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Dr. Jessica Peck discusses parenting strategies around youth sports on American Family Radio
preborn.com/AFR hello and welcome to the
: Dr. Nurse Mama show prescribing Hope for healthy families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well hey there friends and welcome to my favorite time of day getting to spend time with you prescribing Hope for Healthy Families. Today we're going to talk about a topic that I know many of you listening have a lot of feelings about. We are talking about youth sports. Now for me as a pediatric nurse practitioner in primary care, I can't even begin to to tell you how many thousands of sports physicals I've done over the last 30 years. I'm a mom of four myself. My kids have been involved in Sports. And yet sports are changing. When I look at the landscape of youth sports, it is very, very different from when I grew up, when I started it in pediatrics. We're seeing early professionalization, early specialization, a lot of pressure, a lot of earning potentials that are coming from the new name, image and licensure changes in college sports. And it's hard to find a balance. Now, I want to make it very clear, I am not a sports hater. My husband in particular believes that there is no marriage problem, parenting problem, in fact, no global crisis that can't be solved with a sports analogy. We love sports, but they have their proper place. And the truth is, for many families today, youth sports is not just an activity. It's not something that their kids do. It is a family lifestyle. We are talking about things like practices that are many nights a week, tournaments, travel ball, private lessons, recruiting conversations, even pressure to have social media from a young age to increase and increase the ability of to be recruited. We're talking about early morning drives, post game debriefs. All of these things take a lot of family time and energy. And again, there can be tremendous good in that. Sports can teach perseverance and teamwork and discipline and humility and courage and so much character in both the winning and the losing. But here's the question that I want us to wrestle with today. What if sports aren't just just shaping our children's athletic abilities? What if we acknowledge the truth that they are shaping their character? Sports have an influence on the way our kids see their identity, what they value, how they pursue relationships and their understanding of success. Now our kids are all being discipled somewhere. They're learning what matters, what makes them valu, how they should respond when they fail, and how they should treat people they compete against, what their worth is based on in their performance. And sports provides a particularly powerful environment for that formation because. Because parents have a front row seat to their children experiencing virtually every emotion. And that is often on public display. And even more so today, that can often be on social media, as can the emotions of the coaches, which are not always God honoring. Let's just say that. And we are talking with two authors today of a book who argue that these moments are prime opportunities for parents to enter into conversations about what scripture teaches and how to live differently. Now, that doesn't mean that we run away from competitive sports. It means that we need to learn how to parent differently within that ecosystem of sports. How do we keep winning from being the ultimate goal? How do we protect our Family and spiritual rhythms. How do we respond when our child's identity is starting to be wrapped up in their performance? And so we are talking today to Brian Smith. He has been on staff with Athletes in action since 2008. He is a former collegiate athlete, himself a graduate of Wake Forrest University, and he holds a master's degree in theology and sports studies. Did you even know there was such a thing? I bet that will pique some interest from Baylor University. He's the author of the Christian Athlete Glorifying God in Sports and now Away Game. And he and his wife have three children. We're also talking to Ed Uszynski He's an author, a speaker, a sports minister. I know that's some of your dream job, for sure. With more than three decades of experience discipling college and professional athletes, he's written extensively at the intersection of faith and Sports. He holds two theological degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and a PhD in American Cultural Studies from Bowling Green State University. He and his wife have four kids. You can see they are well qualified and well positioned to jump into this somewhat contentious space. So, Brian and Ed, thank you for your courage and joining us in the hot seat today and talking about this really important topic.
Dr. Jessica Peck: I'm so glad to have you here.
Brian Smith: Thanks for having us, Dr. Peck.
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, thanks, Dr. Peck. I was exhausted just listening that wonderfully articulated intro. It's. It's just exhausting to think about the topic.
Dr. Jessica Peck: It is. I mean, it really is. It is all consuming. And as we're talking about sports, I think, you know, whether it's, it could
Dr. Jessica Peck: be sports, it could also be music
Dr. Jessica Peck: or academics or theater or any competitive activity that kids are in. So, regardless of whether you have a kid in sports, you know, a kid in sports, somehow this relates to you. And you know, for a lot of parents, when we talked about youth sports, it used to mean maybe going out to the little league field, the football field on a Saturday, or maybe a Friday night, watch the game. It's way different. Now. Let's talk about, and the title of your book is Away Game. And you talk about being away from home so much. It's no longer community based. We're talking about a lifestyle.
Brian: Tell us a little bit about how you came to be in sports ministry
Let's start with both of you and just your heart for how you came to have a passion for this. Brian, let's start with you. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to be in sports ministry and how God put this message on your heart for us today.
Brian Smith: Yeah, I mean, that's a, that's A loaded question. We can spend the entire time talking about that, but I'll, I will try to be brief. I played every sport imaginable growing up. Ended up running, track in cross country because it was one of the few sports you can't get cut from. Ended, up being pretty decent in a ran at Wake Forrest University. my wife is my high school sweetheart. She ran tracking cross country at Wisconsin. Love it. So sports has been in our blood from early on in our relationship. we have three kids, two in middle school and one in high school. They play every sport imaginable. We've been on staff with the sports ministry, Athletes in action. You said this in the, in the beginning. Oh, since 2008 or 9, I can't even even remember anymore. But our, our entire life has just been inundated in the waters of sports and Jesus and trying to figure out what does it look like, to have our faith in Christ influence the sporting environment that we're in and not flip that equation. So we say all the time that we, we love Jesus, we like sports. Oftentimes we get that backwards. I'm, I'm passionate about waking up every single day and wondering what does it look like to take my faith and my love for Jesus and have that influence every part of athletics that I touch. So I'm also a high school tracking cross country coach. and this is something that even at a public school, I'm trying to figure out what does it look like for me to bring Jesus into these spaces where oftentimes he's not even welcomed.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Brian, I appreciate that boots on the ground perspective. I mean, you definitely have some street cred there. And I think sometimes when we wander into these conversations, families can feel defensive, like you're going to criticize my love of sports. And I appreciate setting the bar clear that, no, that's not what this is about. It's just about a right setting of priorities. Ed, what is your perspective? What brings you to the table today?
Ed Uszynski: Well, you could literally transpose everything that Brian just said and put it on my life. There's just different sports involved. So I grew up in a football, high school football coach's home. I became a basketball player, went to Kent State University to play, even though I ended up not playing there. It's a whole nother story. But I went there to play, ended up playing ball overseas in my 20s. So it was a huge part of my life. Married a two sport collegiate athlete. We have four kids that are playing sports, three that are in college now, one's still in high school and same coached and have just been involved in sports from the very beginning. Have never stopped being involved in sports. But what really brought us to this topic was around 10 years ago and Brian and I were working together on some other projects, but our kids were playing sports, we were coaching. And we suddenly looked up and realized we were on this fast moving train that was very different than what we were doing with college and pro players. This whole youth train was moving, it seemed way faster. And we really felt ill equipped for how to navigate it as parents, as Christian parents, as parents that had kids at different ages in different sports. And we've used this language now for the last few years, we realized we needed an intervention. We were being discipled by sports and had been discipled by sports in a way that was really leaving us ill equipped to. To help our kids. And in fact, if anything, if we were honest, we were maybe doing some damage to our kids. We were adding to the anxiety. We were doing things that were counterproductive to them flourishing in sports. So it made us start to really have intense conversations with each other and other people to say, what can we do to help ourselves and to help other people, like you said, not leave sports and not be completely, you know, just go along for the ride. We don't want to do that, but how do we be obediently involved? Right where I just like Daniel, the character Daniel in the Bible we felt like was just a great role model for living among very secular values. But locking arms with some other people and saying, how do we walk with God in the midst of this? So that's what we've been trying to do.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Ed, that is not an easy task. It really isn't. And I'm so grateful for your honesty and transparency in saying what you just did, because that can be a hard realization to speak out loud. I think a lot of families may think that in their head, like, have we gone too far? Are priorities, Right. But to say it out loud like you just did, to say we thought we were causing damage to our kids, that's really brave and really helpful for all of us. And you described really well how sports have changed a lot. I've seen that in my practice. I've seen that in the research. We know the likelihood of making it to professional sports is increasingly smaller and smaller, although some kids are really gifted and some kids will make it to the big time, to the big leagues.
Ed Uszynski: Ah.
Dr. Jessica Peck: But we see also in research that kids who specialize early. They are more likely to have burnout, overuse injuries, anxiety, depression, all of those things. And I've seen so many kids, kids who maybe lose the joy of their sport, they want to walk away, but their family identity is so wrapped up in it, they feel the pressure of it. Because, you know, this is our whole family social circle. There's a lot of complex dynamics. But Brian, let's go back to you and see what is your perspective on how you've seen sports change. Ed specifically mentioned the last 10 years. How have you seen the progression change? Maybe some things for the good and what some things to be cautious about.
