The Increasing Complexity of Sports in Custody Cases
On December 8, an article appeared by Sports Commentator Dan Orlovsky expressing concerns about the future of youth amateur sports. The former pro quarterback who now is featured on ESPN concludes that youth sports in American is “completely broken.”
Family lawyers have been on the front line of this for some time. One of the issues we commonly see when families split is controversy over child rearing decisions. And one big decision that takes in physical health, emotional health and family finance today centers on youth sports participation.
This writer grew up in a world where there was only one sport available before middle school. It was Little League baseball. It was for boys only and it lasted about eight weeks each Spring. Everyboy was eligible to play, regardless of skill and the concept was to encourage athletic activity and team building. Every kid had to play two innings. That was long ago.
Today, youth sports is a $40 billion industry projected to reach $70 billion by year 2030. If that proves accurate Americans will spend an average of $800 per child per year for sports activities. And that includes all kids from infants to high school seniors. The costs don’t stop there. I just ran into a client and his 17 year old daughter who is something of a volleyball phenom. She just had shoulder surgery; a cost that probably is not included in the category termed youth sports.
Earlier this year, I went to a Penn State college football game. Part of the discussion in the stands concerned what players on the field had “financial packages” and how you manage a “team” in a world where the player standing next you is playing with “benefits” while you are not.
For just about every parent youth sport is and always has been a cost of parenthood. You stand on the sidelines and hope good things happen and no harm is done. But, today, many of your fellow parents aren’t just emotionally invested in the outcome, they are paying for coaches, physical and psychotherapists in addition to team enrollment, equipment and travel expenses. These parents will tell family lawyers that these are “investments” which can lead to college scholarships. And today, we have a new entrant to the money wars. Students can sell their names, images and likenesses (NIL) without violating the rules of amateur status. Colorado Quarterback Shedeur Sanders is reputed to have an NIL value exceeding $5 million and a Louisiana State gymnast, Livy Dunne, just sponsored her team’s Christmas party with some of her $4 million in NIL funding.
In family law the battle typically breaks down by gender. The moms worry about injuries-often with good reason. The danger of CTE injury in football is well known but this month has brought reports that ice hockey players are also showing high rates of CTE. They seem to have a better grasp of how difficult it is to navigate from varsity high school to varsity college and beyond. But fathers love parenting through sports. As Mr. Orlovsky notes, they elevate the Saturday night lights of a game in Scranton to an appearance of the pitch at Wembley Stadium and coach children as if they have hired professionals. The kids get stressed if they fail to achieve in ways that correspond to their parents’ emotional and financial investment. Often, children grasp when they have maxed out their skills when their parents assume they have more to give. In 2016 I testified before the Pennsylvania legislature on a family law reform bill. The man testifying before me was a father who had put $30,000 on his credit cards to underwrite his child’s sports. He thought these expenses should be regularly allocated should parents separate and divorce. His wife was not there to present her side of things, but, as a family lawyer on both sides of the question, I could have done the job for her.
As amateur athletics becomes more and more monetized on both the expense and income side of life, children are feeling the stress. Some of it is criticism over whether the kid gave his all in the last inning he pitched. Some of it is listening to parents quarrel over the cost of the annual summer voyage to the Field of Dreams in Cooperstown or whether the child is displaying signs of a concussion en route home.
The point of the Orlovsky article is that what used to be a couple hours allocated to a physical game has been transformed into an emotional and financial mission with explicit targets. Yes, Junior’s team won the game, but he only had one hit in three at bats or only gained 3 yards per carry. The team won but the kid failed in the mission for free college or college + a $150,000 NIL package.
Courts can’t cope with this. Concussions occur in almost all sports. How is a court to weigh the risk versus the opportunity which amateur athletics can offer? Yet, every day custody litigants want courts to decide whether a child should continue to play or how much each parent should contribute to extracurricular activities. But the more trenchant observation is that kids are having trouble dealing with these now high stakes controversies.
Meanwhile, if you think your kid can make the climb, here are the most recent data;