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Use the Players as Leverage
The title makes me sound like a monster. How can a person who is dedicated to volunteering coaching youth football for free to work with kids even suggest such a thing? How can you a person even suggest using an innocent child?
I have all of these questions and been called every name in the book when I suggest this. My reason I suggest this is because, it works. Yes, in youth football, it really does work.
I have found that in the extreme “bad” parent situation the one thing that has worked 100% of the time is to bench their kid. Nothing shuts up the complainer, criticizer or loud mouth of your youth football coaching quicker than this.
I have bad situations go away, almost instantly, when I benched their kid. Sometimes this is the only thing that works. Yes, you will feel bad and others may make you feel guilty, but this is the right decision to make for the good of the youth football team. It also will make the affected player angry with his parents and they usually tell the parents to knock it off.
This situation is the very extreme but you need to be prepared if things turn ugly while coaching youth football. Unfortunately, bad parents are like the Titanic and what seem like small annoyances become large icebergs making the ship sink fast.
I do believe you need to let the parents know your position at the youth football parent meeting. Do not come off as a jerk; just make it clear this is an option if the rules are not followed.
You do need to talk to the youth football administration first to make sure you have the authority to bench players due to the actions of the parents.
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