Brian Smith: Yeah, we talk a lot about this, in the book Away Game. The, the subtitle is important too, in that book. It's a Christian parents guide for navigating youth sports. And we're trying to, we're really trying to educate parents just to give them language and categories to do exactly what you just said. Like how can we trace what has happened even in the last 50 years? And so we've seen it go from being a place where it's just primarily play. If you think of like the old movies, like sandlot baseball, backyard pickup games, it used to be play and now it's moved significantly more towards performance and winning. It used to be more kid centered where it was just all about what does the kid want? How can we lift them up and support really what they're not just gifted in, but what do they enjoy and what makes them have fun. And it's moved to be more adult, coach and parent centered. You talked in the beginning about the professionalization of, youth sports. That's a massive part of it is it used to be just something where we, we allowed kids just to play and watch. But then I think what's happened over the last half a century, which is crazy to say that is we've just seen like, man, there's so many opportunities where we can take all this good stuff that we've learned as, as fans and coaches. And we've placed this model on the, on the youth sports leagues, thinking this is going to be the most fun possible for the kids. And the stats are telling us that it may be really, really fun for the adult, but it's making the kids absolutely miserable. So even in that shift, we've seen it go from being super affordable to now it's like an expensive luxury type experience from localized to now we're crossing state boundaries. Even in one of the books we talked about, they talked about how it's it's almost like an arms race when you, when you get to like these different palaces that the kids are playing in these days. So it really is wild just to think that there might not be a better time in the world right now to be an entrepreneur. Entrepreneur in the, in the space of youth sports than right now.
Money is changing everything. When you see the earning potential of college athletes now
Like, money is just a massive influence of all this as well.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Oh, it absolutely is. When you see the earning potential of college athletes now and see how much they're earning and how much that's changing. And you know, I know as a professor, we have a lot of talks and faculty governance about budget. It's changing everything. The reverberations are really significant. And one of the things that I've just seen in my own community, in my own life, when I first had kids, I mean, Little League was the thing. We're a baseball family and everybody would go to Little League, but that gradually changed to travel ball. And then it was nobody's playing in the community. Everybody's traveling and going away. And when we come back, Brian, I want to pick that up with you because that is the title of your book, Away Game, and talk about how that dynamic, how being away has changed and what we can do about it. But don't worry, we're going to leave you with some help and some hope. And if you have kids in youth sports or you are involved in youth sports in any way, I highly encourage you to get a copy of this book and to really prayerfully consider how God might equip you to use sports for good, for discipleship, for the good of kids and the good of communities
Dr. Jessica Peck: and the good of eternity.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We'll be right back with more.
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You've Already Won by Shane & Shane: I'm fighting a battle you've already f.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That is you've already won by Shane and Shane. And that's what we're talking about today. Not just winning at sports, but winning at life. I have so been looking forward to this conversation. We're talking with authors and sports ministry leaders Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski. They're the authors of a book called Away A Christian Parent's Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. And this is something that is taking over the country. It is something that we can be excited about. Sports are great. They're great for physical activity. And for me as a mom, as a healthcare provider, anytime I see kids getting up and going outside and learning teamwork and moving their bodies and having sunlight and all the things that is going to be preferable to me than hiding in a basement all summer on a video game, I'm just going to say it out there. Judge me if you wish. But there is also another side to youth sports, a side that pulls us away from discipleship, and it can really skew our priorities. And already Brian and Ed have been very transparent and, and sharing their own journey and their own failures and their own trials and errors, but also still saying, this is worthy of pursuit. We can use sports as discipleship.
Brian, talk about the title of your book, Away Game
And Brian, before the break, we were just talking about the title of your book, Away Game, and how this has really become a lifestyle for many families. Talk about the inspiration for the title, how you see that playing out in real life. Youth sports.
Brian Smith: Yeah, this is a, place where sports metaphors are really helpful because what do you, what do you expect at a home game? You expect favorable calls from referees, you know where to sit in the stands, you know where the bathrooms are. Like, there's comforts and expectations that are often realized that come from being at home. You just, you're just comfortable with the environment. But at an away game, you're often in the stands facing the sun. You're not sure where bathrooms, like the, the locker rooms stink. Everything is set up in sport for the away team to, it makes it a little bit harder. And as we're writing this book and even just, just realizing this ourselves as youth sports parents, we're, we're coming to this conclusion that we, we come to the youth sports environment expecting it to be a home game. Metaphorically, we're expecting, yeah, my kids in this sport and that sport. So it should grow character, it should grow discipline. They, they should learn how to become a good teammate. But the way the system is set up today, it almost does the opposite. Like, if anything, you could argue that youth sports today is better positioned to erode character than actually build it. And so part of the, the, motivation behind or the inspiration behind Away Game as a title is we, especially as Christian people, just need to go back to thinking that this is, it's a good gift from God. But the way it's set up today is we really are, we're playing in a way game with you sports. We're entering into an environment where we're strangers in a, in a foreign land. And so for us to enter into that, with that expectation, then we begin to question, okay, what does it look like for me to enter into a space like this? Even though it's been jacked up by sin and destruction and non flourishing for our kids? How can I be a part of redeeming that space? Because you still, it's an away game, you still have to play.
Dr. Jessica Peck: That is a great analogy. I haven't checked my phone, but I feel like my husband's already texting me saying see? Sports analogies for everything. Which is so true. They're really helpful. Any problem our kids ever have, we're going to go back. It's usually going to be story about some blind father at a football game. That always makes my husband cry. But I digress. You probably know even what I'm talking about. But, but you, Brian, let's go back to you and talk something more. sorry, Ed, let's go back to you and talk a little bit more about that discipleship issue. Let's talk about how there's a balance there and we can say all the right things. We can say, oh yeah, church is the most important thing. And you know, we, we want our kids to grow up to love God and serve others. But our calendar, our checkbook, our credit card, they kind of are accountability partners and they can tell on us a little bit. How do we recognize when we've got our, our priorities out of whack?
Ed Uszynski: You know, it's so interesting because Brian and I really have not spent a ton of time trying to help people parse out how much they should play or where they should play or how much they should pay to play. I just, we just think that's going to look different for people all across the spectrum. What we're saying is, no matter how much time and energy you're giving to it, are you looking for the categories in your child's life that will develop their soul? In other words, most of us go to a game and we're watching for their playing time. We're watching to see how they perform. That's what all of our metrics have to do with their performance. Are they getting better at whatever it is we think they're failing at? is the coach treating them fair? Are they on the right team to be positioned for a high School future. You know, our minds are. We almost act like they're agent, they're sport agent in the way we watch and think about the game. And what Brian and I are saying to ourselves and anyone who will listen is that's never going to fully go away. But do we have another list that's right next to it? And we'd say should be over on top of it. That's, that's looking for other kinds of wins, that's looking for character development, that's looking to see how they're interacting with teammates, that's looking to see whether they're taking steps of growth. Are they. They displaying courage? Are they taking responsibility for the way they interact with the coach, for the way they go through the handshake line after the game? are they stepping into their fears with the gospel and leaning into the Lord instead of just trying to manage their, their fear of failure on their own? There's so many other categories that somebody needs to be paying attention to. And it even might have been true 50 years ago that coaches were more equipped actually to care more about those types of things and felt responsibility to try to build those things into kids. That's not so much true anymore. It's hard to find a coach that has any of that as what he or she is watching for. So it becomes that much more important that we take on that role of discipler, that we start to think like a sport. Missionary is language that we use. And so again, what that may mean is that I'm going to have to have a confrontation with myself first. Like, I'm bringing my own fears, I'm bringing my own expectations, my own regrets from my sports past, my fear of this imaginary future not being realized that I'm trying to project onto my kid. And again, we can end up talking the whole time just about that. Like, we have to, we have to get more healthy in the way we're coming to the games and the practices so that we can have a different list that even matters to us. Because right now, for too many of us, it really doesn't.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Honestly.
Dr. Jessica Peck: you just drop some really serious truth bombs in that. Honestly, Ed, because we've all sat. If you've sat in the stands at any youth sports, you will see bad actors. I mean, you really will. You'll see good parents who become really bad actors on or sideline coaches. And somehow, you know, we've just got so much passion. And we were talking, even the break, about how most parents who have their kids in sports were really, well, intentioned we want our kids to love it. We want to have fun together. We want them to be disciplined and build character and somehow it can just bring out the worst in us. And we focus on performance. And I think how much would it be different if a kid came off the field and instead of immediately criticizing their technique, we say, hey, it took a lot of courage to go out back out there after you struck out. Hey, it was really courageous not to throw your helmet. Hey, you spoke blessings and not curses over your teammates, over your referees, over your umpires. That took character. But that somehow it just seems like that just takes a back seat there.
More money spent on sports makes kids less likely to enjoy them, study finds
And you talk about, Ed, how everything should be different. And I agree every, every situation is going to be, look different. And I think about, even in the kids, in my own family, we have, I have one family member who was really, really gifted athletically and so their path looks a lot different. But at the same time you share a correlation in the book that the more money families spend on a sport, the less likely their child may be to enjoy it. Brian, can you speak to that and how you felt when you, when you saw that and maybe how it can be instructive for us in the moment?
Brian Smith: Yeah, absolutely. And I was shocked by that originally too when I saw the study. Like this is hardcore data that they're finding the more we spend, the less our kids enjoy sports. And so we, we've had conversations with each other and other people and the more you talk about it, it makes sense. When you get the kid a new 600 bat and when you're traveling across state lines, whether or not you communicate it to them, there is an expectation of, we have paid for this, we are traveling this far, you need to perform. Right. And a lot of times parents aren't saying that outright, but when they get the bat, when they're traveling, when they get the NewSong Jersey, there, there comes this expectation that's hard enough for like 16 year olds, 26 year olds struggle with that. But we're putting that reality on, 6 year olds, 8 year olds and they're crippling under the pressure. And so again, let's say this well intentioned parents, we want to get our kids the best stuff. We want to give them the best opportunity to, to thrive in sport. But it often comes with this sometimes uncommunicated expectation that you need to perform. And kids don't want to perform. They, they want to play and have fun.
