They should rename this forum site to be the "Holdback Complaint/Whining Forum". Truly unbelievable how many folks whine about this in every single age group for boys. It does no one any good at all to whine about it unless there is a plan to change to an age based system. In Baltimore, there will always be some kids who started Kindergarten at 6, went to pre-first, or even repeated a middle school grade. Different families have different reasons for doing so and no one should forget that very often those reasons are very valid ones that have nothing to do with size or athleticism. Just hold out a year or two….they will all be in high school and there will no shortage of kids who are bigger than all the holdbacks! Someone should arrange a butt-kicking contest and offer front row seats to all of the whining parents so they can enjoy seeing all of those OH-SO-OLD holdbacks be taken down!
How about a butt kicking contest and we start with you? Stop trying to defend the holdback system and making excuses that blah blah blah lets just wait blah blah blah. If your kid can't cut it playing on age, get him to try harder, not that complicated.
My kid has played up for the last three years and he is absolutely better for it. The point of youth lacrosse, especially at the middle school level, is to prepare kids for what they will see in high school. It is absolutely unrealistic to get your panties in a wad about a kid who is a few weeks or months older than the 9/1 date. I agree with the other comment about the fact that there is no rule that has been broken if kids are completing a pre-first year. They are playing with their class. It's just flat out soft to complain about it.
You miss the point of youth sports. Lacrosse is the only sport that somehow justifies letting a select group of older children play down.
And you talk out of both sides of your mouth.. First you say your son is playing up and everyone else should man up. But for some reason that does not apply to the kids that are the heldback and oldest. Any reason they shouldnt man up?? They are not just older than everyone by a few weeks . They would be only that much older if everyone was born on Sept 1...Most kids are born in the entire 12 month period..So these holdbacks are anywhere from 1-12 months older the majority of kids at the very minimum. With many being 4 to 16 months older.
I think you're misinformed like all of the complainers about holdbacks. Lacrosse is not the only sport. You are comparing club lacrosse to rec basketball, football, etc. Rec lacrosse is age based. Don't say the problem is lacrosse, trying to damage the reputation of the sport I'm assuming your son plays. The proper comparison would be club lacrosse to AAU basketball and Grassroots football and other similar club level leagues (most of which are grade based). If you don't like club lacrosse, move to an aged based league, just like those who prefer rec over AAU or Grassroots football.
Talking about Youth....Soccer with many times more people playing and more popular along with many more opportunities is age base. They have a worldwide age based system that US follows. Competitive Baseball is age base. I dont know what Football u have seen , but all competitive Football in Texas and Florida is Age based along with other states. Grass roots lets several grades compete but you always get to be older one day..
AAU just went to grade base along with age base and it is a complete mess. You think the vitriol is bad here..go to any site discussing this.There are Facebook pages dedicated to restore the system back to age. Several top AAU programs will not compete against other grade base programs.
So just one of your examples is TRYING to go grade base and it is worst than lacrosse due to the participation of many more children.
I am not damaging lacrosse by insisting grade base is wrong at youth level. The damage is coming from a system that allows select certain players to be older than anyone else.Playing down with select kids goes against all youth lacrosse stands for. Doesnt take much Common sense to figure that out.School teams are were you can get your advantage.
