Advice for Parents with Kids Playing Sports

Casey Bass: Today on ClubHouseGAS, we are at the Fame Football camp where it's all about the kids. And today we talk to the biggest kid of them all, my buddy and a friend of the show, Lomas Brown. Today on ClubHouseGAS, once again, I get to hang out with my hero Lomas Brown. Lomas, thank you so much for joining us buddy. Lomas Brown: Oh! No problem, no problem. Casey Bass: Did you not bring the ring out for the kids today? Lomas Brown: You know what I was in such a rush that the ring got left behind, but make sure the ring would be back. He is disappointed, he didn't come. I will make sure the ring is back. Casey Bass: You are out here with three first round guys. Lomas Brown: Yes. Casey Bass: So the kids -- they don't really know who you are. They are going to be flocking to them, but as soon as you pull their ring out, it's pretty nice of you to do that for Ronnie and Carlos. Now, they will give some attention because if you got that ring the kids could care less, there is no doubt for Ronnie Brown and Carlos Rogers. Lomas Brown: Yeah, you are right. You are right. Casey Bass: I want to talk to you about what's going just today in general. You have got a few kids. You have lived what 60, 75 years now. Lomas Brown: Yeah. Case Bass: So, you've got some experience under your belt and you understand what it's like to point at the highest level of every level. You played in the ACC, you played in the NFL, you have played in the Pro Bowl and in fact, won the Super Bowl. What we are seeing now is, a lot of time it's two extremes, either kids aren't involved at all or it seems like kids may be are too involved. First let's talk about the importance of kids just being involved in the community and being involved in sports. Lomas Brown: Well, I think that's important because again, if you look at a lot of these kids out here, maybe one or two kids out of hundred or two hundred kids, don't get into pros. It just doesn't happen. So what you want to do, you want to make sure these kids are great adults in their community, because most of them are going to end up right back in their community that they were raised in. So you just want to make sure you help these kids to be productive adults, raise good kids, and try to uplift the community. That's what you want to do. You don't want to stress pro football or stress football. You want to stress what these guys can do outside of football. Casey Bass: Alright. So for parents who hear that and then they have got their kid in baseball on Monday, dance class on Tuesday, Church on Wednesday, back to baseball on Thursday, back to dance on Friday and then we are playing games on Saturday and then back in Church on Sunday. Is that healthy or is that takingit too far? Lomas Brown: Well, to me, I don't think that's really healthy and the thing I would encourage a parent to do, if you are a parent that has never played any sports before, seek the advice of somebody that's playing sports. Because like you say, a lot of times, you go overwhelm these kids. You don't want these kids to the point where they are burned out early, then when they get older they don't want to have anything to do with the sport. So I would encourage a parent if you've never played before, get some advice about how much you should put your kids into sporting events. And if you are a parent that's played before then you should really know how much to give your kids, how much your kids can handle. Get advice if you really don't know. Casey Bass: Did you just play football? Was it football all the time for you or you were young age playing the sport. Lomas Brown: No. I played Basketball. I did a little track with the shot put and stuff but football was my main thing. I tried not to overwhelm myself, doing too much and also I have to do that with my nine-year-old son. He is in swimming, he wants to do tennis, he wants to do golf, he wants football. So I am going to have to pull the reins back a little bit on them. I think that's where the parents support to trying to help guide these kids. Casey Bass: So what about kids nowadays? Parents are seeing a 10 or 11-year-old, who is really good at baseball and they stick them in that mold, and they say you are a baseball, that's what we are going to work on and we are seeing specialization with 10-year-olds in one athlete. Lomas Brown: Right. Right. I won't put that. You know the old saying, don't put all your eggs in one basket. Then I would not do that. Let your kids experience all these sports. To me sport is the greatest remedy in the world. You could be having all kind of problems, you come out on any sport fields, let's say any sporting event and your problem seems to dissipate. So to me let the kids go into all different sports. Let them see what they want to go into and maybe there is something else. Maybe they don't want to be a baseball player. Maybe it's something else they want to accomplish. Give them the opportunity to choose what they want to do. Casey bass: Just not all of them at one time, give him a couple days a week just to be a kid. Lomas Brown: There you go. You got to be a kid, you got to run around, jump on the trampoline, squirt guns, and all the things that kids do. Let them be kids. Casey Bass: And where does academics fall into all of this? Lomas Brown: Hey I will tell you what, that's very important because again, sports is just something as a recreational tool, use it as that. But your education, that's something that's going to be there for the rest of your life and that's what you are going to use pretty much everyday, not sports. You are going to use what you have up here. So make sure that is their priority, not sports. Casey Bass: Lomas, thank you so much. We appreciate it, we love you. Here is Lomas Brown, Casey Bass and this is the ClubHouseGas.