Dr. Jessica Peck: They do want to play and have fun. And I think, Ed, there's a lot of families who feel trapped in this. It's. Maybe it starts off that way. It starts off really fun, and then it's just. Just, okay, yeah. All right. We can do two nights a week.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Okay.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We can do one weekend a month.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Okay.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We can do one private lesson. And all of a sudden they just feel like they're trapped in this. And maybe they're listening and thinking, yeah, I get what you're saying.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We've probably gone too far. But, like, how do we get out? Do you have any advice for resetting of priorities and how to do that in a way that's not destructive to family dynamics?
Ed Uszynski: Yeah. and we do talk about it a ton of that. We almost need to give ourselves permissions to be parents again and to be in control, more in control. Instead of giving our control over to a sports league or giving it entirely over to a coach. Let's say we don't. We don't want to travel, on a Sunday morning or show up at even the local field on a Sunday morning because we have a conviction that we want to be in church on Sunday morning. We would encourage parents to go to coaches and say, we're not going to be there on Sunday morning. Morning. And, you know, is that okay? Again, you don't have to go in and be a jerk about it, but just say, this is where our family is at. We're going to be here for all the rest of it. But we want to be in church on Sunday morning. Or maybe it's Wednesday night and, you know, there's three practices a week, and one of them's on Wednesday night. And Wednesday night is just an important church night for us. It really is a category to go in and say, we still want to be on the team if you'll have us, and you want to invest in our kid. These are spaces that we're not going to be present. And maybe there'll be some consequence for the kid. He's not going to get to start the next game or whatever. Okay, that's okay. That's not the end of the world. We're saying that this matters to us enough, that it's first and we're going to build sports around it. And we found, again, in our own experience and just in listening to people, most coaches actually will be okay with that. They really will. Again, depends on the sport. And I've heard all kinds of. We both heard all kinds of different stories, but you as a parent can at least initiate that, that you don't have to just because you paid $2,500. And they're saying this is for an entire year, not just for the, the seven week soccer season because you're gonna have to do all these other trainings in X, Y and Z. You can say we're not going to do that. We're going to play this season, but we're not going to be available. My 10 year old's not going to be available to play year round soccer for you. And if that's an expectation, then let's go somewhere else. But again, even there we, we did this, and, and the league was fine with it. We're not going to be at all the extra stuff because they want to play something else or they want to take time off and they were okay with it. They still made us pay for the full year, which again, it's a bit of a racket at that level, but it's like, okay, if that's the way the game's being played, if we really want to be a part of this league but on our terms, then we'll pay the money. But we're only going to come for the season and not the rest of it. So there really are options. You're, you're still on the train, you're riding it it, but you don't have to just go along for the ride. You can negotiate on on the,
Dr. Jessica Peck: on the train cars and communicate to your kids your, your priorities. I mean that, that action speaks a lot more than words of just saying church is important to us, but putting your literally your money where your, where your bat is or where your football helmet is or whatever that is, that speaks a lot differently. And I don't know about you guys, I'm sure you've had the same experience. I've talked with a lot of parents who have young adults who are really regretful about the priorities that they set and thinking we over prioritize sports. And I have yet to talk to anyone who said I really wish we'd done more. I really wish that we'd paid more, that we'd invested more time. I usually don't see that.
You talked about FOMO in sports. It's an acronym for Fear of missing out
But one of the other interesting dynamics of this that definitely caught my eye in your book was fomo. Now for those listening who think, wait, what did she just say? It's an acronym for Fear of missing out. Now this is something that teenagers experience socially a lot. And actually in science we have a scientific scale where we can scientifically measure feelings of fomo. It is a real phenomenon and it's fascinating. But you talked about FOMO in sports. And Brian, I'd love to hear your observations about this because that can be another family dynamic motivator here.
Brian Smith: Yeah, and so again, let's, let's say this well intentioned parents, we're all doing the best job we can with the information that we have. But the youth sport industrial complex is what we called in the book. The YSIC feeds off of our fear of missing out. It really has developed into a system that promises the world but rarely if ever delivers on those promises. And so it's always going to over promise and under deliver, which is, which is driving this fear of missing out. So a couple things worth pointing out with what the YSIC is over promising and under delivering. They are promising that if, if, if we involve ourselves in their team sport, league, whatever, that our kid will essentially ascend up into the right trajectory wise. The latest data is saying that 70% of kids are quitting by the age of 13, which is crazy if you think about it. Before kids have even hit their physical peak, just as human beings, they've had enough of this system that is encouraging pressure and anxiety and professionalization. And so it's just one of those spaces where, yeah, we, we need to be careful as parents when we're feeling this, this FOMO in our own hearts and our kids might even be communicating it. What are they actually missing out on? Is it reality or is it some fictitious brand of reality that, that the youth sports is selling us?
Dr. Jessica Peck: Kids are really good at gaslighting us. Honestly, they can convince us. I mean they do, they come to us and they, we say, know you can't have a phone. And they're like, you don't understand, you've just destroyed my social life forever. And somehow we believe them. They're so convincing and we think, oh yes, I've just ruined your life. And sometimes we just need to seek some wise outside counsel. And that's why I'd put a plug in. If you have a child who is a competitive athlete, you really need a very good healthcare provider who's very comfortable with taking care of sports. You need to talk about things like sleep and nutrition and prevention of overuse injuries and somebody who's going to really help you optimize their health. There are a lot of really great professional guidelines, even on things like pitch counts. Now these are from orthopedic surgeons who are doing Tommy Jon surgeries and people who are right there in the middle of it. But when we come back, we'll have more help and hope from Brian Smith And Ed Yusinski about awareness game. Don't go away. We'll see you after this break.
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As youth sports industry complex rises, there are some lessons for Christian families
Love God Love People by Danny Gokey: I've been running in circles Jumping the hurdles Getting caught in that rush Doing so much I'm feeling kind of worn out all this checking the boxes trying to be flawless has me spinning my head catching my breath Too afraid to slow down I tell myself to keep this up that God wants more than just my love But I've been complicating things Things it's just like me to overthink Gotta keep it real simple keep it real simple Bring everything right back to ground zero Cause it all comes down to this Love God and love people we're living the world that keeps breaking but if we wanna find a way to change all comes down to this Like I
Dr. Jessica Peck: welcome back friends. That is love God and love people by Danny Gokey. And that's what we all want our kids to grow up and do is love God, love people, serve their communities. And sometimes our priorities get out of whack. We're talking about youth sports today, which can be a tremendous opportunity for character development and for learning life lessons and being strong and body minded spirit. But as we see the youth sports industry complex rising like never before in modern American history, there are some lessons for Christian families. And we have sports ministry leaders here with us, Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski who have written a book called Away Game A Christian Parents Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. If you are in any way connected with youth sports, I think this is an essential read because this is something I see literally every day in clinical practice. I see kids who are, coming in for sports physicals, sports injuries or Just kids who come in for an earache, but are also athletes. And I see the impact on families for good and sometimes for not good. And Ed, ah, right before the break, we were talking about this concept of fomo. And you have a really important counterbalance, a check for us there, some words of encouragement and hope.
There's a ton of pressure on parents to get their kids into college
And I want to pick it up right there.
