Amanda Mericle

If I told you someone scored a touchdown and a homerun in the same week you wouldn’t believe me because today athletes are focused on one sport, especially at the professional level. However, one man, Deion Sanders, was able to participate in football and baseball at the professional level and complete this feat of athleticism. He is also the only man to play in both the Super Bowl and the World Series. Sanders is not alone in his support of multi-sport participation as many other professional athletes in the past and present have played multiple sports. There are even more examples of multi-sport athletes at the college level, and a few schools have even begun to encourage the participation in multiple sports. Athletes who participate in multiple sports are able to experience different environments, develop better skills, and maintain a passion for the game. There are several benefits to participating in multiple sports so why do many athletes, coaches, and parents still believe focusing on one sport is the best option?

I will first need to define a few technical terms central to my thesis. The following definitions are taken from Merriam-Webster Dictionary and Medscape, a medical dictionary. An athlete is “a person who is trained or skilled in exercises, sports, or games requiring physical strength, agility, or stamina” (“Athlete”). An overuse injury, otherwise known as cumulative trauma disorder, is “described as tissue damage that results from repetitive demand over the course of time” (Laker). Burnout is “exhaustion of physical or emotional strength or motivation usually as a result of prolonged stress or frustration” (“Burnout”). Cross-training means “to engage in various sports or exercises especially for well-rounded health and muscular development” (“Cross-training”).

Forty years ago, high school athletes were striving to letter in multiple sports before their senior year. If you were able to letter in three sports as a sophomore or even a freshman, you were at the top of your class. Playing a varsity sport in high school was the pinnacle of many athletes’ careers and only a few went out for sports at the collegiate level. Outside of school-sponsored sports, there were not many other opportunities for athletes. Summer leagues did exist but they were not as competitive as they are now and there were no travel teams. The idea of dropping a sport to focus on a single sport never crossed an athlete’s mind and athletes did not quit a sport unless they were injured. They played sports because they loved the thrill they got and it was a way to spend time with friends. Back then, the emphasis was not placed on which travel teams got you the best exposure for college but it was on how many different sports you could play during high school. Over the past forty years, the trend of sport specialization has been rising, and the age at which athletes specialize has been getting younger and younger (Wojtys).

Today, we see athletes dropping all sports but one at alarming young ages. There are instances where kids start focusing on one sport as young as six or seven. We see this through the rise of travel teams geared towards children of these ages. This is alarming because when I think of six and seven-year old kids I think of kids like my brother, who is eight. He spends a majority of his time outside riding his bike or kicking around a soccer ball just like he should be doing as an eight-year old kid. However, not all eight-year old kids are like my brother and they spend a majority of their time focusing on a single sport, often not even by their own choice. Children should not have to cope with the pressure of succeeding at a single sport when they are this young. Even high school students should not feel pressured to solely focus on one sport but at least at an older age they can begin to make decisions for themselves. This is one of the reasons why we see many athletes suffer from “burnout,” which was not an issue forty years ago. Many athletes who have been focusing on one sport their entire lives since they were young lose the joy and passion they once had for the game. The six and seven-year old children who were put on a club soccer team fail to see the point of playing once they reach high school because it may not have been their idea in the first place and they have not been able to get this across to their parents before. Some athletes decide to specialize in one sport even before high school in order to achieve greater levels of skill and move on to the next level. Others even bypass school sports altogether and focus on travel teams such as the year-round Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) or move to different cities and live with sponsor families so they can be exposed to better opportunities for their chosen sport. However, by doing this, these young athletes center their entire lives around a single sport and miss out on other opportunities around them like making memories other friends. By playing multiple sports, athletes do not always have to be around the same people and they can decide if they even want to specialize at all. Many kids decide to play sports just for the fun of it rather than play with the weight of others’ expectations on them (Wojtys).

