Youth sports have become somewhat of a circus. There are elite teams and traveling teams and tryouts, and double headers. Parents’ entire weekends (and weekday nights!) are dedicated to sports for their kids! And parents get into it. How many videos have you seen on TikTok of parents getting into literal fistfights at sporting events for their kids? It’s never, ever that serious, and yet, I’ve even caught myself yelling on the sidelines of my daughter’s youth soccer games. Spoiler alert: she’s six! I was being over the top!
Thankfully, I realized that I was acting totally and completely unhinged on my own. Some parents need a helpful reminder from others — like their kids’ coaches.
In a now viral Instagram video, youth volleyball coach Katelyn Sallee has a very serious and important conversation with her player’s parents. Basically, they need to be supportive or STFU on the sidelines.
“There’s a lot of coaching happening on the sidelines,” the coach and club director for FCA Force Volleyball in Northern Kentucky says in her video.
She imitates some of the sounds and comments she hears from parents from the sidelines. She explains to the parents that she knows those cheers and comments are “all just investment,” however, the players are not having it.
“They need their mom and their dad just going, ‘Heck yeah, good effort. Get the next one!’ They need more of that. So keep the energy high, I’m not gonna ever shut that down. I need it, I’ll even say more, I ask for it sometimes, but just make sure it’s focused on the right things. Can we do that? All right, I love you big time!”
In her caption, she explained more about why these kinds of conversations are important.
“❗Hard Conversation❗At one of our tournaments this year, a couple of my former high school players came to support us. As they sat in the stands, they noticed how engaged our parents were—lots of cheering, encouragement, and yes… some sideline ‘coaching’ and frustration too. Without me asking, they pulled me aside to express concern,” she explained.
“They remembered what it felt like to be young, learning the game, and feeling that pressure from the bleachers—when what they really needed was freedom, support, and trust.”
She continued, “As a coach—and a parent—I get it. It’s hard to sit back. We want our kids to succeed, and it’s easy to let emotion take the wheel. But if we really care about their growth—not just as athletes but as people—we have to protect their space to learn, to fail, to be coached, and to try again. FCA FORCE parents sign agreements for how we operate as a team, but agreements only matter when we create moments of real check-in and honest accountability. This wasn’t an easy conversation to have, but it was necessary—and we pursued it with love because that’s what’s best for everyone involved.”
Oh boy, we love it when a youth sports coach gentle-parents a bunch of enthusiastic sports parents!
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