Ed Uszynski: Well, one of the pressures that I think we all feel is, our kid going to be one of the 2% or less than 2% that are going to play in college, which again is a ridiculous percentage. But it's so easy, all of us, maybe ours is going to be the one at 10 years old. And what Brian and I can say with great confidence from having worked most of our vocational life with college athletes and being around them all the time and professional athletes, athletes, is that if your kid winds up being one of the 2%, it's not going to be because of you harassing him or her to go out and shoot more in the driveway or to go work out or whatever it is the sport demands. They're going to be a college athlete because they have a physical gifting that separates them from the other 98% that you really, again, it's in your DNA. You had something to do with that, but it's a natural thing. And they have a mental, they just have a mental edge that's different than the other 98. They're motivated to go out and fix their left hand in the driveway. They're motivated to put in extra time. They never want to leave the gym or the pool or the field because they have just such a passion and a drive to excel in it. And that's a rare person. But it's, it's not. And it's been really helpful for me to realize this before it was too late. It's not going to be because it was. That's what I did or my wife did. And it's not going to be because of words. I keep chirping at my kids. That's not what's going to produce. In fact, if anything, that might actually discourage them to Brian's point, when we know that 70% are quitting by age 13. I don't want to be the one that's actually handicapped, my child from being able to reach their potential because I use too many words and pressured them too much. It's actually my silence might actually be the thing that helps get them there, which seems so counterintuitive. But not just silence, but my love, my consistent, Your identity with me is based on our relationship, not on how you perform today. And it can be really different to consistently communicate that to our kids. But the other thing we talk about all the time is that there's a ton of pressure now. We hear this all the time when we do seminars. We're afraid that if we don't do X, Y and Z, they're not going to make their high school change team. Like, their high school situation is so hyper competitive, which we, you know, we've got districts all around me here in the greater Dayton area in Ohio that are like that. They are intense. It's difficult to make the high school team. So that is true. But we can definitely say that what's going on when they're 10 or 11 or 12 is not going to determine or dictate what happens when they're 16 or 17 or 18. There's a thousand things that are going to happen five, six, seven years from now that are completely outside my control as a parent. I don't know what the coach is going to be like, whether he or she is going to like my kid. I don't know if my kid will still even care about this sport anymore. It may be that there's kids that move in that even haven't been a part of our community that suddenly show up in high school. They're just better than my kid at that position. maybe the coach is going to force my kid to play a position that they're not comfortable with. And they're just, they're not going to be as good at that as they, you know, they had their sights set on being a quarterback and suddenly they get moved to a tight end. and we've got just gobs of those stories where it's like, wow, I put all this stress on myself when they were 10 because I was trying to create this outcome that actually I have almost no control of now, now that they're in high school. So that sounds discouraging, but we actually say. We actually think it's encouraging. Like, you can take a deep breath. And again, if you're, if you're a person who comes from a Christian worldview and believes that there is a God who has, has, who has a plan for your kid, and loves your kid more than you do. I want to kind of get alongside of that and be fully present today at, practice or fully present today at the game and not be so stressed out about the future, not be so stressed out about what they're not doing right now in their performance and start paying closer attention to those kinds of categories that are going to matter way more when they're 25 years old than whether or not they swung at that called strike three again or didn't swing at it. It's not gonna matter 10 years from now. But how they went through the handshake line afterwards just might, that just might affect the way that they interact in a marriage in the future, or what kind of a member of a church they are in the future, or what they're like in the Walmart parking lot in the future. Those are shaping the type of person that they're becoming. And I want to get better at paying attention to that kind of stuff while I'm at a game and not get so worried about things in the future that I can't control.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Ed, your book may be called Away Game, but the things that you're saying are painfully close to home. I mean, these are realities that you're seeing. I see this every day. I've seen it in my own home, in my kids school, in my community and just in my practice everywhere. It's all of these little micro interactions and the feeling, the pressure, the control and we don't meet mean it, but it just kind of creeps in there. And then we have this environment and this may be something, you know, that's really hard to answer. But when we look at the environment and we're sitting in the stands, we know it's not just us because we see, we know who that one parent is who is going to use words that should be bleeped out in live audiences. Right. We know about the one who's going to chew out the ref. We know about, you know, this kind of environment. What advice do you have have for families who are looking to influence that environment beyond even just okay, yeah, you're right. Between me and my athlete, you know, m me and my child, that there's that one dynamic, but there's this whole dynamic of the ecosystem. How can Christian parents be a good influence and carry the gospel and the good news and that character to influence their larger ecosystem of their team where they're playing?
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, Such a great question. Brian and I literally just wrote an article for Upward Sports about it. Maybe we can include it in show notes somewhere.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Yeah, we definitely are.
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, there's really practical things that we can do. You know, one of the things that I need to do is once I've dropped off my kid at the game or practice or whatever, that's a great time for me to Have a devo moment for me to have a God consciousness moment. To just get reconnected to the spiritual side of myself and say, God, help me before I walk into this stadium. Here's the things I'm afraid of. Here's when I go bad, this is how I go bad. Help me not do that. Help me be more concerned about the people around me than I am. Just what's happening with my kid. I'm always going to be worried about what happens with my kid. But help me to expand that to include more people. That really is a great practical step just to, just to clear my head, get God focused before I walk in. Brian and I say this all the time. Practice. Do an evaluation of what's coming out of your mouth at games. Like we've encouraged people stop cheering, stop talking so much at the field. when you. Again, we can talk about this for the whole show. When you start to pay close attention to what's coming out of your mouth, you realize most of it is, actually has more to do with me and what I want than it is to actually help my child. My children have told me they don't want to hear me at games. It distracts stresses. Again, we've had, we've had these conversations when you start to become quiet, you start to pay attention more to what everybody else is saying. And Brian says this all the time. You have a tendency almost to become judgmental when you actually start to pay attention to the amount of screaming and yelling and contradictory messages that are being sent and just the anxiety that's in the voices. So stop doing that, that. See if you can practice the discipline of being quiet. Learn the other kids names on the team so that you're not just focused on your kid, but really you could start giving positive energy to other kids. If you're going to give energy anywhere, start asking more substantive questions of the people that you get to sit with all the time. That maybe it's not a coincidence that God has your lives intersecting for this stretch of weeks or months or even years together. And maybe you could be the one in a, in a culture that, that's super isolated and is longing for human connection. Again, a whole nother show, right?
Dr. Jessica Peck: Yeah.
The reason why kids quit sports is because they're not having good experience
Ed Uszynski: Maybe you could be the one who for this hour as we sit here, you bring up a question about real life. You ask about work, you ask about some other aspect of life and show interest in people, which I won't do that if I'm just sitting there stressed out about why my kid's not in the game yet, or why they got taken out so soon or why they didn't shoot when they got the ball passed to them. You know, again, go back to the devo. Lord, help me not to do that. Help me actually to be more interested in the people around me. And when you do that, it's actually contagious because people want that. And so Brian and I have said, we're not trying to change all, you know, the macro sports problem. What if we just focused on our corner of the bleachers every weekend?
Brian Smith: What if.
Ed Uszynski: What if we just said, Lord, help me change so that when I show up in these spaces, just this little space is different. And our kids can have a different experience because we're changing as parents. That's what our goal really is. And it works. It does work. Again, we've been talking about this for years now, and I have tried these things that we're talking about, and I still am failing. I still am failing. But that's where apologies come in. And at least now I'm catching myself. And it's like, no, this actually will make a difference in their experience. Experience.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, that is, it is so encouraging. And I do agree with you, Ed. It's. It is contagious. It's contagious either way. It can go down, but it can go up too. And I think you're right. There's something in humans that we want that connection. And when you're behaving differently, when you're the, the team, the. The family that's saying, hey, we are all in, except on Sundays, we will be in church. You're welcome to come with us. We'll be all in that other time. And we're the ones who are not, not cussing out the ref. Let's just be honest. And, and doing that differently. That is an opportunity to share the hope of the gospel. And it can be. It can be really hard to do that. And one of the other easy ways that you talk about in your book, Ed, is, is you talk about just how athletics is all about discipline, it's all about rhythm, it's all about routine. What are some more practical ways that you can say. You talked about just praying, just that simple devotional, just taking that simple prayer in there. God, watch my mouth. Help me to watch what I'm saying. What are some other rhythms that you think you could together to be helpful in that way?
Ed Uszynski: Well, we talk about before the game and, and helping our kids. Like, there's so much stress that goes into just getting to a game. I Think parents feel because uniforms are everywhere, food's not ready. And so we could do a better job of doing what needs to happen for our kid to not be entering into the competitive space already full of anxiety and to help us do the same thing. Thing. So you know what your home is like. Like what what is. What are decisions that could be made ahead of time that will make getting out of that house better, a better experience. But the other thing that we haven't talked about is after games, and that's just a huge one.
Ed Uszynski: That most kids. Actually, we talk about all the kids that are quitting sports. Again, there's research on this. The reason why kids quit sports is because they're not having a good experience. The number one thing that they point to and not having a good, good experience is what happens in the car ride home. Because most of us as parents have been sitting there and we've been making our list of things that we want to talk about after the game is over and they don't want to do that. And I know we're running out of time, so let me just say this real quick. It's a. Much rather than asking or diving into how they played or performed, maybe just ask, is there anything from the game that you want to talk about today? Most of the time our kids are going to say no, which is actually good to hear that because then it's not worth trying to force a bunch of my words into the space. Then if they don't really want to talk about it, if they do, then great. What do you want to talk about? If they don't want to talk about it, then don't talk about it. Go get a Slurpee, Go get ice cream. Move on. Yeah, move on. It's a game. Let it be over again. The only reason I want to say a bunch of stuff is because I want your future to look different. They just want to play. So let, let that be. Okay.
Ask your kids after games did they have fun? Why or why not?
ask them, did they have fun today? That's been a great question for me. After games, did you have fun? Why or why not? and that's turned into interesting conversations that have nothing to do with how they played. Some of our kids will want to talk about how they played or what they did or didn't do, but most of the time they won't.
Dr. Jessica Peck: And I can't believe we have to leave it there. I feel like this is dot, dot, dot, to be continued because. Because I feel so passionate about this as well. And hey, my husband thinks sports analogies fix all problems. I think combining ice cream with it is like a magical level of, sometimes it can really make you feel a lot better. Listen. The book is called A Christian Parents Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. Away Game is what it's called. It's by Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski You can go to their Athletes in Action website. We'll link some resources from the show notes But I pray that you will be prayerful about the athletes who are in your circle of influence. Pray for all those kids going back to school, starting school sports. And as you do, I pray, as I always do, that the Lord will bless you and keep you and make his face to shine upon you. And I'll see you right back here tomorrow.
