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There is no other endeavor where so many children are governed by unrelated adults without any common minimum standards of health, safety, practice or conduct as there are in organized, non-school youth sports. Organized and community-based youth sports have become an important part of the fabric of family life for millions of New Yorkers, and more than ever are the sole source of a child’s physical activity and their memory of this time in their lives.
by Stephanie Smith
CNN
February 5, 2010
For more than 20 years, former San Francisco 49ers lineman George Visger has lived his life out of hundreds of small yellow notebooks. In them he scrawls the minutiae of his daily life: "4:45 am left house. 2 stops to find coffee and a roll. Paper work till 9:25. 10:05 Ed called."
The notebooks are the last vestige of his memory.
"I always have them. They sit in my back pockets," said Visger, 51. "The movie '50 First Dates,' this has been my life for 28 years. I get up in the morning and I have no clue what I have to do that day. If it's not written down it doesn't exist."
Visger said his memory began fading in 1982. During his brief, injury-shortened career playing for the 49ers, he said, a jarring tackle caused a concussion.
"I went into a coma and almost died," said Visger. "At one point I was given last rites."
It was the culmination of a life using his head -- to tackle -- that almost killed Visger. His is one of several cases of ex-NFL athletes struggling with memory loss, depression and sudden, frightening bouts of rage. Experts believe the reason for the brain damage is concussion.
by Staff
Around the Rings
February 8, 2010
The first edition of the Africa Youth Games host contract between the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA) and the Local Organising committee represented by the Morrocco National Olympic Committee and the Ministry of Sports was singed on Wednesday 3 February at Atlas Hotel in casablanca, Morrocco.
The games are targeting young Africans athletes (boys and girls) aged between 15 and 17 years. The Games will be held from May 9th to 15th 2010 in Rabat.
14 sports desciplines will be on the programme: Athletics, Basketball (3 vs 3), Boxing, Fencing, Football, Gymnastics, Judo, Rowing, Swimming, Table Tennis; Taekwondo, Tennis and Wrestling. Exceptionnally, 2 sports: Swimming and Gymnastics will be hosted in Casablanca.
by Express-Times staff
Lehigh Valley Live
February 02, 2010
WARREN COUNTY, NJ -- A shoving match that ensued when an angry parent charged a coach at a youth wrestling tournament at Belvidere High School has officials from the Tri-County Youth Wrestling League looking to speak with witnesses as well as the parties involved.
According to police, Robert Spezza, of Liberty Township, allegedly assaulted Dan Shamsudin, a coach with Parsippany PAL, after the Redhawks had defeated Hackettstown 80-0 in a midget wrestling match.
"This guy went crazy, trampled one of our kids and sent him to the hospital," Dan Shamsudin's brother, Sharif Shamsudin, said.
Spezza, 40, reportedly accused coach Shamsudin, 28, of using delay tactics during the match then came out of the bleachers and knocked him to the gymnasium floor.
by Peter Schworm
Boston Globe
January 9, 2010
Board members are squabbling over league rules, and jockeying for control. Managers are allegedly stockpiling talent in the minor leagues. Lawyers are involved.
No, this isn't another labor dispute in Major League Baseball. This contentious state of affairs comes courtesy of Little League - ages 9 to 12.
The Parkway Little League - one of the state's oldest leagues, known in Boston as an intensely competitive winning machine - is awash in controversy, beset by bitter disputes over how the 14-team league is run and who should run it. The infighting has dragged on for months, delayed league elections and the annual player draft, and resulted in the league's charter being suspended amid allegations that it has run afoul of a host of Little League rules.
The strife, many say, is fallout from the often hypercompetitive culture of youth sports, the latest example of intensely involved parents turning a beloved childhood game into a bureaucratic brawl.
"You know how adults can be in these situations. They're worse than the kids,'' said Steve Barr, media relations director for Little League International in Williams port, Pa. "In this case, things kind of snowballed and got out of control. It was adults bickering more than anything else.''
by John McGourty
NHL.com
February 5,2010
Former Phoenix Cardinals running back Tony Jordan is one of the top athletes that Rochester, N.Y., has produced. He was a high-school All-American at East High, went to Kansas State on a full scholarship and earned All-Conference status.
Jordan has met many of the most famous athletes and celebrities in North America, but he's looking forward to this weekend when he'll meet a sports pioneer, Willie O'Ree, who became the first black to play in the National Hockey League when he broke in with the Boston Bruins in 1958.
"I'm excited about this opportunity because it's not too often you get to meet someone who is an important part of sports history," said Jordan, now a manager with the City of Rochester Recreation Department. Jordan's involvement goes far beyond the job. The Tony Jordan Sports Foundation helps the city assist over 4,000 youths participate in organized, non-scholastic, volunteer-led, sports activities.
"The buzz in Rochester is great and the kids at the two schools he'll visit are very excited," Jordan said. "It's Black History Month and Willie is a part of black history. The adults get as excited as the kids and there are adults here that remember him playing in the NHL.
