, let’s quit putting that out there,” Webber said. “When we talk about the kids playing too many minutes, those are for guys who have already chosen their major in sports. How can you choose a major in sports before 14? How can you choose what you’re going to be great at? Your body hasn’t even developed. You haven’t even grown. I would just encourage community leaders and parents not to be intimidated by sport. You know enough. You know how to discipline your child. You know how to encourage them.”

Watch select sessions of the Summit here.

Michigan Secretary of State supports state authority to help access to sports
Speaking on a Summit panel about the role of government in youth sports, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said she would support adopting a commission and/or creating a high-level state government position that would help prioritize access to sports.

Benson is chairing a 14-member task force in Michigan, commissioned by the state governor, that aims to increase opportunities for women and girls in sports. The commission is still several years away from issuing its report, but Benson anticipates it will recommend a cabinet-level position focused on access to sports — an idea she has discussed with Big East Conference commissioner Val Ackerman, an advisor for the task force.

“We notice in states that are leading, and in foreign countries that are leading, they often have that high-level position — whether it’s advisory or authoritative — to actually implement changes and to advise those making decisions how to prioritize access to sports,” Benson said. “In my view, any government at any level – state, local or federal – should consider that type of permanent voice at the table as they make decisions from transportation to budget and everything in between.”

As states across the country consider legalizing sports betting, Benson said the opportunity exists in Michigan to use gambling revenue for access to youth sports. It’s a concept that’s used in Norway.

“Where the revenue goes – whether it’s to schools, to schools and sports, or to sports – I think is part of the negotiation right now,” Benson said. “In my view, it is a way to generate revenue. There are also ways to get revenue by having high-profile sporting events – hosting the NFL Draft, for example. That also enables us to create policies that will generate revenue for our state and our economy that can be reinvested as opportunities for people to play sports.”

Benson was also asked by an audience member if college athletes should be allowed to make money off their own name, image, and likeness. California may soon finalize a law making it illegal for colleges in that state to punish an athlete for accepting endorsement money. Benson said she would “lean toward wanting to ensure individual athletes’ likenesses are empowered and their likenesses are protected and they have some autonomy over that – whether it’s through payments and/or other ways to protect their own brand, even if they are in the early stages of an amateur or professional career.”

Special Olympics chairman: Sports doesn’t yet teach that everybody belongs

The biggest problem facing sports is clustering people around ability levels, a structure that narrows the field and stigmatizes everybody else, said Tim Shriver, chairman of the Special Olympics. Speaking on a Summit panel about sports for social impact, Shriver said he believes the day will come when every U.S. high school has a Special Olympics Unified team, meaning athletes with intellectual disabilities play on the same team as those without intellectual disabilities.

“I don’t think the world of sport has yet fully absorbed the challenge of the Special Olympics movement because it is a radical vision of human equality,” Shriver said. “It’s not a cute sidelight. People ask me do you go to the real Olympics? And for a long time I said, ‘Well, sometimes, but only occasionally and we’re not the same as them.’ About 10 years ago I started saying, ‘Yes, I do – all the time.’”

Shriver said sport has an unhealthy paradigm by selecting kids for teams solely by performance and spectators. “That’s a super powerful destructive influence on children. … Who’s the fastest person with Down Syndrome in the world? I have no idea – and I don’t care, honestly.”

Shriver said he becomes emotional when a Special Olympics athlete raises his or her arms in joy after a third- or fourth-place finish. “Not because I feel sorry for her, but because I wish I was more like her,” Shriver said. “And not because she has an intellectual disability, but because she has the bravery to reveal that she herself believes that her best is enough.”

College baseball coach finds rec league better than travel ball

Even college baseball’s national coach of the year isn’t immune from the pitfalls of travel sports. University of Michigan baseball coach Erik Bakich said he mistakenly signed up his son for travel baseball around 8 years old.

“We thought he was really good,” Bakich said. “He ended up not really liking baseball at all. Here he is, we’re paying $2,000 a year, and he says, ‘I hate baseball.’ Dagger to the heart. So we said, ‘OK, we won’t play travel.’ We gave him a year off travel ball and went back to playing a rec league and he loves it. The competition and coaching and caliber – there’s not much difference. He’s enjoying baseball again.”