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Dr. Jessica Peck discusses parenting strategies around youth sports on American Family Radio
preborn.com/AFR hello and welcome to the
: Dr. Nurse Mama show prescribing Hope for healthy families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well hey there friends and welcome to my favorite time of day getting to spend time with you prescribing Hope for Healthy Families. Today we're going to talk about a topic that I know many of you listening have a lot of feelings about. We are talking about youth sports. Now for me as a pediatric nurse practitioner in primary care, I can't even begin to to tell you how many thousands of sports physicals I've done over the last 30 years. I'm a mom of four myself. My kids have been involved in Sports. And yet sports are changing. When I look at the landscape of youth sports, it is very, very different from when I grew up, when I started it in pediatrics. We're seeing early professionalization, early specialization, a lot of pressure, a lot of earning potentials that are coming from the new name, image and licensure changes in college sports. And it's hard to find a balance. Now, I want to make it very clear, I am not a sports hater. My husband in particular believes that there is no marriage problem, parenting problem, in fact, no global crisis that can't be solved with a sports analogy. We love sports, but they have their proper place. And the truth is, for many families today, youth sports is not just an activity. It's not something that their kids do. It is a family lifestyle. We are talking about things like practices that are many nights a week, tournaments, travel ball, private lessons, recruiting conversations, even pressure to have social media from a young age to increase and increase the ability of to be recruited. We're talking about early morning drives, post game debriefs. All of these things take a lot of family time and energy. And again, there can be tremendous good in that. Sports can teach perseverance and teamwork and discipline and humility and courage and so much character in both the winning and the losing. But here's the question that I want us to wrestle with today. What if sports aren't just just shaping our children's athletic abilities? What if we acknowledge the truth that they are shaping their character? Sports have an influence on the way our kids see their identity, what they value, how they pursue relationships and their understanding of success. Now our kids are all being discipled somewhere. They're learning what matters, what makes them valu, how they should respond when they fail, and how they should treat people they compete against, what their worth is based on in their performance. And sports provides a particularly powerful environment for that formation because. Because parents have a front row seat to their children experiencing virtually every emotion. And that is often on public display. And even more so today, that can often be on social media, as can the emotions of the coaches, which are not always God honoring. Let's just say that. And we are talking with two authors today of a book who argue that these moments are prime opportunities for parents to enter into conversations about what scripture teaches and how to live differently. Now, that doesn't mean that we run away from competitive sports. It means that we need to learn how to parent differently within that ecosystem of sports. How do we keep winning from being the ultimate goal? How do we protect our Family and spiritual rhythms. How do we respond when our child's identity is starting to be wrapped up in their performance? And so we are talking today to Brian Smith. He has been on staff with Athletes in action since 2008. He is a former collegiate athlete, himself a graduate of Wake Forrest University, and he holds a master's degree in theology and sports studies. Did you even know there was such a thing? I bet that will pique some interest from Baylor University. He's the author of the Christian Athlete Glorifying God in Sports and now Away Game. And he and his wife have three children. We're also talking to Ed Uszynski He's an author, a speaker, a sports minister. I know that's some of your dream job, for sure. With more than three decades of experience discipling college and professional athletes, he's written extensively at the intersection of faith and Sports. He holds two theological degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and a PhD in American Cultural Studies from Bowling Green State University. He and his wife have four kids. You can see they are well qualified and well positioned to jump into this somewhat contentious space. So, Brian and Ed, thank you for your courage and joining us in the hot seat today and talking about this really important topic.
Dr. Jessica Peck: I'm so glad to have you here.
Brian Smith: Thanks for having us, Dr. Peck.
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, thanks, Dr. Peck. I was exhausted just listening that wonderfully articulated intro. It's. It's just exhausting to think about the topic.
Dr. Jessica Peck: It is. I mean, it really is. It is all consuming. And as we're talking about sports, I think, you know, whether it's, it could
Dr. Jessica Peck: be sports, it could also be music
Dr. Jessica Peck: or academics or theater or any competitive activity that kids are in. So, regardless of whether you have a kid in sports, you know, a kid in sports, somehow this relates to you. And you know, for a lot of parents, when we talked about youth sports, it used to mean maybe going out to the little league field, the football field on a Saturday, or maybe a Friday night, watch the game. It's way different. Now. Let's talk about, and the title of your book is Away Game. And you talk about being away from home so much. It's no longer community based. We're talking about a lifestyle.
Brian: Tell us a little bit about how you came to be in sports ministry
Let's start with both of you and just your heart for how you came to have a passion for this. Brian, let's start with you. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to be in sports ministry and how God put this message on your heart for us today.
Brian Smith: Yeah, I mean, that's a, that's A loaded question. We can spend the entire time talking about that, but I'll, I will try to be brief. I played every sport imaginable growing up. Ended up running, track in cross country because it was one of the few sports you can't get cut from. Ended, up being pretty decent in a ran at Wake Forrest University. my wife is my high school sweetheart. She ran tracking cross country at Wisconsin. Love it. So sports has been in our blood from early on in our relationship. we have three kids, two in middle school and one in high school. They play every sport imaginable. We've been on staff with the sports ministry, Athletes in action. You said this in the, in the beginning. Oh, since 2008 or 9, I can't even even remember anymore. But our, our entire life has just been inundated in the waters of sports and Jesus and trying to figure out what does it look like, to have our faith in Christ influence the sporting environment that we're in and not flip that equation. So we say all the time that we, we love Jesus, we like sports. Oftentimes we get that backwards. I'm, I'm passionate about waking up every single day and wondering what does it look like to take my faith and my love for Jesus and have that influence every part of athletics that I touch. So I'm also a high school tracking cross country coach. and this is something that even at a public school, I'm trying to figure out what does it look like for me to bring Jesus into these spaces where oftentimes he's not even welcomed.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Brian, I appreciate that boots on the ground perspective. I mean, you definitely have some street cred there. And I think sometimes when we wander into these conversations, families can feel defensive, like you're going to criticize my love of sports. And I appreciate setting the bar clear that, no, that's not what this is about. It's just about a right setting of priorities. Ed, what is your perspective? What brings you to the table today?
Ed Uszynski: Well, you could literally transpose everything that Brian just said and put it on my life. There's just different sports involved. So I grew up in a football, high school football coach's home. I became a basketball player, went to Kent State University to play, even though I ended up not playing there. It's a whole nother story. But I went there to play, ended up playing ball overseas in my 20s. So it was a huge part of my life. Married a two sport collegiate athlete. We have four kids that are playing sports, three that are in college now, one's still in high school and same coached and have just been involved in sports from the very beginning. Have never stopped being involved in sports. But what really brought us to this topic was around 10 years ago and Brian and I were working together on some other projects, but our kids were playing sports, we were coaching. And we suddenly looked up and realized we were on this fast moving train that was very different than what we were doing with college and pro players. This whole youth train was moving, it seemed way faster. And we really felt ill equipped for how to navigate it as parents, as Christian parents, as parents that had kids at different ages in different sports. And we've used this language now for the last few years, we realized we needed an intervention. We were being discipled by sports and had been discipled by sports in a way that was really leaving us ill equipped to. To help our kids. And in fact, if anything, if we were honest, we were maybe doing some damage to our kids. We were adding to the anxiety. We were doing things that were counterproductive to them flourishing in sports. So it made us start to really have intense conversations with each other and other people to say, what can we do to help ourselves and to help other people, like you said, not leave sports and not be completely, you know, just go along for the ride. We don't want to do that, but how do we be obediently involved? Right where I just like Daniel, the character Daniel in the Bible we felt like was just a great role model for living among very secular values. But locking arms with some other people and saying, how do we walk with God in the midst of this? So that's what we've been trying to do.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Ed, that is not an easy task. It really isn't. And I'm so grateful for your honesty and transparency in saying what you just did, because that can be a hard realization to speak out loud. I think a lot of families may think that in their head, like, have we gone too far? Are priorities, Right. But to say it out loud like you just did, to say we thought we were causing damage to our kids, that's really brave and really helpful for all of us. And you described really well how sports have changed a lot. I've seen that in my practice. I've seen that in the research. We know the likelihood of making it to professional sports is increasingly smaller and smaller, although some kids are really gifted and some kids will make it to the big time, to the big leagues.
Ed Uszynski: Ah.
Dr. Jessica Peck: But we see also in research that kids who specialize early. They are more likely to have burnout, overuse injuries, anxiety, depression, all of those things. And I've seen so many kids, kids who maybe lose the joy of their sport, they want to walk away, but their family identity is so wrapped up in it, they feel the pressure of it. Because, you know, this is our whole family social circle. There's a lot of complex dynamics. But Brian, let's go back to you and see what is your perspective on how you've seen sports change. Ed specifically mentioned the last 10 years. How have you seen the progression change? Maybe some things for the good and what some things to be cautious about.
Brian Smith: Yeah, we talk a lot about this, in the book Away Game. The, the subtitle is important too, in that book. It's a Christian parents guide for navigating youth sports. And we're trying to, we're really trying to educate parents just to give them language and categories to do exactly what you just said. Like how can we trace what has happened even in the last 50 years? And so we've seen it go from being a place where it's just primarily play. If you think of like the old movies, like sandlot baseball, backyard pickup games, it used to be play and now it's moved significantly more towards performance and winning. It used to be more kid centered where it was just all about what does the kid want? How can we lift them up and support really what they're not just gifted in, but what do they enjoy and what makes them have fun. And it's moved to be more adult, coach and parent centered. You talked in the beginning about the professionalization of, youth sports. That's a massive part of it is it used to be just something where we, we allowed kids just to play and watch. But then I think what's happened over the last half a century, which is crazy to say that is we've just seen like, man, there's so many opportunities where we can take all this good stuff that we've learned as, as fans and coaches. And we've placed this model on the, on the youth sports leagues, thinking this is going to be the most fun possible for the kids. And the stats are telling us that it may be really, really fun for the adult, but it's making the kids absolutely miserable. So even in that shift, we've seen it go from being super affordable to now it's like an expensive luxury type experience from localized to now we're crossing state boundaries. Even in one of the books we talked about, they talked about how it's it's almost like an arms race when you, when you get to like these different palaces that the kids are playing in these days. So it really is wild just to think that there might not be a better time in the world right now to be an entrepreneur. Entrepreneur in the, in the space of youth sports than right now.