It is important for us to encourage our athletes to participate in multiple sports because they will have many benefits as a result. Encouraging our athletes can be helpful for their overall happiness, health, and skill. Specializing on one sport puts not only physical pressure on an athlete but also emotional pressure. Oftentimes, specializing leads to a more controlled career for an athlete. It is not the athletes controlling their careers and focusing on what they love but the parents and coaches telling the athletes what they think is best for them. This leads to the athlete losing his passion and love for the game, especially if he has specialized at a young age. By playing multiple sports when they are younger, athletes have the opportunity to experience different sports and choose which ones they enjoy playing instead of being encouraged to focus on one sport at a young age and never getting the chance to experience anything different. My thesis is relevant because it will help people understand the benefits of playing multiple sports and why our society should encourage the participation in multiple sports. Encouraging this participation benefits athletes but it is not only athletes who should care because anyone who cares about the wellbeing of children should be an advocate for this cause. It has been proven by studies that young athletes who participate in multiple sports experience fewer injuries. Also, multi-sport athletes develop different relationships with teammates because they move from team to team. Playing multiple sports also increases a child’s wellbeing because he is able to determine what he does and does not like without being influenced by what his parents decide what sport they want him to play. Simply the reasoning of overuse injuries and psychological pressure should be enough to convince any person that multiple sport participation is the moral choice.

In order to prove it is beneficial for athletes to play multiple sports, I will confirm three arguments: playing multiple sports decreases the risk of serious injury, cross-training improves an athlete’s overall skill, and college recruiters look for multi-sport athletes rather than single-sport athletes. I will then refute two counterarguments: it is necessary for athletes to follow the 10,000-hour rule for better results and single-sport athletes will experience greater success, as shown by their skill level, as well as a longer career in their chosen sport.

My first argument is playing multiple sports is beneficial to athletes because it decreases their risk of serious injury. A myth has been spread that specialization in one sport is the best option for athletes who wish to continue their athletic career at higher levels. However, this is simply not the truth, especially in an athlete’s younger years. The types of injuries most prevalent in single-sport athletes are overuse injuries. These types of injuries occur because these athletes are repeating the same motions over and over again. There is no change in the athletes’ movements so the same muscles and joints are being used every time they play.

Two examples of an overuse injury are shoulder injuries and Tommy John injuries, which are common in throwing sports such as baseball or softball and cause serious problems for an athlete. These types of injuries can lead to issues down the road and can severely hinder an athlete in his later adult years (Andrews 98). Tommy John injuries are especially dangerous because the MLB and other baseball organizations have been lulled into a false sense of security that after receiving Tommy John surgery, an athlete will make a full recovery and experience no further issues. In 2014 alone, more pitchers underwent Tommy John surgeries than during the entire decade of the 1990s. A recent survey found that twenty-five percent of MLB pitchers have had Tommy John surgery and some have even had second and third surgeries. Why would pitchers need to go back to receive further operations on their elbow if the surgery is “successful”?

One such athlete who underwent two Tommy John surgeries is Jarrod Parker, a pitcher for the Oakland Athletics. In 2016, thirteen months after receiving his second surgery, Jarrod was pitching in a game when he experienced a sharp pain in the area of his elbow that had been operated on. Parker also experienced immediate swelling in his elbow and trainers soon discovered he had fractured his elbow. Jarrod Parker underwent surgery to repair his elbow but has recently decided to retire from baseball. He was only twenty-nine and still had a promising future ahead of him. Even though coaches, parents, and athletes have this example, and many others, to look at, they still believe Tommy John surgery will actually make an elbow stronger and give an athlete the ability to throw harder. However, analysis of pitchers after they have undergone surgery has shown performance declines in speed and accuracy and getting the surgery may not even get an athlete back to the performance level he was at before the injury. Only eighty percent of pitchers who receive the treatment get back to where they were and sixty-seven percent keep playing for more than one season after the first surgery. The Tommy John surgery also involves great risk because there is a complication rate of twenty percent. Ulnar nerve injury, factures, and infection are very common after the procedure. Also, the recovery time spans from twelve to eighteen months with nearly a year of intense physical therapy until an athlete can return to fast-speed pitching. Even Tommy John himself took nearly three years to return to pitching.

After undergoing this surgery, athletes are not good to go. Of the pitchers who receive first-time Tommy John surgery, twenty-five percent need additional procedures, thirty-four percent experience shoulder injuries, and fifty-seven percent return to the disabled list at least one more time. Experts agree that the best way to avoid these problems is to never need the surgery in the first place. The way they suggest to accomplish this is to play multiple sports so an athlete is not throwing year-round and his arm can be given a break (Monto).