Other Announcements from Project Play Summit

• Please join us in congratulating our Project Play Champions. These organizations committed to taking a new, meaningful, specific action consistent with the strategies of Project Play.

• New local State of Play reports were released in Hawai’i and Seattle-King County. Coming in 2020: Reports in Central Ohio and Camden, New Jersey.

• The 2019 State of Play report was released with the latest youth sports participation data and trends. Read the report and see the charts.

• The football team at American Heritage School is the first Healthy Sport Index Contest winner. Nominations for other high school teams based on exemplary health are being accepted at pn/hsicontest.

• Project Play and Nickelodeon developed the World Wide Day of Play partner playbook. Register here to gain access to the playbook.

• Project Play and Kellogg’s announced a partnership to search for the best middle school programs in the country. The goal: Revitalize middle school sports by inspiring leaders to adopt models that serve as many students as possible.

“I’ve lived with depression, and without sport, I don’t think there was a way to approach that challenge with such optimism and belief and a hard wire that I can control my fulfilment and what I want to get out of life. All of that came through being a kid and finding play.”

— Kyle Martino, NBC Sports broadcaster and former pro soccer player

“I would challenge those in the room to make a commitment. Don’t have a coaching staff for a girls team that has all men. Don’t serve on a panel that has all men. Insist on diversity because we need you to do that.”

— Nicole LaVoi, Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport co-director

“As a big brand, we have a responsibility to make awareness to the whole world about giving opportunities to everybody.”

— Mariona Miret, FC Barcelona Foundation head of programs

“Here was a gut-punch reminder of how brutal life in the NFL can be. ‘Not For Long’, indeed.”

— Yahoo! Sports columnist Pat Forde on C.J. Anderson, who learned he was cut by the Detroit Lions shortly after a moderated conversation with Forde at the Summit.

“Don’t bet on programs, bet on people. People have values. People have passion. Great programs are the result of passionate people.”

— Dave Egner, Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation CEO

“When you rearrange the letters in ‘listen’ it spells ‘silent.’ In order to truly listen, we have to silence our brains and stop trying to be right and figuring out how to respond. Just shut up and listen to our children.”

— Valorie Kondos Field, former UCLA gymnastics coach

“I’m familiar with how you can get caught up in this (youth sports) mania. You want so much for the happiness of your kid that you’d do anything for that, and this seems like their happiness is being good at this time. But in retrospect, it was mania. In retrospect, my son wishes he had played more sports and not played 100 games of baseball a year.”

— David Brooks, New York Times columnist and executive director of the Aspen Institute Weave: The Social Fabric Project

“I’ve messed up at it (sports). My daughter was a D-1 (college) athlete and I fell in love with it. Who wouldn’t? I think I pressed too much and junior year she burned out of college. It’s hard for parents, but the big thing I want to say is we all have to do what you all are doing here today: We all have to tell our stories.”

— Peter Gilbert, Hoop Dreams filmmaker

“I’d like to see parents who don’t pay to see their kids win, who don’t try to fuel arguments because they may have lost, or their kid may not have won the meet.”

— Daniel Solomon, 12, Urbana, MD

Story originally published here.

Press release: Project Play Summit kicks off in Detroit on September 17

Watch the Project Play Summit online and join the conversation on social media with #DontRetireKid; press are invited to apply for credentials.

Press release: Aspen Institute releases youth sports report in Hawai'i

State of Play Hawai’i shows that 26% of Native Hawaiian youth meet the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommended 60 minutes of physical activity per day.

Hoop Dreams at 25: Is youth basketball any wiser now?

Jon Solomon
Editorial Director, Sports & Society Program

It’s been a quarter-century since the release of Hoop Dreams, the sports documentary that launched the genre with its revealing portrait of two African American young basketball players (William Gates and Arthur Agee) trying to improve their lives. In many ways, Hoop Dreams was the first reality show.

Originally intended to be a 30-minute short film, Hoop Dreams filmmakers shot 250 hours of footage for a three-hour film spanning six years in the lives of Gates and Agee as they chased NBA dreams that neither reached. At a young age, Gates was viewed as the second coming of NBA great Isiah Thomas – they were both inner-city Chicago kids who played for the same coach at a white, suburban Chicago private high school – but Gates’ career was derailed by injury. Agee, also from the inner city, played at the private school as well but was forced to leave early in his career when the coach determined his basketball skills weren’t worth keeping.

