How to be a Basketball Parent
I’ll be honest, I began this piece as a goodbye to basketball scouting.
I am a retired soldier who is finishing up my Master’s of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction and the burden of school work, family, and scouting had begun to be too much. To tell the truth, it is manageable, though. Everything is manageable when you’ve been through the stresses of war and are able to look at life through that lens. The question I find myself wrestling with recently however is whether it is worth it to continue scouting. That’s when I had to sit down and take stock of the good, the bad, and the ugly of what I deal with on a daily basis.
As part of my job, there is a lot of travel. I drive to tiny towns in rural parts of Oklahoma almost weekly. As a relatively new transplant to the “Sooner State,” I often didn’t know most of these towns existed until I get there. I love spending time in little gyms, looking for undiscovered gems, and hopefully getting players recognized for their hard work that wouldn’t be seen otherwise. I am followed on Twitter by hundreds and hundreds of college coaches and the biggest thrill in my life is having a coach reach out about a player that I wrote about, especially when I know that player doesn’t have any offers yet.
The majority of the time that I travel to these towns, I spend as much or more on gas than I make for the article that I write. I made less working for Prep Girls Hoops last year than I do in three months just doing nothing because of my military retirement. I say all of this as a way of showing that this isn’t about money for me. I took this job as a way of continuing to be involved in sports and sportswriting. I continued doing this job because in my first year I was able to directly help at least three players get college scholarships who didn’t have any offers until I wrote about them.
You’re probably asking yourself, “so why the title about basketball parents?” Well, I’ll tell you. You are the reason that I was – and potentially still am – on the verge of quitting. You, basketball parent are the issue. Every time I release new rankings and have to stay off of Twitter for a week because of the vitriol spewed against me. Every time I write anything about the “best” at a certain position, I can count on specific parents coming after me if their child isn’t mentioned. Every time I write about a specific team and don’t mention that specific player, I can count on a message, text, or email from you, basketball parent. So, this message is for you.
The Army spent 14 years instilling values in me that I took to war overseas and brought back home. They are values that I instill in my kids and that I still live my life by to this day. One of the most important of those is selflessness. I don’t live for me. I live to serve. I have already said that I don’t do this to get rich. Some of you would be better served by taking your self out of your daughter’s recruiting. It isn’t about you. Just like the way that everything I write either stated or by omission isn’t about your daughter, her basketball career is not about you. This is her journey and a lot of you would be better served by backing off and enjoying it.
I have spent a lot of time talking to college coaches about you in particular, basketball parent. You’re mad at those schools that aren’t recruiting your daughter despite her stellar averages and how much better – in your eyes, at least – she is than her peers, right? Well, somebody needs to tell you… you are the reason she isn’t being recruited. Basketball at the college level is about building a family and though your daughter can’t choose who is in hers, these coaches can. They aren’t choosing you. They’d absolutely love to have her.
Before you do things like send an angry tweet to the reporter who misquoted her scoring total or send a DM to the guy who ranked her No. 20 instead of No. 1, where you think she belongs, maybe ask yourself what ulterior motives these people have. Did your daughter do something to make them angry and now they’re saying that she averaged 14 a game instead of 15? Not likely. Did she do something to rile them up and it made them want to rank her a lot lower than any outside observer would think she should be, thereby discrediting themselves and their entire rankings just to spite her? I don’t think so. Chances are, the reporter or the guy doing the scouting are simply doing the best they can. Want to reach out and ask them politely for the logic behind the rankings or correct the scoring average through a politely worded email? Go ahead.
The state of Oklahoma is just under 70,000 square miles. Next time you think about sending an angry email to the person doing the rankings, close your eyes and picture the town of Felt in your mind. You probably can’t. It is a town of 90 people located about as far out into the panhandle as you can go before entering New Mexico. But, they have a basketball team. At one time or another, that basketball team has had a prospect on it. To get there from my house, it would cost about $117 in gas for the trip and that is without a hotel room – so, 13 hours of driving in one day. But, because you, basketball parent, expect my rankings to be perfect and have every possible player covered and listed, I guess I need to do that. I mean, you’re just one basketball parent. There could be more basketball parents out there in Felt. You can’t possibly think you and your player are the only ones who matter, right?
While I continue to ponder my future moves, let me go ahead and tell you what you should do with your future. Hopefully, your player isn’t a senior this season and there is still some time to help you do your job of basketball parenting. Lord knows you know how to do mine, so let me return the favor. Sit in the stands. Cheer loudly for your child when they do something well. Cheer for her teammates when they do something well. Cheer for the other team when they do something well. Do not criticize the officials who make as much for a game as I do for an article. They also have no vendettas against your child. Do not criticize the coaches who are just doing the best they can for everyone involved – either in public or in the car on the way home with your player. Again, discourse behind closed doors with the other adult involved is always the best answer.
On social media, send out stats, videos, photos, and accomplishments. We don’t need any of your opinions. DM’s and emails should be limited strictly to updating us on accomplishments and statistics for your child or even other kids who you feel deserve it. Believe it or not, that makes you look pretty good. Occasionally a question is OK if it is worded politely. I have had my eyes opened by them and nobody who works in the public eye should shy away from polite discourse that takes place behind closed doors. Most of all, before you criticize anything written about your child for not being 100% accurate or completely and totally gushing or glowing, ask yourself if the person who wrote it was intentionally trying to do your daughter harm or were they just doing the best they could. As I have said before on Twitter, what good would it do any of us to tear down a team or player from Oklahoma? We are advocates. Not enemies. Just like your kid’s coach, we all want what is best for her.
On the subject of rankings, I don’t mean to downplay their importance, but understand that it is not the be-all and end-all of what it means to be a high school basketball player. It is one scout’s opinion – often with the input of other coaches and scouts – and is the closest approximation of where their talent projects them to end up. Some players may not be there yet, but a professional basketball scout can see where their athleticism, basketball IQ, work ethic, and other factors can get them. We can also see if their family is a hindrance and yes, we do take that into consideration just like college coaches. You have to trust that maybe it is something that the average basketball parent can’t see.
Of course you think your daughter is No. 1. You should! I think my son is No. 1 in everything even when I can see with my own two eyes that he is finishing about 150th in his cross country races. He is my No. 1! Rankings are a list of players for coaches to use as a baseline to get an idea of the players that may be within their range. They do not get players recruited or not recruited. I have told people before, any college coach who would use rankings made by someone else as the absolute, definitive list of players they should and shouldn’t recruit definitely should not be coaching at the college level.
Now, with that being said, is what you are doing hindering your child’s recruiting or helping? Is making people like me want to give it all up going to help your daughter or anyone else in Oklahoma? It’s time for a change and it begins with you, basketball parent.