Today's Athlete vs Us Oldtimers

I took this from part of a post that Braves had on one of our other threads and got me thinking...

What is different today versus when we were playing? True, we didn't play the sport "year round" but we did play the sport that was in season...so we never really had any down time.

What is different with todays Athlete...would like to hear your opinions

 

Well, my first thought is we were better looking with our sideburns, fu manchu's and wool uniforms

 

Dbacks20

You're correct about the fact that a lot of kids played 2 or 3 sports. But the big difference I see is that most of those games were local and at least not overnighters. A boy playing travel ball now spends a good bit of time on the road for the entire weekend. This requires a higher level of commitment in my mind, than giving up the Friday under the lights.

 

Braves...you're right on...but something more than the obvious.

 

Yankees, I hear what you're saying....but if you weren't playing you were still practicing or working out everyday.

 

Today vs Yesterday

We were working out back then, but I think the level of training and sport specific coaching and instructing alot of kids get today is much greater than what we had back in our days.

We do need to bring back stirrup socks for baseball. The sideburns, I can live without them, but every kid should have to play at least one basketball game in the smooth 80's high cut huggers.

 

Obviously I can't speak for everyone, but where I grew up in the late 60's in Miami Florida we usually had weekends off in high school atheletics. Atleast the high schools I was familiar with in Dade County. You had some down time to just goof around and be a kid with your friends. Yes the kids have fun when they are on the road for a tournament in whereever, but they also don't have the kind of free time I had as an high school athlete. College was all together a different animal for me.

Obviously we had different experiences - but my son definitely spent more time playing baseball than I did.

 

Man...that's why all of the girls would come to the games.

I agree about the sport specific training. It's much better now. The other thing is that back when I played coaches never made a big deal about weight lifting....stretching and running, yes, ad nauseum.

I would say overall coaching is better now...but not game time coaching. The old school coaches could outfox any of these new guys...and could motivate with the best of 'em.

 

Whoa yankee...I didn't know that. So, you were in Miami when Kendall was just a forest of trees, Cocoant Grove was cool before it was chic and Collins Ave was "oye vay"

Wow...I bet you had a lot of fun

 

We played ALL sports....

IMO, generally speaking, we were better ATHLETES back then....played multiple sports, depending on the seasons. In my heart, I still hate fall baseball....it ruined Pop Warner football!

The kids today are much better players, but they are mostly single-sport specialists. They are bigger, stronger, and faster, but in my heart, I still think it's wrong to have 7-8-9 year old kids that only play baseball all year round. Kills my soul....guess I'm just bitter because nobody figured out how to play football in the spring!

My passion is the pigskin....I played baseball because girls liked baseball pants! I played basketball and wrestled just to stay in shape in the winter. (BTW, girls don't like wrestling singlets!) Kids today usually don't play them all....very few kids today letter in 3 sports.