The movie is “not only a documentary,” film critic Roger Ebert wrote in 1994. “It is also poetry and prose, muckraking and expose, journalism and polemic. It is one of the great moviegoing experiences of my lifetime. … Hoop Dreams contains more actual information about life as it is lived in poor black city neighborhoods than any other film I have ever seen.”

On Sept. 17 at the Project Play Summit in Detroit, the Aspen Institute will host a panel discussion, ”Hoop Dreams at 25 – Is Youth Basketball Any Wiser Now?” The panel features former NBA star Chris Webber and Peter Gilbert, one of the movie’s filmmakers, and examines what has changed – and still needs to change – for the game to better serve kids.

Scheduling conflicts will prevent Gates and Agee from appearing at the Project Play Summit. Gates now works at a prison in Texas; Agee is a motivational speaker who still lives in the West Side of Chicago. They recently spoke in separate interviews with Jon Solomon, editorial director of the Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program, about the impact of the movie 25 years later and the current state of youth basketball.

Jon Solomon: Does it feel like it’s been 25 years since the movie came out?

William Gates: It really doesn’t feel like it’s been that long. The crazy aspect of it is, it still resonates. That freaks me out. I think it’s great because the message is still strong, but it’s bad because the message is still strong and we haven’t advanced as much as we’d like to. I think Hoop Dreams opened minds and hearts and hit a sympathy nerve, but like with all things, if there was never a plan to change, it still hovers there.

When Hoop Dreams first came out, everybody was fired up and said, “We really need to address how high school and college athletes are being treated and this meat market (for how basketball recruits are identified and treated). I can still hear (basketball recruiting analyst) Bob Gibbons in the movie saying, “I’m serving up meat and trying to serve it up nice and neat.” Now the high school coaches have been removed from having control and the shoe companies came in and were more impactful. They run basketball as a whole now.

Solomon: What’s different about youth basketball today compared to 25 years ago?

Arthur Agee: They’ve taken it from the outdoors and put it inside gyms now. You lose something. There’s that community aspect where anyone in the neighborhood can walk on the court, and he’s 35 years old and really playing hard, but you don’t understand why he’s playing hard because of the way he played growing up. You go inside a gym, now everything is for show. Forget about the win. I want to cross these guys up and get an “oooh” and go directly on Twitter.

We never played in a sanctioned AAU tournament (in the 1980s and ‘90s). We had neighborhood teams. I played against Chris Webber. That was just two neighborhood coaches who wanted to play each other and let’s compete. One thing I do like about AAU is it gives these kids something better than they’re used to. Some kids never get to travel and go anywhere. But what’s lost is the fundamentals of the game. Kids are 12 and 13 playing with 15- and 16-year-olds. No, play with your age group. Some of the AAU coaches, it’s all about wins. OK, but is the kid learning anything?

Solomon: William, your kids have played basketball, including in college, and you coach AAU. You faced a lot of pressure as a player, especially after you injured your knee. How did your experiences shape how you coach other kids?

Gates: In my program, we start from fifth grade until you quit. We don’t lose you. We keep you. We want to see you develop, because to me, basketball is our classroom. We have to teach these kids how to tie a tie, what fork to pick up, how to teach them etiquette and culture.

Curtis (Gates’ deceased brother) used to tell me all the time: “Use basketball, don’t let it use you.” I didn’t understand it at 14 or 15. But as I’ve got older, I understand it more and more. Parents (of kids on his team) say they don’t know what to say to college coaches. I say, “Yeah, you do. You know what’s best for your family. You’ve been raising this child your whole life. If you know you have a kid who doesn’t like to be yelled at, you may not want to play for a coach who yells a lot. If you value education, then find a school that values education.”

On my AAU team, a lot of times a parent will say, “My son is going through this. Can you talk to him?” I’m more than happy to do that, but when I’m done, I’ll call the parent and tell them what’s going on. I don’t want to take that responsibility away from them.

Solomon: Arthur, what’s your 11-year-old son’s basketball experience been like?

