kids quitting.

nice haiku, man

As others have said don't waste your time with people who don't want to be a part of your program. The world is filled with quitters.

One thing I disagree with is "they'll regret it their whole life". I know plenty of current high school kids who have quit sports and know several men my age that quit high school sports. The majority of them could care less about quitting and they don't regret anything. It's almost like it never happened to them. People don't regret things they never cared about.

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Don't get me wrong. If someone decides to quit we talk to them to figure out why they are quitting and of course we try to change their mind, but we don't keep trying every time we see them in the hall.

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General Douglas MacArthur said, "Age wrinkles the body; quitting wrinkles the soul."

Last month I held a new player meeting an 10 of the 20 guys that showed up had quit at one point in the program. How do you handle situations like this? Once they quit are they done?

Hell no. If they're willing to do the offseason stuff to get back on the team they're welcome back. 

Not really on subject, but had a 2 way senior starter quit the day before 1st rd. playoff game. Better off. If they don't want to be there, don't waste breath and time on worrying about it. As others have said, focus on what you have, coach 'em up, get better or get used to it.

I'm our middle school's baseball HC and also help with the HS varsity when I have time. I also teach at the HS. And I volunteer some of my time with little league. Because I do all this, I see kids grow and become young men from age 11-18. I think it's great when I see those players ive been watching from 11 years old excel at the high school level and beyond.

As great as what I described is, there's 4 times as many kids I've seen play baseball through middle school and not play in high school. Maybe I'm wrong and heartless, but it rarely phases me when a kid doesn't go out for the team in high school. In most cases I couldn't care less.

14 year old kids can just lose interest for various reasons. Their teenagers. Some of my players were more into basketball and chose AAU bball in the spring when they get to high school. Some play golf or lacrosse. Some quit because in MS they realized they just weren't good. And some realize they just don't wanna play baseball and are more into video games and hanging out with buddies instead.

When I ask them in the hall or in class why they didn't want to play baseball anymore,they tell me why, and I ask how it's going and tell them good luck.

Long winded I know, but in my opinion you can't let kids quitting effect you this much.

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Yes, you cant waste time and energy on those that do not want to be there. Ultimately you have those who are with you and those who are against you, you do not want to keep those who are against everything you stand for, everything you are trying to accomplish. Its easier to go alone than go with a bunch of turkeys around your neck.

I think if you can get kids to buy in, they get their friends to buy in, you keep them around and when they are all seniors, and big and strong, other kids will jump on board.

Coaches get too much credit. The kids can really help sell or destroy the image of the program and often it starts with "whos playing?"

No sense wasting much effort trying to bring them back or trying to run them down to make examples of them, and taking "punishing quitters" too seriously can really come back to bite you.

Football's a tough sport. Just because a kid has talent doesn't mean he likes it or will help your team. Just because one kid quits doesn't mean it's an attack on you. In the end, they don't really owe you a thing so there's no sense treating them as if they do.

Before I got here, we had a kid on the team who wasn't very good and was, evidently, kind of an annoying idiot to boot. He quit in the offseason after an assistant coach told him he sucked. After he quit, the same coach (who's no longer here) went around talking about what a pathetic young man he was for quitting on us.

This kid has a younger brother in 8th grade who's probably the most talented athlete our school would have seen in at least a decade. He's obsessed with football and would have really helped us next year. I say "would have" because he'll be attending a high school 35 minutes away because his family is so upset about what "we" said about his other son.

Our current staff has a policy: if you miss weights or practices because you weren't on the team, you must "make up" EVERY SINGLE ONE of those missed days before you can suit up in a game. This is done to discourage kids from skipping spring ball, weights, and summer practice and then showing up Week 1 expecting to start.

We had kids coming out when school started last year who had never played football before who were head and shoulders above our other players athletically, but were told they wouldn't get to play until the 6th game of the season because of all the practice they "missed." Every one of those kids quit.

Now if they want to come back and play for us next year, they must "make up" every single one of those days, PLUS every day of practice and weights they've missed after they quit. Theoretically, this means they must sit out the entire season before they'll be eligible to play. When they hear that, they don't bother. We have a total of 23 kids in our program and have struggled for years with low numbers.

When I was in HS, my senior year a new coach got a bunch of 11th and 12th graders to come back out who'd quit either after 8th or 9th grade. A bunch of those guys started, played on two of the best teams our school had ever had, and several made All Conference. One became a 2 time All State LB, Conference DPOY, and a Div. 1aa signee.

If a kid's willing to put in the time and work the next year, why not let him earn a shot?

Who's idea was that? The HC doesn't realize this is one reason why your numbers are so low?

How does a kid make up a practice or workout? You might as well just have a rule if you quit, you can never come back, because what you're asking is almost impossible.

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It was the HC's idea.  He feels it's how we make weights, spring ball, etc. important.  Before he took over, there was a big problem at this school with kids, especially the top athletes, waiting until the season started to come out because they didn't want to bother with any offseason work.  He also feels that it's not fair to the kids who do show up and work hard to let others get by without doing the same amount of work.  Our numbers are now about back to where they were before he took over.

A kid makes up a missed practice or workout by doing extra lifts, running, or doing calisthenics at the end.  10 forties or 50 up-downs/jumping jacks=1 make up day.  Kids can do a max of 4 per week until the season starts, then it's a max of 3.  If a kid does attend the weight room at least sparodically without actually "quitting" or going MIA for more than 3 weeks, we'll let him slide on most of his.  If a kid misses a day of practice during the season, he can't make it up and will instead sit out a quarter for each day missed. The big thing is about discouraging quitters and offseason do-nothings.

We actually do have a rule that if a senior quits at any time after the first day of spring practice for any reason then he is not allowed to ever come back.

AFAIK, no one has ever challenged it with them.  As long as we're not being abusive to the kids, ignoring player safety, or letting inappropriate things go on in the locker room/showers (which HAS caused problems here before), they're pretty hands off.

Again, we don't actually enforce it to the letter with a lot of kids, but that's the policy and what we tell the kids.