My son has been exposed to both the volunteer dad during in-house as well as the paid coaches on his tournament team and I agree there are challenges with both. On the "dad" side, being dad's with minimal experience or some LAX experience, the problems do arise having there own child on the team. They are committed, but they have a tendency to overcompensate for there lack of experience and knowledge with to much control and a lot of yelling.
On the flip side with the paid coaches, they seem to focus a lot more on the "team" and less on skills.
my son falls into a grey area being a goalie. His town coaches cannot teach him anything and have even told me they will not try, all they ask is that he shows up to play which he does and does quite well. Most of the time i end up running on the field to warm him up as well.
On the tourney team, it seems to unfortunately be very similar and all the money i am paying to these high prices "experts" doesn't do much for my kid. a couple of them are hall of fame goalies and again, they are now hired to just coach the team so the individuals do not seem to get the help they need. Oh, i can pay extra for there private time, but i think i am already paying enough I end up doing a lot of drills with him in the back yard in our own cage from videos on youtube from the major colleges. heck, maybe i should be a coach as i am running better drills than the guys i am paying......
So its a problem to say the least..... i have guys who can't coach him and won't try vs. the guys who can coach him and don't want to.....
I agree with your assessment that many of the volunteer town coaches(dad's) don't have the skill set to teach your child everything he needs to know and that is why many people seek better coaching in a travel program. My point was if you are picking a travel team, I have had a much better experience when I have gotten a coach with a child on the team. If that coach was a player great. If he wasn't that doesn't mean he has not learned the game or doesn't have the ability to coach the team. The comment from another poster was "Stay Away" from a coach that never played lax. As you can see, many of these programs are business first, develop the kids second. There are progams out there with excellent VOLUNTEER coaching and because they are invested in the team(their child) you will get all the extra practice time etc..without having to mortgage your house to do it! Keep working with your son like you are doing. That is where he will improve the most!