Agee: He was playing AAU. It just cost too much money. They wanted $1,000 to $1,300. And the thing is, that’s just the entry fee on the team. That’s not the travel. What if mom and dad can’t go? Now, you have to arrange for them to go with other parents and money to eat. Hell, no. That’s just way too much. My fiancé and I, we’re trying to buy a home. It works for my son playing locally around Chicago. He’s not going to Orlando.

I want my son to enjoy the game, have fun with it. My basketball career was wonderful, and I feel so sorry for kids who are under so much stress if they don’t go to practice. They’re doing it for the parents. They’re playing too many games now. It’s like a job these days for kids. You can burn a kid out. You shouldn’t be playing five or six games a weekend. Let your body heal back up. Let your energy be right.

Solomon: William, there’s a scene in Hoop Dreams where your St. Joseph’s High School coach, Gene Pingatore, asks you what you’ll study in college and you say, “I’m going into communications, so when you come asking for donations, I’ll know the right way to turn you down.” The perception was he was using players. Was that how you viewed him?

Gates: People thought Coach and I fell out and didn’t get along. My son played for Coach. I went to his funeral recently. It was heartbreaking when I heard he had passed. To me, every coach has their personal flaws, but I was closer to him than (Gates’ college coach at Marquette University) Kevin O’Neill. Yeah, (Pingatore) was an old-school coach and said some outlandish things. But there aren’t too many players who played for the guy who didn’t walk away and say four years later, “I’m a better person.”

Solomon: Any regrets about making Hoop Dreams?

Agee: No, I use it to teach my son. He’s obsessed with Hoop Dreams. He probably watches twice a week. He picks out his favorite part and says, “Dad, what were you thinking about when you had to leave St. Joseph’s? Do you think (Pingatore) didn’t believe in you?” I said, “Yeah, I didn’t show good promise as a ballplayer like William Gates did. Had my skills developed a little earlier, I probably would have stayed there. But you can see that didn’t stop me from growing my game.”

Solomon: William, there’s a moment in the movie that beautifully characterizes the hopes and, typically, letdowns of chasing the NBA dream. You say, “That’s why when somebody says, ‘When you get to the NBA don’t forget about me,’ and all that stuff, I should say, ‘Well, if I don’t make it, don’t forget about me.’” Twenty-five years later, have people forgotten about you?

Gates: That’s been a blessing, honestly. Here we are 25 years later and people still recognize me. I’ll be coaching and people will recognize me and take a picture with their kid. That always brings a smile to my face. It’s a reminder it’s still just a game and that Arthur and I haven’t been forgotten. There are so many athletes who have been.

But it is bittersweet. Hoop Dreams has brought a tremendous amount of blessings in my life and I would never take it away. But it’s also a reminder that my dream didn’t happen. I think sometimes people think they’re watching a fictional movie. Man, that’s my life. You’re seeing the results of what happened in my life. Every time I watch, I know my knee is about to give out my junior year. It’s a reminder for me of what could have been. But it’s more sweet than bitter.

Register for the Project Play Summit on Sept. 17-18 in Detroit at as.pn/2019ppsummit. Speakers will include Chris Webber, Valorie Kondos Field, David Brooks and Tim Shriver. See the Summit agenda for more information. Learn about Project Play at ProjectPlay.us.

Story originally published here.

Staying in the game: Progress and challenges in youth sports

Jon Solomon
Editorial Director, Sports & Society Program

In the often confusing and frustrating world of youth sports, some progress is being made. The Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program’s Project Play discovered these trends within research of kids ages 6 to 12:

• The percentage of kids playing team sports on a regular basis increased for the third consecutive year. Baseball, cheerleading, gymnastics, lacrosse, softball, swimming, tennis, volleyball and wrestling all registered positive bumps.

• Fewer kids were physically inactive for the fourth consecutive year.

• Multisport play continued to make a slight comeback.

Those are among the key findings from the Aspen Institute’s State of Play 2019 report released today on how well stakeholders served children through sports over the past year. To that end, the Project Play 2020 campaign, “Don’t Retire, Kid” campaign, raises awareness about gaps in the youth sports system that cause kids to quit sports or not start in the first place – and solutions to keep them in the game.

But major gaps remain. While regular sports participation increased to 38% in 2018, it’s still far from the level of 45% in 2008. Kids from lower-income homes are more than three times as likely to be physically inactive. Families are spending on average almost $700 per child for one sport each year, with some parents spending tens of thousands of dollars. And less than three of 10 youth coaches have been trained within the past year.

