Worst Sports Parents?
 

Deadspin wants to know.

Which Sport Produces The Worst Parents?

This would be like associating all writers and their parents with "Idiots", because this one sounds that way.

Sometimes when one is given space to publish articles, it is obvious where there brains are located.

Did you read the article, especially the one about holding in farts?

Football is 7th, behind cheerleading, tennis, gymnastics, hockey, figure skating and BASEBALL ??? This write has no credibility.

I have had umpires ask why I don't work football. But whenever I see a football game, I see some coach/parent berating the side judge on his sideline about a penalty that someone else on the crew made. I'd be calling unsportmanship penalties all game long (since EJ doesn't seem to be an option). I'd wear out my welcome in football officiating very quickly.

I think baseball parents get a bad rap because many umpires put up with their crap too long and parents think that its acceptable. It shouldn't be. I am all for parent involvement and think they should attend little Johnnie's games, but they aren't required to be there and shouldn't be allowed to stay if they can't behave.

I went ahead and moved this because it applies to all sports and we should use this section more.

Problem is, this will probably be the last post for this thread. And I really think it is a baseball issue, since the writer was bashing baseball parents in particular.

The article also talks about cheer parents and hockey parents but I'm not going to make duplicate threads for the others.

This will either gather interest or it won't but it applies across sports.

FWIW, in my experience cheer parents weren't so bad though I never really dealt with them. Fastpitch softball and rec league basketball parents tie for me in being the worst.

Bad sports parents is a universal issue to all sports...I'd also venture to say it's worse in basketball and maybe peewee football since parents tend to be right on top of you.

From what I hear, hockey parents are the worst, at least around here. I think it probably has something to do with the sheer amount of time/money invested in hockey. Skates, uniforms, sticks aren't cheap, especially because most of it has to be replaced often as the kids grow. And ice time isn't cheap either. So you get the "I'm paying $3500/year for my kid to play hockey, so he better be the best, and if he isn't it's the coaches/ref's fault" mentality.

I've never officiated hockey though, so it's just a guess.

Depends where. Anywhere that I've worked, it's been on HS or MS fields where there is a clear separation from the stands and the playing field. I know there are some places that play in city parks that are not like that though.

I'm surprised not much mention has been made of soccer parents. I've read plenty of horror stories about them.

True...I guess my caveat should be peewee football games in which the parents are right on top of the field instead of in seated in a bleacher type setting.

I can't believe that any sport parents (given the opportunity to misbehave) is any worse than another. That is why I like working baseball. I have stopped a game and not allowed it to continue until a forewarned parent is out of sight and earshot. Games are usually much quieter less hostile after. Though the kids aren't asked, I'll bet they enjoy themselves more when mom/dad isn't acting like a tool.

Funny that you say that because I can't count the amount of times that during a basketball game (usually during free throws) I can hear the players, in the lane spaces, talking to each other, complaining about their parents yelling, and actually saying that they wished their parents wouldn't come to the games.

They all are bad. They are all bad because the same thing motivates them. They think that that yelling makes a difference and they think that someone is screwing their kid on some level. Instead of just just watching and enjoying, they yell and scream. I have seen stupid parents in all sports when they get the opportunity to be heard (in their mind). The fans that are the worse are the Pee Wee fans as they usually know little about the game they are yelling about as their kids have not played very long. But this is the case in every sport. When the kids to go HS usually the stupidity subsides a little as they would sound stupid yelling about minor rules that clearly might not apply the older the kids get.

Peace

When our daughter played soccer a lot of parents yelled because they did not know any rules. Since some knew I worked football games they asked me if it was a good call. While I knew some soccer rules I did not know all of them.

I think the problem with youth football parents (and coaches) is that they yell if they think an NFL or NCAA foul should be called. You know ,that wasn't DPI, the pass was uncatchable or that foul is an automatic first down. I call those rules "as seen on TV" since that is where they get them.

I think that's a bigger issue in football...NFHS rules on some things are drastically different from NCAA and the even more so from the NFL. With a sport like basketball...while there are differences between the codes, a majority of the the rules are the same.

Indeed....."HE'S OUTSIDE THE POCKET!!". Heard 6 times in high school games this year (admittedly, JV/Freshmen with less experienced coaches).

I honestly didn't know there wasn't a pocket under NFHS rules...I played high school football in Texas which means NCAA rules. Then again, when I saw the differences between NFHS and NCAA rules like somehow being able to get called for PI for face guarding w/o contact, I was shocked (and that's just some of the IMO stupid rules/interpretations I think NFHS football has).

And it's just getting worse with NFHS eliminating automatic 1st downs on DPI next year.

Many years ago when I still did baseball I was working the field in a high school game between two small private schools in Texas. The assistant coach was also the father of the catcher for the home team. Catcher was having a rough game, several passed balls and Coach Dad was really riding him.. more and more with each miscue.

Finally during one of these dress downs from the dugout catcher stands up, drops all his gear on home plate, pulls off his jersey, and walks away.

Sad.

The younger the kids, the worse the parents. Just like players learn to play, parents learn to behave at about the same pace.

Pee wee hockey coach Martin Tremblay gets 15 days in jail for tripping player - ESPN

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I heard about this on the local sports radio station on the way to work. Seeing the video makes it even more incredulous. I hope this guy gets "tripped" every day of his 15 days in jail.

While I certainly don't defend them, parents yelling at officials is nothing more than parents reacting to something that brings harm to their kids. They like to see their kids succeed in all things that life throws at them, and when they feel someone has caused them to fail, they're going to react, sometimes way over the top. Conversely, if they feel someone causes the opposing team to fail, they're quiet as church mice. :D

That said, I've umpired boys baseball up to the high school level, and now I umpire girls fast-pitch softball up to the NCAAs. By far, the worst parents I've ever seen were the ones in my son's local Little League at games involving 7-8 year-olds in the machine pitch division. To this day, I'm convinced it was because this was the first division of ball where scores and standings were kept, and championship trophies were awarded by the league at the end of the season. Young parents just couldn't handle their first exposure to competitive play. The problem was exacerbated by the fact that the umpires who worked those games were brand new volunteers who didn't have a good grasp of the rules.

As the league UIC, I tried each year to get the league's Board of Directors to change the machine pitch division to a non-competitive environment, where no standings were kept and no post-season championship games were played. I never succeeded. So each season, I had to deal with unruly parents yelling at my new umpires, and actually fighting with each other in the stands. It was unreal.

The only time I've ever had to do something about fans in a basketball game was a 5th/6th grade boys game. We had to have the table crew replaced because the two dads working the clock and book couldn't stop arguing with each other and the coach.

Today, I have some 7th grade YMCA games, we'll see what happens.

Unfortunately that may be a function not so much of learning to behave, but how much they care. The more they care, the more of them will be there, and, there being a fixed percentage of bad sports in any crowd, the more bad sports will be in attendance. As the kids age, the parents stop turning out. When they get up to a certain age, the crowds may increase from people who care more about the game than they do about the players, which probably diminishes the fraction of bad sports.