A study done at Ohio State University found athletes who specialized early, high school aged and younger, experienced a higher rate of adult physical activity than those who played multiple sports (O’Sullivan). Athletes can avoid worrying about how their bodies will hold up in the later years by rotating the sports they play. This will give overused muscles, normally muscles around the joint areas, a break while still enabling the athlete to remain active and in shape.

Because playing multiple sports decreases the risk of injury, an athlete will also be less likely to experience a season-ending, or potentially career-ending, injury such as the injury Jarrod Parker experienced. Dr. Neeru Jayanthi of Loyola University found in a study of 1200 athletes, athletes who specialized were 70-93 percent more likely to be seriously injured than athletes who played multiple sports (O’Sullivan). Athletes who only participate in a single sport dedicate all their time to one sport, so their muscles are not able to rest, which leads to injuries like stress fractures and muscle tears. These types of injuries are not so bad when given time to heal but oftentimes single-sport athletes do not allow enough time for their injuries to heal and the same muscles are being overworked. Oftentimes, a single-sport athlete will injure himself and start working the same injured muscles too soon because he either injured himself during the season and tries to play too soon or he uses the injured muscle while training during the off-season. A single-sport athlete is more susceptible to overuse injuries because he performs the same movements day in and day out and the same muscles never get a break. A multi-sport athlete is able to give his muscles a break because different sports require different movements which means different muscles will be used each season.

Cross-training helps to heal overuse injuries because as an athlete moves to his next sport, he will likely not be working the same exact muscles which allows him to not aggravate muscles which may have been overworked the previous season. Single-sport athletes injure themselves and never have a chance to recover because they are competitively participating in their chosen sport all year long. This statistic from Loyola University that single-sport athletes are seventy to ninety percent more likely to be seriously injured than multi-sport athletes should be a wake-up call to all athletes and coaches and parents to push for multi-sport participation (O’Sullivan).

Another statistic is the amount of Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) tears among athletes, especially female athletes. When compared to male athletes, female athletes are about two to ten times more likely to experience an ACL tear because of the differences in how the bodies of men and women are made. A factor that contributes to females being more likely to tear their ACL is anatomy. In women’s bodies, the intercondylar notch, a groove at the bottom of the femur where it meets the knee, is much smaller than in men’s bodies. Because the notch is narrower, this restricts the movement of the knee, especially when an athlete is making twisting movements. Women also have wider hips than men which affects the alignment of the knee and makes women more prone to knees moving inwards, which puts stress on the ACL. Another factor is the gender difference when looking at biomechanics. Women’s knees tend to be more flexible than men’s which means it is easier for females to hyperextend or strain their knee and surrounding muscles and tendons. Also, women’s hips and upper leg muscles are not as strong as men’s so when force is exerted through jumping or changing direction, more of the force is absorbed through the knee rather than through the surrounding muscles. The last factor that helps explain why females have a higher tendency to tear their ACL is hormones. Although scientists do not understand the correlation between ACL tears and hormones, some studies have found that females have a higher risk of experiencing an ACL injury during their menstrual cycle and seem to be more susceptible to injury during the first part of their cycle (DeVries).

The rate at which these injuries occur among female athletes who specialize, especially in soccer, is increasingly higher than those who choose to participate in multiple sports (Gotlin 214). A study done at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health found athletes who specialized in one sport were fifty percent more likely to experience a lower-extremity injury, an injury defined as an injury to the lower musculoskeletal system, than athletes who participated in multiple sports. These types of injuries include ACL tears (Rerjck). Continuing to specialize in one sport also leads to further ACL tears and other knee-related injuries (Gotlin 214).

My second argument is multi-sport participation is beneficial because cross-training improves an athlete’s all-around skill. Experts suggest playing multiple sports builds up different muscles and produces an all-around better athlete. Most athletes have a sport they have decided is their favorite; however, this does not mean playing other sports will hurt their abilities in their top sport. Many athletes play a different sport in their offseason and develop skills that complement their primary sport. For example, if a football player plays basketball in his offseason, the hand-eye coordination developed in basketball will help him when he starts up football again. One athlete who is an example of this is Clayton Richard, a veteran pitcher for the San Diego Padres. He never solely focused on baseball. Richard was a three-sport athlete at McCutcheon High School and excelled at baseball, basketball, and football. He remarked, “It was a tremendous benefit. If I had picked one in high school, I don’t know that I’d still be playing.” The skills he developed in basketball and football, such as hand-eye coordination and footwork, aided his baseball abilities and enabled him to become a star pitcher for a professional baseball team (King).

