I actually feel bad for this kid. I feel for any little kid being pushed into tackle football at a young age. It's needless and reckless but this is some shameful **** going on.
This father is clearly living through his kid. Only thinking about attention and short term gains. He's contacting anyone with an email, Twitter, IG, Facebook and begging for attention.
And the problem is none of this is real. Like the kid is a decent little player but he doesn't look "special" if we're being objective and brutally honest. He's very good but anyone who knows anything about sports, football. Knows what's, what.
Some younger kids standout but most if not all catch up by HS. This kid is in the 3rd grade lol what do you seriously think you can tell at that age? 1)Football doesn't have prodigies that young. 2)You don't need to play football at a young age to be good later. It can actually hurt you. Even in HS you have to dominate. If you do there's a good chance you'll dominate in college if you're truly a cut above but kids are kids at that age.
I mean to each their own but there's no advantage or benefit to playing football that young. Again it can hurt you with injuries, concussions etc and football probably has the worst coaching out of the main sports at that level. One of the reasons is football isn't a "skill" game besides QB. The saying "you can't make the club from the tub" is truest in football. Hockey is a skill sport. Baseball is a skill sport. Basketball especially nowadays. You have guys like Benn (hockey) who come on late but these kids are absolutely next level skilled by 16-18 yo.
Football, save for QB. You need to be really really ****in tough and a little nuts. Durability, mental/physical toughness, pain tolerance and on are all more important than "skills."
Ofc all players need technique, nuance to their game but it's simply not as important than being a ****in savage. Genes > skills in football save QB. Pass rushers need to use stride length and hand work, OL need to use feints and footwork. WR need to understand leverage blah blah blah. It's not as important as being a physical specimen that can handle and dish out tremendous amounts of pain.
Point is you can work on catching, do all the drills you want but you're not transforming yourself into a 6'4/240 badass that can run, hit, catch going 20 mph and jumping almost 40 inches. You're born with 99.99999% or you're not.
The kid is a stud and should be proud of himself! He's handling himself well considering his father is pimping him out. I just hate how the dad is handling this. Colleges aren't inviting him in bc hes a real prospect. They're getting paid and pub from it. I'm not hating on the kid at all. I just hope he's not burnt out by 16 and is footballs Conner Bedard (hockey phenom) but I have my doubts. This stuff is made up by a higher power and the kid themselves. Parenting only goes so far and this type ain't it. He's putting a target on his child in one of the more physical sports ever. Even today football is brutal. I hope his kid has others around him looking out for his best interest.