Money is changing everything. When you see the earning potential of college athletes now
Like, money is just a massive influence of all this as well.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Oh, it absolutely is. When you see the earning potential of college athletes now and see how much they're earning and how much that's changing. And you know, I know as a professor, we have a lot of talks and faculty governance about budget. It's changing everything. The reverberations are really significant. And one of the things that I've just seen in my own community, in my own life, when I first had kids, I mean, Little League was the thing. We're a baseball family and everybody would go to Little League, but that gradually changed to travel ball. And then it was nobody's playing in the community. Everybody's traveling and going away. And when we come back, Brian, I want to pick that up with you because that is the title of your book, Away Game, and talk about how that dynamic, how being away has changed and what we can do about it. But don't worry, we're going to leave you with some help and some hope. And if you have kids in youth sports or you are involved in youth sports in any way, I highly encourage you to get a copy of this book and to really prayerfully consider how God might equip you to use sports for good, for discipleship, for the good of kids and the good of communities
Dr. Jessica Peck: and the good of eternity.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We'll be right back with more.
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You've Already Won by Shane & Shane: I'm fighting a battle you've already f.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That is you've already won by Shane and Shane. And that's what we're talking about today. Not just winning at sports, but winning at life. I have so been looking forward to this conversation. We're talking with authors and sports ministry leaders Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski. They're the authors of a book called Away A Christian Parent's Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. And this is something that is taking over the country. It is something that we can be excited about. Sports are great. They're great for physical activity. And for me as a mom, as a healthcare provider, anytime I see kids getting up and going outside and learning teamwork and moving their bodies and having sunlight and all the things that is going to be preferable to me than hiding in a basement all summer on a video game, I'm just going to say it out there. Judge me if you wish. But there is also another side to youth sports, a side that pulls us away from discipleship, and it can really skew our priorities. And already Brian and Ed have been very transparent and, and sharing their own journey and their own failures and their own trials and errors, but also still saying, this is worthy of pursuit. We can use sports as discipleship.
Brian, talk about the title of your book, Away Game
And Brian, before the break, we were just talking about the title of your book, Away Game, and how this has really become a lifestyle for many families. Talk about the inspiration for the title, how you see that playing out in real life. Youth sports.
Brian Smith: Yeah, this is a, place where sports metaphors are really helpful because what do you, what do you expect at a home game? You expect favorable calls from referees, you know where to sit in the stands, you know where the bathrooms are. Like, there's comforts and expectations that are often realized that come from being at home. You just, you're just comfortable with the environment. But at an away game, you're often in the stands facing the sun. You're not sure where bathrooms, like the, the locker rooms stink. Everything is set up in sport for the away team to, it makes it a little bit harder. And as we're writing this book and even just, just realizing this ourselves as youth sports parents, we're, we're coming to this conclusion that we, we come to the youth sports environment expecting it to be a home game. Metaphorically, we're expecting, yeah, my kids in this sport and that sport. So it should grow character, it should grow discipline. They, they should learn how to become a good teammate. But the way the system is set up today, it almost does the opposite. Like, if anything, you could argue that youth sports today is better positioned to erode character than actually build it. And so part of the, the, motivation behind or the inspiration behind Away Game as a title is we, especially as Christian people, just need to go back to thinking that this is, it's a good gift from God. But the way it's set up today is we really are, we're playing in a way game with you sports. We're entering into an environment where we're strangers in a, in a foreign land. And so for us to enter into that, with that expectation, then we begin to question, okay, what does it look like for me to enter into a space like this? Even though it's been jacked up by sin and destruction and non flourishing for our kids? How can I be a part of redeeming that space? Because you still, it's an away game, you still have to play.
Dr. Jessica Peck: That is a great analogy. I haven't checked my phone, but I feel like my husband's already texting me saying see? Sports analogies for everything. Which is so true. They're really helpful. Any problem our kids ever have, we're going to go back. It's usually going to be story about some blind father at a football game. That always makes my husband cry. But I digress. You probably know even what I'm talking about. But, but you, Brian, let's go back to you and talk something more. sorry, Ed, let's go back to you and talk a little bit more about that discipleship issue. Let's talk about how there's a balance there and we can say all the right things. We can say, oh yeah, church is the most important thing. And you know, we, we want our kids to grow up to love God and serve others. But our calendar, our checkbook, our credit card, they kind of are accountability partners and they can tell on us a little bit. How do we recognize when we've got our, our priorities out of whack?
Ed Uszynski: You know, it's so interesting because Brian and I really have not spent a ton of time trying to help people parse out how much they should play or where they should play or how much they should pay to play. I just, we just think that's going to look different for people all across the spectrum. What we're saying is, no matter how much time and energy you're giving to it, are you looking for the categories in your child's life that will develop their soul? In other words, most of us go to a game and we're watching for their playing time. We're watching to see how they perform. That's what all of our metrics have to do with their performance. Are they getting better at whatever it is we think they're failing at? is the coach treating them fair? Are they on the right team to be positioned for a high School future. You know, our minds are. We almost act like they're agent, they're sport agent in the way we watch and think about the game. And what Brian and I are saying to ourselves and anyone who will listen is that's never going to fully go away. But do we have another list that's right next to it? And we'd say should be over on top of it. That's, that's looking for other kinds of wins, that's looking for character development, that's looking to see how they're interacting with teammates, that's looking to see whether they're taking steps of growth. Are they. They displaying courage? Are they taking responsibility for the way they interact with the coach, for the way they go through the handshake line after the game? are they stepping into their fears with the gospel and leaning into the Lord instead of just trying to manage their, their fear of failure on their own? There's so many other categories that somebody needs to be paying attention to. And it even might have been true 50 years ago that coaches were more equipped actually to care more about those types of things and felt responsibility to try to build those things into kids. That's not so much true anymore. It's hard to find a coach that has any of that as what he or she is watching for. So it becomes that much more important that we take on that role of discipler, that we start to think like a sport. Missionary is language that we use. And so again, what that may mean is that I'm going to have to have a confrontation with myself first. Like, I'm bringing my own fears, I'm bringing my own expectations, my own regrets from my sports past, my fear of this imaginary future not being realized that I'm trying to project onto my kid. And again, we can end up talking the whole time just about that. Like, we have to, we have to get more healthy in the way we're coming to the games and the practices so that we can have a different list that even matters to us. Because right now, for too many of us, it really doesn't.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Honestly.
Dr. Jessica Peck: you just drop some really serious truth bombs in that. Honestly, Ed, because we've all sat. If you've sat in the stands at any youth sports, you will see bad actors. I mean, you really will. You'll see good parents who become really bad actors on or sideline coaches. And somehow, you know, we've just got so much passion. And we were talking, even the break, about how most parents who have their kids in sports were really, well, intentioned we want our kids to love it. We want to have fun together. We want them to be disciplined and build character and somehow it can just bring out the worst in us. And we focus on performance. And I think how much would it be different if a kid came off the field and instead of immediately criticizing their technique, we say, hey, it took a lot of courage to go out back out there after you struck out. Hey, it was really courageous not to throw your helmet. Hey, you spoke blessings and not curses over your teammates, over your referees, over your umpires. That took character. But that somehow it just seems like that just takes a back seat there.
More money spent on sports makes kids less likely to enjoy them, study finds
And you talk about, Ed, how everything should be different. And I agree every, every situation is going to be, look different. And I think about, even in the kids, in my own family, we have, I have one family member who was really, really gifted athletically and so their path looks a lot different. But at the same time you share a correlation in the book that the more money families spend on a sport, the less likely their child may be to enjoy it. Brian, can you speak to that and how you felt when you, when you saw that and maybe how it can be instructive for us in the moment?
Brian Smith: Yeah, absolutely. And I was shocked by that originally too when I saw the study. Like this is hardcore data that they're finding the more we spend, the less our kids enjoy sports. And so we, we've had conversations with each other and other people and the more you talk about it, it makes sense. When you get the kid a new 600 bat and when you're traveling across state lines, whether or not you communicate it to them, there is an expectation of, we have paid for this, we are traveling this far, you need to perform. Right. And a lot of times parents aren't saying that outright, but when they get the bat, when they're traveling, when they get the NewSong Jersey, there, there comes this expectation that's hard enough for like 16 year olds, 26 year olds struggle with that. But we're putting that reality on, 6 year olds, 8 year olds and they're crippling under the pressure. And so again, let's say this well intentioned parents, we want to get our kids the best stuff. We want to give them the best opportunity to, to thrive in sport. But it often comes with this sometimes uncommunicated expectation that you need to perform. And kids don't want to perform. They, they want to play and have fun.
Dr. Jessica Peck: They do want to play and have fun. And I think, Ed, there's a lot of families who feel trapped in this. It's. Maybe it starts off that way. It starts off really fun, and then it's just. Just, okay, yeah. All right. We can do two nights a week.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Okay.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We can do one weekend a month.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Okay.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We can do one private lesson. And all of a sudden they just feel like they're trapped in this. And maybe they're listening and thinking, yeah, I get what you're saying.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We've probably gone too far. But, like, how do we get out? Do you have any advice for resetting of priorities and how to do that in a way that's not destructive to family dynamics?