Below is Project Play’s annual release of charts showing the national landscape in youth sports compared to past years. Unless otherwise noted, all data were provided to the Aspen Institute by the Sports & Fitness Industry Association (SFIA), which in 2018 commissioned an online survey of 20,069 individuals through Sports Marketing Surveys.

On average, a family annually spends $693 per child in one sport, according to a 2019 national survey of youth-sports parents by the Aspen Institute and Utah State University Families in Sport Lab. The most expensive sports: ice hockey ($2,583), skiing/snowboarding ($2,249), field hockey ($2,125), gymnastics ($1,580), and lacrosse ($1,289). The latest expensive: track and field ($191), flag football ($268), skateboarding ($380), cross country ($421), and basketball ($427).

The average child today spends less than three years playing a sport and quits by age 11, most often because the sport just isn’t fun anymore, according to the Aspen Institute/Utah State parent survey. The sports with the longest shelf life: field hockey, skiing/snowboarding, and flag football.

More than four in 10 coaches reported having never received training in concussion management, general safety and injury prevention, physical conditioning, and effective motivational techniques. The latest numbers also make clear that when coaches do get trained, it’s typically not on an annual basis.

Given how difficult it is to find volunteer coaches, the 2018 numbers continue to show how more coaches can be added. Only 27% of youth coaches were female, up from 23% in 2017 but still very low. There are also very few coaches of high school and college age, and not many senior citizens who coach.

Good news: The percentage of kids who play at least one day during the year has held steady for five straight years since increasing in 2014. Also, the amount of kids playing team sports on a regular basis increased in 2018 by nearly a full percentage point. The bad news: For the third straight year, fewer kids are playing an individual sport.

Kids played an average of 1.87 team sports. It’s the second straight year with a slight improvement, though still well below the level of 2011 (2.11). Anecdotally, there are signs that kids are sampling more sports but still playing one sport year-round against the advice of medical experts due to the risk of burnout and overuse injuries.

This statistic showed a rare increase in 2018. Important note: SFIA changed this definition in the past year, though percentages for previous years have also been adjusted based on the new definition.

Each year, this continues to be the most positive statistic we track. The percentage of physically inactive children has now decreased for four consecutive years, from 19.7% in 2014 to 17.1% in 2018. That’s still too many children not moving their bodies, but it’s a major advance. Every household income category had fewer inactive children except one: Kids in homes under $25,000, where the inactive rate has gone from 24.4% in 2012 to 33.4% in 2018.

The gap between girls and boys regular participation sports has closed since 2012. But that’s because the percentage of boys dropped significantly in those six years, compared to a modest decline by girls. Kids who identify as Asian/Pacific Islander were the only ethnicity to increase regular sports participation.

To learn more about Project Play, visit www.ProjectPlay.us. Read State of Play 2019 at as.pn/play2019 to learn all 40 developments regarding the latest youth sports trends over the past year. The report is sponsored by Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS).

Story was originally published here.

Meet ESPN’s Cassidy Hubbarth, emcee of the 2019 Project Play Summit

Sports & Society Program

In August, the Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program launched a new campaign, “Don’t Retire, Kid,” to raise awareness about declining youth sports participation and solutions to create positive experiences for kids. One of the PSAs included Cassidy Hubbarth, a talented NBA and college football broadcaster at ESPN, as a reporter at a fictional press conference for a 9-year-old boy to retire from sports.

“What are you going to do with all your free time?” Hubbarth asked.

“Whatever’s fun,” the boy responded.

That’s as good a way as any to introduce Hubbarth to Project Play. On Sept. 17-18, Hubbarth will emcee the Project Play Summit. Jon Solomon, editorial director of the Sports & Society Program, recently spoke with Hubbarth about the pressures she faced to specialize in one sport, the pros and cons of social media use by young athletes, and the growing number of players who arrive to the NBA injured after playing too many games as a child.

Jon Solomon: What was that experience like for you at the Don’t Retire, Kid video shoot?