My third argument is athletes should play multiple sports because college recruiters look for multi-sport athletes rather than single-sport athletes. The goal of any athlete who is serious about his sport is to get recruited by a college after high school. The best way for an athlete to accomplish this is to participate in multiple sports because many coaches, college and professional, look for athletes who have had experience in multiple sports. Many college coaches have started to see the benefits of having multi-sport athletes on their rosters. One coach who has seen this is Pete Carroll, former USC and current Seattle Seahawks football coach. He stated,

The first questions I’ll ask about a kid are, “What other sports does he play? What does he do? What are his positions? Is he a big hitter in baseball? Is he a pitcher? Does he play hoops?” All of those things are important to me. I hate that kids don’t play three sports in high school. I think that they should play year-round and get every bit of it that they can through that experience. I really, really don’t favor kids having to specialize in one sport. Even [at USC], I want to be the biggest proponent for two-sport athletes on the college level. I want guys that are so special athletically, and so competitive, that they can compete in more than one sport (O’Sullivan).

Pete Carroll, other coaches, and even elite athletes have all begun to voice their opinion on this issue, and the resounding opinion of all these coaches and athletes is playing multiple sports in high school helped them get to where they are today. In an interview, Dom Starsia, the men’s lacrosse coach for the University of Virginia, revealed his opinion on whether he prefers athletes to specialize or diversify when it comes to sports. He stated,

My trick question to young campers is always, “How do you learn the concepts of team offense in lacrosse or team defense in lacrosse in the off-season, when you’re not playing with your team?” The answer is by playing basketball, by playing hockey and by playing soccer and those other team games, because many of those principles are exactly the same. Probably 95 percent [of our players] are multi-sport athletes. It’s always a bit strange to me if somebody is not playing other sports in high school (O’Sullivan).

Many times, athletes will make the decision to drop all other sports at such an early age because they believe it is the only way they will be able to play in college. However, many colleges have begun a trend toward recruiting multi-sport athletes. One such college is Ohio State University, which posted a graph that portrayed the number of football players who had only played football in high school and the number of football players who had played multiple sports. Only five Buckeyes had played only football in high school and the other forty-two had played at least one other sport in high school. These statistics not only came from a state university but came after this university had won the national championship, which means these multi-sport athletes were not playing for some tiny, unknown school. The majority of the players recruited for this prestigious state school were multi-sport athletes, which means there must be a benefit for participating in multiple sports while in high school (King). Ohio State is not alone in its beliefs, as Clemson’s head coach, Dabo Swinney, also agrees.

The trend toward preferring multi-sport athletes even continues to the professional level. In the 2016 NFL draft, 224 of the 253 picks were multi-sport athletes and in the 2017 NFL draft, 30 of the 32 first-round draft picks had participated in multiple sports. Even though playing multiple sports will not guarantee an athlete will participate in collegiate level sports, it will greatly improve the chances and is a necessity now more than ever.

The first counterargument to my thesis is it is necessary for athletes to follow the 10,000-hour rule for better results. Several years ago, Anders Ericsson, a Swedish researcher, and his colleagues developed the idea that ten years or 10,000 hours of focused and specific practice were needed to master the skills in a particular field. This argument favors sport specialization, especially at an early age, because according to this rule, the only way athletes will meet their full potential and reach expert status is if they are exposed to a sport at an early age and maintain a high volume of practice over time. According to the Aspen Institute research brief, this rule “inevitably promotes early specialization” (DeLench). This mantra of practicing for 10,000 hours has been recited countless times by coaches, the sports industry, and best-selling authors such as Malcolm Gladwell, who wrote Outlier and made the 10,000-hour rule well-known among a mass audience.