Ed Uszynski: Yeah. and we do talk about it a ton of that. We almost need to give ourselves permissions to be parents again and to be in control, more in control. Instead of giving our control over to a sports league or giving it entirely over to a coach. Let's say we don't. We don't want to travel, on a Sunday morning or show up at even the local field on a Sunday morning because we have a conviction that we want to be in church on Sunday morning. We would encourage parents to go to coaches and say, we're not going to be there on Sunday morning. Morning. And, you know, is that okay? Again, you don't have to go in and be a jerk about it, but just say, this is where our family is at. We're going to be here for all the rest of it. But we want to be in church on Sunday morning. Or maybe it's Wednesday night and, you know, there's three practices a week, and one of them's on Wednesday night. And Wednesday night is just an important church night for us. It really is a category to go in and say, we still want to be on the team if you'll have us, and you want to invest in our kid. These are spaces that we're not going to be present. And maybe there'll be some consequence for the kid. He's not going to get to start the next game or whatever. Okay, that's okay. That's not the end of the world. We're saying that this matters to us enough, that it's first and we're going to build sports around it. And we found, again, in our own experience and just in listening to people, most coaches actually will be okay with that. They really will. Again, depends on the sport. And I've heard all kinds of. We both heard all kinds of different stories, but you as a parent can at least initiate that, that you don't have to just because you paid $2,500. And they're saying this is for an entire year, not just for the, the seven week soccer season because you're gonna have to do all these other trainings in X, Y and Z. You can say we're not going to do that. We're going to play this season, but we're not going to be available. My 10 year old's not going to be available to play year round soccer for you. And if that's an expectation, then let's go somewhere else. But again, even there we, we did this, and, and the league was fine with it. We're not going to be at all the extra stuff because they want to play something else or they want to take time off and they were okay with it. They still made us pay for the full year, which again, it's a bit of a racket at that level, but it's like, okay, if that's the way the game's being played, if we really want to be a part of this league but on our terms, then we'll pay the money. But we're only going to come for the season and not the rest of it. So there really are options. You're, you're still on the train, you're riding it it, but you don't have to just go along for the ride. You can negotiate on on the,
Dr. Jessica Peck: on the train cars and communicate to your kids your, your priorities. I mean that, that action speaks a lot more than words of just saying church is important to us, but putting your literally your money where your, where your bat is or where your football helmet is or whatever that is, that speaks a lot differently. And I don't know about you guys, I'm sure you've had the same experience. I've talked with a lot of parents who have young adults who are really regretful about the priorities that they set and thinking we over prioritize sports. And I have yet to talk to anyone who said I really wish we'd done more. I really wish that we'd paid more, that we'd invested more time. I usually don't see that.
You talked about FOMO in sports. It's an acronym for Fear of missing out
But one of the other interesting dynamics of this that definitely caught my eye in your book was fomo. Now for those listening who think, wait, what did she just say? It's an acronym for Fear of missing out. Now this is something that teenagers experience socially a lot. And actually in science we have a scientific scale where we can scientifically measure feelings of fomo. It is a real phenomenon and it's fascinating. But you talked about FOMO in sports. And Brian, I'd love to hear your observations about this because that can be another family dynamic motivator here.
Brian Smith: Yeah, and so again, let's, let's say this well intentioned parents, we're all doing the best job we can with the information that we have. But the youth sport industrial complex is what we called in the book. The YSIC feeds off of our fear of missing out. It really has developed into a system that promises the world but rarely if ever delivers on those promises. And so it's always going to over promise and under deliver, which is, which is driving this fear of missing out. So a couple things worth pointing out with what the YSIC is over promising and under delivering. They are promising that if, if, if we involve ourselves in their team sport, league, whatever, that our kid will essentially ascend up into the right trajectory wise. The latest data is saying that 70% of kids are quitting by the age of 13, which is crazy if you think about it. Before kids have even hit their physical peak, just as human beings, they've had enough of this system that is encouraging pressure and anxiety and professionalization. And so it's just one of those spaces where, yeah, we, we need to be careful as parents when we're feeling this, this FOMO in our own hearts and our kids might even be communicating it. What are they actually missing out on? Is it reality or is it some fictitious brand of reality that, that the youth sports is selling us?
Dr. Jessica Peck: Kids are really good at gaslighting us. Honestly, they can convince us. I mean they do, they come to us and they, we say, know you can't have a phone. And they're like, you don't understand, you've just destroyed my social life forever. And somehow we believe them. They're so convincing and we think, oh yes, I've just ruined your life. And sometimes we just need to seek some wise outside counsel. And that's why I'd put a plug in. If you have a child who is a competitive athlete, you really need a very good healthcare provider who's very comfortable with taking care of sports. You need to talk about things like sleep and nutrition and prevention of overuse injuries and somebody who's going to really help you optimize their health. There are a lot of really great professional guidelines, even on things like pitch counts. Now these are from orthopedic surgeons who are doing Tommy Jon surgeries and people who are right there in the middle of it. But when we come back, we'll have more help and hope from Brian Smith And Ed Yusinski about awareness game. Don't go away. We'll see you after this break.
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As youth sports industry complex rises, there are some lessons for Christian families
Love God Love People by Danny Gokey: I've been running in circles Jumping the hurdles Getting caught in that rush Doing so much I'm feeling kind of worn out all this checking the boxes trying to be flawless has me spinning my head catching my breath Too afraid to slow down I tell myself to keep this up that God wants more than just my love But I've been complicating things Things it's just like me to overthink Gotta keep it real simple keep it real simple Bring everything right back to ground zero Cause it all comes down to this Love God and love people we're living the world that keeps breaking but if we wanna find a way to change all comes down to this Like I
Dr. Jessica Peck: welcome back friends. That is love God and love people by Danny Gokey. And that's what we all want our kids to grow up and do is love God, love people, serve their communities. And sometimes our priorities get out of whack. We're talking about youth sports today, which can be a tremendous opportunity for character development and for learning life lessons and being strong and body minded spirit. But as we see the youth sports industry complex rising like never before in modern American history, there are some lessons for Christian families. And we have sports ministry leaders here with us, Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski who have written a book called Away Game A Christian Parents Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. If you are in any way connected with youth sports, I think this is an essential read because this is something I see literally every day in clinical practice. I see kids who are, coming in for sports physicals, sports injuries or Just kids who come in for an earache, but are also athletes. And I see the impact on families for good and sometimes for not good. And Ed, ah, right before the break, we were talking about this concept of fomo. And you have a really important counterbalance, a check for us there, some words of encouragement and hope.
There's a ton of pressure on parents to get their kids into college
And I want to pick it up right there.
Ed Uszynski: Well, one of the pressures that I think we all feel is, our kid going to be one of the 2% or less than 2% that are going to play in college, which again is a ridiculous percentage. But it's so easy, all of us, maybe ours is going to be the one at 10 years old. And what Brian and I can say with great confidence from having worked most of our vocational life with college athletes and being around them all the time and professional athletes, athletes, is that if your kid winds up being one of the 2%, it's not going to be because of you harassing him or her to go out and shoot more in the driveway or to go work out or whatever it is the sport demands. They're going to be a college athlete because they have a physical gifting that separates them from the other 98% that you really, again, it's in your DNA. You had something to do with that, but it's a natural thing. And they have a mental, they just have a mental edge that's different than the other 98. They're motivated to go out and fix their left hand in the driveway. They're motivated to put in extra time. They never want to leave the gym or the pool or the field because they have just such a passion and a drive to excel in it. And that's a rare person. But it's, it's not. And it's been really helpful for me to realize this before it was too late. It's not going to be because it was. That's what I did or my wife did. And it's not going to be because of words. I keep chirping at my kids. That's not what's going to produce. In fact, if anything, that might actually discourage them to Brian's point, when we know that 70% are quitting by age 13. I don't want to be the one that's actually handicapped, my child from being able to reach their potential because I use too many words and pressured them too much. It's actually my silence might actually be the thing that helps get them there, which seems so counterintuitive. But not just silence, but my love, my consistent, Your identity with me is based on our relationship, not on how you perform today. And it can be really different to consistently communicate that to our kids. But the other thing we talk about all the time is that there's a ton of pressure now. We hear this all the time when we do seminars. We're afraid that if we don't do X, Y and Z, they're not going to make their high school change team. Like, their high school situation is so hyper competitive, which we, you know, we've got districts all around me here in the greater Dayton area in Ohio that are like that. They are intense. It's difficult to make the high school team. So that is true. But we can definitely say that what's going on when they're 10 or 11 or 12 is not going to determine or dictate what happens when they're 16 or 17 or 18. There's a thousand things that are going to happen five, six, seven years from now that are completely outside my control as a parent. I don't know what the coach is going to be like, whether he or she is going to like my kid. I don't know if my kid will still even care about this sport anymore. It may be that there's kids that move in that even haven't been a part of our community that suddenly show up in high school. They're just better than my kid at that position. maybe the coach is going to force my kid to play a position that they're not comfortable with. And they're just, they're not going to be as good at that as they, you know, they had their sights set on being a quarterback and suddenly they get moved to a tight end. and we've got just gobs of those stories where it's like, wow, I put all this stress on myself when they were 10 because I was trying to create this outcome that actually I have almost no control of now, now that they're in high school. So that sounds discouraging, but we actually say. We actually think it's encouraging. Like, you can take a deep breath. And again, if you're, if you're a person who comes from a Christian worldview and believes that there is a God who has, has, who has a plan for your kid, and loves your kid more than you do. I want to kind of get alongside of that and be fully present today at, practice or fully present today at the game and not be so stressed out about the future, not be so stressed out about what they're not doing right now in their performance and start paying closer attention to those kinds of categories that are going to matter way more when they're 25 years old than whether or not they swung at that called strike three again or didn't swing at it. It's not gonna matter 10 years from now. But how they went through the handshake line afterwards just might, that just might affect the way that they interact in a marriage in the future, or what kind of a member of a church they are in the future, or what they're like in the Walmart parking lot in the future. Those are shaping the type of person that they're becoming. And I want to get better at paying attention to that kind of stuff while I'm at a game and not get so worried about things in the future that I can't control.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Ed, your book may be called Away Game, but the things that you're saying are painfully close to home. I mean, these are realities that you're seeing. I see this every day. I've seen it in my own home, in my kids school, in my community and just in my practice everywhere. It's all of these little micro interactions and the feeling, the pressure, the control and we don't meet mean it, but it just kind of creeps in there. And then we have this environment and this may be something, you know, that's really hard to answer. But when we look at the environment and we're sitting in the stands, we know it's not just us because we see, we know who that one parent is who is going to use words that should be bleeped out in live audiences. Right. We know about the one who's going to chew out the ref. We know about, you know, this kind of environment. What advice do you have have for families who are looking to influence that environment beyond even just okay, yeah, you're right. Between me and my athlete, you know, m me and my child, that there's that one dynamic, but there's this whole dynamic of the ecosystem. How can Christian parents be a good influence and carry the gospel and the good news and that character to influence their larger ecosystem of their team where they're playing?