"Willie was here in 2002 and I've heard from people who met him then. They can't stop talking about him because he made such an impact. He's a great people person and he made a great impression. One guy showed me the picture that he had taken with Willie O'Ree and the Bruins playing card that Willie signed."
O'Ree will be in Rochester this weekend as the guest of Genesee Valley Youth Hockey, a volunteer-led program that provides free weekly hockey instruction and equipment to a group of about 80 Rochester children at the Genesee Valley Park Sports Complex Ice Skating Rink. O'Ree will visit two schools on Friday and visit with the Rochester Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired.
Baseball in China has been hard hit by the sport's removal from the Olympics but the Yankees also brought some good news with them when it was confirmed that the Beijing Games stadium would be rebuilt in the southeastern port city of Xiamen.
"We feel it is a great opportunity here in China to continue to grow the game of baseball," Brian Cashman, general manager of Yankees, told a news conference.
"And hopefully one day a citizen of China will participate and help a Major League Baseball team win a world championship, just like many members who have already done so from other countries now."
Despite Premier Wen Jiabao being a fan and its overwhelming popularity in Taiwan, baseball is a distant second to the hugely successful NBA in the ranks of American sporting exports to China.
The loss of Olympic status after the 2008 Beijing Games was a big blow as China's state sports system focuses almost all of its energy and cash on success in Olympic sports.
The Yankees are doing their best to help out and created a partnership with the Chinese Baseball Association (CBA) three years ago, the first between the CBA and an MLB club
by Maureen Nolan
Syracuse Post-Standard
February 04, 2010
Roland Grimes moved away from Central New York a few years ago, but he's reaching back to help organize a town hall meeting about ethics and accountability in sports.
Its particular focus is on sports and youth in the black community. He wants to get local people talking about the subject.
The idea is for the town hall, scheduled for Feb. 24, to bring together all facets of the community involved in youth sports, for instance parents, coaches, trainers and educators, for a discussion. Grimes said organizers do not yet have a time and location for the meeting.
He played football for Syracuse University in the 1980s and lived in the area for years, during which he was active in a number of ventures. In 2007, he moved to the Washington, D.C. area, where he is currently the director of guidance and counseling at Bishop McNamara High School in Forestville, Md.
Grimes is working with a colleague and former Orange football player, Bryce K. Bevill, to organize the forums in several cities, including Washington, D.C. They've written a book about youth, sports and development, with a focus on black youth.
C.W. Post News
February 2, 2010
BROOKVILLE, N.Y - C.W Post in co-sponsorship with C.W Post Student - Activities, the East Coast Conference, and Long Island Women's Institute is proudly celebrating the 24th Annual National Girls & Women in Sports Day on Tuesday Feb. 2 in the Hillwood Commons Lecture Hall from 6-7 PM.
Special guest speakers will include Assistant Commissioner of the Northeast Conference Joyce Bell, Associate Director of Athletics at Columbia University Jacqueline Blackett, Director of Athletics at St. Francis College Irma Garcia, Director of Women's Basketball Ops at Rutgers University Michelle Edwards, along with Lisa White Head Athletic Trainer for The New York Liberty.
by Tina Szybisty
Ann Arbor Health News - Examiner.com
February 2, 2010
ACL stands for Anterior Cruciate Ligament and it links the femur (large bone in upper leg) to the tibia (bones in lower leg) by running crosswise inside the center of the knee joint. The ACL is one of four ligaments that help stabilize knee movement.
As recently reported on WXYZ news, these types of injuries are on the rise in youth girls (as much as eight times more than males). They tend to be caused by pivoting movements and landing from a jump.
According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control), "nearly 30,000 girls age 19 and younger suffered ACL injuries that required surgical repair in 2006." It's felt that girls are not equipped for the vigorous training that is often expected of them at this age because their bodies are building fat while boys are building muscle. This is due to the nature of their hormones; testosterone vs. estrogen. Girls bodies are building fat stores around the crucial, growing reproductive organs and her ligaments become more relaxed and therefore, more susceptible to injury.
It's also felt that a girl's wider pelvic structure causes a steeper angle on the connecting ligaments in this area.
by Kay Lazar
Boston GLobe
February 2, 2010
There was the nasty concussion Ben Price suffered from an eighth-grade skiing accident. Then the countless jarrings from wrestling and baseball. By senior year, he was plagued by nagging headaches after football practices at Wayland High School.
His mother, Wendy Price, did not connect the incidents until a chance conversation last year with another parent at a youth soccer game. That parent, Dr. Ann McKee, is studying a form of early dementia that was once thought to develop primarily in boxers. Now McKee and her colleagues think the disease may be silently destroying the brains of athletes in a variety of sports after years of repetitive blows to the head.
"You don't know who is going to be the unlucky one,'' said Price, who asked McKee to speak at a forum in Wayland.
The turnout - 200 parents, coaches, and students attended - was a sign of the success of the nation's first center to study chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE. Created by McKee and three partners 17 months ago at Boston University Medical School, the center has quickly spread awareness about the dangers of repetitive head injuries, largely by targeting the National Football League.
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