As a former college coach , not lacrosse, I feel that both perspectives have validity. When we were recruiting watching games we needed to know how the athlete played within a system, what kind of team player he was and how that athlete could contribute to a team. We found that multi sport team athletes had a higher sports iq then single sport athletes. An athlete that can play within a system is usually coachable also. The skills portion of individual workouts were important but has a great flaw. Many many times we saw athletes look like absolute stars when working through skills and drills. These were talented can't miss star type players. However, these same players just had no team iq and shrunk in a game. It was more frequent a player was a little less talentd in drills but a better game performer. It was no easy process and all coaches make mistakes. The one thing that always stood out was speed you can't teach it in any sport.
I'll agree with the speed assessment, definitely true. You couldn't be any more wrong on your other points. Multi-sport athletes are just that, multi-sport athletes. Kids that have different interests, that's it. If two kids are of the same talent, multi-sport has nothing to do with anything. It does not make the kid any better. All you need to do is look at the Thompsons... I assure you, no amount of football or basketball gave those kids the stick skills or lacrosse IQ they have. They had talent, and it was honed for years with constant practice and a love of the game. Hence, they won lacrosse's high honor. This fact is the final nail in the coffin of this silly notion about multi-sport athletes somehow being superior lacrosse players. Once again, no amount of football will give you the skills that these Thompsons have, period, end of story. To dispute this or say otherwise is pure ignorance.