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, Such a great question. Brian and I literally just wrote an article for Upward Sports about it. Maybe we can include it in show notes somewhere.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Yeah, we definitely are.
Ed Uszynski: Yeah, there's really practical things that we can do. You know, one of the things that I need to do is once I've dropped off my kid at the game or practice or whatever, that's a great time for me to Have a devo moment for me to have a God consciousness moment. To just get reconnected to the spiritual side of myself and say, God, help me before I walk into this stadium. Here's the things I'm afraid of. Here's when I go bad, this is how I go bad. Help me not do that. Help me be more concerned about the people around me than I am. Just what's happening with my kid. I'm always going to be worried about what happens with my kid. But help me to expand that to include more people. That really is a great practical step just to, just to clear my head, get God focused before I walk in. Brian and I say this all the time. Practice. Do an evaluation of what's coming out of your mouth at games. Like we've encouraged people stop cheering, stop talking so much at the field. when you. Again, we can talk about this for the whole show. When you start to pay close attention to what's coming out of your mouth, you realize most of it is, actually has more to do with me and what I want than it is to actually help my child. My children have told me they don't want to hear me at games. It distracts stresses. Again, we've had, we've had these conversations when you start to become quiet, you start to pay attention more to what everybody else is saying. And Brian says this all the time. You have a tendency almost to become judgmental when you actually start to pay attention to the amount of screaming and yelling and contradictory messages that are being sent and just the anxiety that's in the voices. So stop doing that, that. See if you can practice the discipline of being quiet. Learn the other kids names on the team so that you're not just focused on your kid, but really you could start giving positive energy to other kids. If you're going to give energy anywhere, start asking more substantive questions of the people that you get to sit with all the time. That maybe it's not a coincidence that God has your lives intersecting for this stretch of weeks or months or even years together. And maybe you could be the one in a, in a culture that, that's super isolated and is longing for human connection. Again, a whole nother show, right?
Dr. Jessica Peck: Yeah.
The reason why kids quit sports is because they're not having good experience
Ed Uszynski: Maybe you could be the one who for this hour as we sit here, you bring up a question about real life. You ask about work, you ask about some other aspect of life and show interest in people, which I won't do that if I'm just sitting there stressed out about why my kid's not in the game yet, or why they got taken out so soon or why they didn't shoot when they got the ball passed to them. You know, again, go back to the devo. Lord, help me not to do that. Help me actually to be more interested in the people around me. And when you do that, it's actually contagious because people want that. And so Brian and I have said, we're not trying to change all, you know, the macro sports problem. What if we just focused on our corner of the bleachers every weekend?
Brian Smith: What if.
Ed Uszynski: What if we just said, Lord, help me change so that when I show up in these spaces, just this little space is different. And our kids can have a different experience because we're changing as parents. That's what our goal really is. And it works. It does work. Again, we've been talking about this for years now, and I have tried these things that we're talking about, and I still am failing. I still am failing. But that's where apologies come in. And at least now I'm catching myself. And it's like, no, this actually will make a difference in their experience. Experience.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, that is, it is so encouraging. And I do agree with you, Ed. It's. It is contagious. It's contagious either way. It can go down, but it can go up too. And I think you're right. There's something in humans that we want that connection. And when you're behaving differently, when you're the, the team, the. The family that's saying, hey, we are all in, except on Sundays, we will be in church. You're welcome to come with us. We'll be all in that other time. And we're the ones who are not, not cussing out the ref. Let's just be honest. And, and doing that differently. That is an opportunity to share the hope of the gospel. And it can be. It can be really hard to do that. And one of the other easy ways that you talk about in your book, Ed, is, is you talk about just how athletics is all about discipline, it's all about rhythm, it's all about routine. What are some more practical ways that you can say. You talked about just praying, just that simple devotional, just taking that simple prayer in there. God, watch my mouth. Help me to watch what I'm saying. What are some other rhythms that you think you could together to be helpful in that way?
Ed Uszynski: Well, we talk about before the game and, and helping our kids. Like, there's so much stress that goes into just getting to a game. I Think parents feel because uniforms are everywhere, food's not ready. And so we could do a better job of doing what needs to happen for our kid to not be entering into the competitive space already full of anxiety and to help us do the same thing. Thing. So you know what your home is like. Like what what is. What are decisions that could be made ahead of time that will make getting out of that house better, a better experience. But the other thing that we haven't talked about is after games, and that's just a huge one.
Ed Uszynski: That most kids. Actually, we talk about all the kids that are quitting sports. Again, there's research on this. The reason why kids quit sports is because they're not having a good experience. The number one thing that they point to and not having a good, good experience is what happens in the car ride home. Because most of us as parents have been sitting there and we've been making our list of things that we want to talk about after the game is over and they don't want to do that. And I know we're running out of time, so let me just say this real quick. It's a. Much rather than asking or diving into how they played or performed, maybe just ask, is there anything from the game that you want to talk about today? Most of the time our kids are going to say no, which is actually good to hear that because then it's not worth trying to force a bunch of my words into the space. Then if they don't really want to talk about it, if they do, then great. What do you want to talk about? If they don't want to talk about it, then don't talk about it. Go get a Slurpee, Go get ice cream. Move on. Yeah, move on. It's a game. Let it be over again. The only reason I want to say a bunch of stuff is because I want your future to look different. They just want to play. So let, let that be. Okay.
Ask your kids after games did they have fun? Why or why not?
ask them, did they have fun today? That's been a great question for me. After games, did you have fun? Why or why not? and that's turned into interesting conversations that have nothing to do with how they played. Some of our kids will want to talk about how they played or what they did or didn't do, but most of the time they won't.
Dr. Jessica Peck: And I can't believe we have to leave it there. I feel like this is dot, dot, dot, to be continued because. Because I feel so passionate about this as well. And hey, my husband thinks sports analogies fix all problems. I think combining ice cream with it is like a magical level of, sometimes it can really make you feel a lot better. Listen. The book is called A Christian Parents Guide to Navigating Youth Sports. Away Game is what it's called. It's by Brian Smith and Ed Uszynski You can go to their Athletes in Action website. We'll link some resources from the show notes But I pray that you will be prayerful about the athletes who are in your circle of influence. Pray for all those kids going back to school, starting school sports. And as you do, I pray, as I always do, that the Lord will bless you and keep you and make his face to shine upon you. And I'll see you right back here tomorrow.
Dr. Jessica Peck: We'd like to thank our sponsors, including PreBorn. PreBorn has rescued over 400,000 babies from abortion. And every day their network clinics rescue
Dr. Jessica Peck: 200 babies lives.
Dr. Jessica Peck: Will you join PreBorn in loving and supporting young moms in crisis? Save a life today. Go to preborn.com/AFR the views and
Jeff Chamblee: opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.
Jessica is joined by Ed Uszynski and Brian Smith to talk about navigating youth sports.
https://www.thechristianathlete.com/
https://giving.preborn.com/preborn/checkout/afa?sc=43490GF2022&campaign=404750
https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/youth-sports-on-sunday-morning
(00:00) More than 80% of abortion vulnerable women choose life after seeing ultrasound at a PreBorn Network clinic
(01:47) Dr. Jessica Peck discusses parenting strategies around youth sports on American Family Radio
(07:38) Brian: Tell us a little bit about how you came to be in sports ministry
(15:30) Money is changing everything. When you see the earning potential of college athletes now
(16:49) Without people like you, this podcast would not exist
(19:11) Brian, talk about the title of your book, Away Game
(25:50) More money spent on sports makes kids less likely to enjoy them, study finds
(31:10) You talked about FOMO in sports. It's an acronym for Fear of missing out
(34:14) Reverend Don Wildmon: Culture Warrior
(35:19) As youth sports industry complex rises, there are some lessons for Christian families
(37:39) There's a ton of pressure on parents to get their kids into college
(46:10) The reason why kids quit sports is because they're not having good experience
(50:10) Ask your kids after games did they have fun? Why or why not?
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