Cassidy Hubbarth: It was great. I was able to have a conversation with the young boy (Navonne Love), who was so impressive. It was pretty cool to see someone at his age perform the way he did. To be a part of this initiative means a lot to me because I was a three-sport athlete in high school. I took pride in the fact that I participated in a lot of sports. It’s my first introduction to this initiative, which I really didn’t know until that shoot day that kids were “retiring” and were no longer participating in sports. Given that I work in sports, sometimes it can be a little bubble and I don’t really understand what is happening outside that bubble.

Solomon: What sports did you play growing up?

Hubbarth: I played pretty much every sport except for hockey and, oddly enough, tennis because my whole family played tennis. I think because my parents and two older brothers played tennis, I never got in their doubles game. My main sports were basketball and soccer, and in high school I ran track. I also swam, played softball, and did gymnastics.

When I moved to high school, I was the only three-sport athlete in my grade, and I had a large graduating class of almost 700 people. A big problem was I was being pressured from my soccer team to drop basketball to specialize in soccer. I was better at soccer, but I was never going to drop basketball. I felt pride each season having a team to be part of. I think a lot of people who got the team awards on my soccer team played club sports, and it always felt a little political that I wasn’t on a club team and that’s who was voting on awards. It’s not like I’m holding a grudge all these years later! (laughs)

Solomon: Did you stick with basketball despite pressure from soccer?

Hubbarth: There was no way I was going to drop basketball. We won the state soccer championship my junior year. One of the best players on the team decided not to play her senior year to play travel (soccer) instead. And I just remember this letdown that we could have made another run for a title. But she had to do what was best for her and it opened up scholarship opportunities for her, so I can’t hold a grudge.

Solomon: You have a large social media presence. Social media has also become a big part of youth sports. What are the pros and cons of social media use by younger athletes?

Hubbarth: We’ve seen clips of LeBron James’ kid (playing basketball). That’s a lot of pressure in many ways to be the son of LeBron James. But there’s an interest. … Social media creates opportunities, but it creates pressure. Everyone likes a good story, but there’s no gate to close off the mean and cruel people in this world.

It’s hard, but I think young people are used to showcasing themselves in front of a camera. They’ve grown up with these devices, so I think it’s natural to them. I just worry about how it affects their psyche. I didn’t have a cell phone until I was late in high school, but I was taking video of myself. Facebook launched when I was in college. I made sure I stayed off Facebook because I knew I wanted to be in sports broadcasting, and I was worried people would post things of me I didn’t want out there. …

It’s very helpful there are NBA names like Kevin Love and DeMar DeRozan being upfront about mental health and anxiety, so there’s not this stigma around it. People are truly consumed through their phones and there is a little bit of social anxiety in interpersonal communication skills. Everybody is putting out their best foot forward on social media and then when it comes down it, there’s no hiding in front of cameras on the main stage. I can’t imagine what the pressure is to be Zion Williamson (who had more than 1 million Instagram followers as a high school basketball recruit) when I deal with my own anxieties just on television.

Solomon: There was a good two-part series recently by ESPN.com documenting that NBA players are arriving to the league with broken bodies because of how many games they’ve already played as youth. Do players talk about this wear and tear they accumulate before they even enter the league?

Hubbarth: Yeah, the AAU circuit is big business. Part of it is it’s what they love to do, and they’d probably be playing basketball somewhere at the park (if not for AAU). But it’s different when it’s a competitive stage like that because these AAU tournaments have gotten major. You can feel the tension at these tournaments because these players are fighting to be listed in the top recruits or be in front of college coaches. That plays into how hard they’re pushing it at these summer games.

Solomon: I saw that you have a new baby daughter. Congratulations. I know it’s incredibly early, but have you thought about what sports experiences you think you may want for her to have one day?

Hubbarth: I think she’s going to be an athlete. She’s pretty coordinated and close to walking and she’s not even nine months. As a parent, you judge every little thing day to day and you always think your child’s a genius! I want to support her on whatever she wants to do. I just hope she kind of explores as much as she can to be a part of a team. It’s something I really would like for her. Being part of a team taught me so many lessons that apply to my work today and my home life.

Register for the Project Play Summit on Sept. 17-18 in Detroit at as.pn/2019ppsummit. Speakers will include Chris Webber, Valorie Kondos Field, David Brooks and Tim Shriver. See the Summit agenda for more information. Learn more about Project Play at ProjectPlay.us.

The story was originally posted here.