While research does show a correlation between athletes practicing and their improvement in their sport, this does not mean 10,000 hours are required to reach an expert skill level. Studies actually show in many sports considerably less than 10,000 hours are required to reach a high level at that sport. Top competitors in sports such as basketball, field hockey, and wrestling only require 4,000 to 6,000 hours of deliberate practice to reach professional levels (DeLench). This means athletes do not need to spend every waking moment practicing one sport to become highly skilled at it, and they can spend some of their time enjoying other sports. A study performed at Princeton University found deliberate practice, which was defined as “engagement in structured activities created specifically to improve performance in a domain,” did not affect the performance levels of athletes as much as advocates for the 10,000-hour rule had claimed. Deliberate practice accounted for just a ten percent difference in performance (DeLench). This study weakened the myth athletes need ten years or 10,000 hours of intentional practice to master one sport, which means athletes do not have to specialize in a single sport at an early age and can try multiple sports while they are still young, even if they decide to focus on one after high school.

The concept of 10,000 hours is also flawed because when athletes at similar experience levels are compared, the amount of practice and training time that went into getting them to that experience level differs greatly. The amount of practice and the amount of training time is different because it depends on the athlete. Several factors determine how long or how much an athlete needs to train to reach a certain experience level. Some of these factors are coach/parent involvement, genetic background, and an athlete’s physical fitness level. Many athletes are blessed to have coaches and parents in their lives who support them and want to see them succeed. These coaches and parents listen to the athlete they are helping and do what they can to help him reach his goals. Some athletes even have a jump on other athletes just because of their genetic background. Some athletes are born athletes and have no problem figuring out a sport while other athletes need more time to work on their coordination and skills. An athlete’s fitness level also factors into how much time he must spend on training. If you are fit, it will be much easier to reach a certain experience level because you will only need to spend time training in technical skills for your sport (DeLench).

The American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) concluded “diversified sports training during early and middle adolescence may be a more effective strategy in ultimately developing elite-level skills in the primary sport due to a positive transfer of skills” and athletes should consider “delaying intensive, specialized training until late adolescence, rather than a specific age, to optimize skill development in most sports” (DeLench). By “a positive transfer of skills,” the AMSSM means athletes who participate in multiple sports are able to carry skills learned in one sport over to the next sport. As a three-sport athlete, I am able to carry skills developed through one sport over to the other two. For example, in soccer I am primarily defensively focused and have developed an instinct to be able to foresee where a player wants to pass the ball. By developing this instinct, I am able to intercept the ball as the opposing team passes it. This skill has transferred over to basketball beautifully because I am able to use the same movements and techniques. The footwork I use to play defense in soccer is almost identical to the footwork I use to play defense in basketball. The problem with the 10,000-hour rule is it discredits the coach/parent involvement, genetic ability, and even physical fitness as reasons for an athlete’s success and only points to deliberate practice as a reason for success in a sport.

The second counterargument to my thesis is single-sport athletes will experience greater success, as shown by their skill level, as well as a longer career in their chosen sport. They believe focusing on one sport increases an athlete’s skill level and enables them to play longer. However, researchers have begun to discover the exact opposite. Because of the cross-sport skills multi-sport athletes are able to develop, they actually become more skilled and have a higher sports IQ than single-sport athletes. An athlete’s sports IQ refers to his knowledge of the game, how well he is able to apply skills learned through drills to game situations, and how quickly he is able to make decisions in the middle of a game. This is why baseball players play basketball during their offseason to increase their hand-eye coordination or soccer players run track to improve their speed and reaction time (Eytel).

Athletes who participate in multiple sports are also more likely to experience longer-term success than single-sport athletes. One reason for this is because there tends to be a lower burnout rate among multi-sport athletes than among single-sport athletes. Burnout becomes a serious problem for athletes who specialize too early because the extreme pressure put on all the practices, games, and skills makes a young athlete lose the love for the game by the time college, and sometimes even high school, rolls around. By participating in multiple sports, an athlete is able to balance different sports and retain a passion to play each one. By playing multiple sports, an athlete is not always surrounded by the same people, playing the same sport on the same team. He is able to experience engaging with different teammates and different coaches. A multi-sport athlete also has the opportunity to experience different roles on a team. He could be the star player on the soccer team and a bench player on the basketball. This provides an athlete with humility because he will not always be the best player on the team and it can be a learning experience. A multi-sport athlete is given diverse opportunities and experiences different teams, teammates, and coaches (Duffek).

Another reason why multi-sport athletes experience longer term success than single-sport athletes is athletes who play multiple sports experience less injuries, especially overuse injuries, which I referred to in my first confirmation argument. Because of this, multi-sport athletes can have a healthier, longer career and will most likely be more active in adulthood than athletes who focused on a single sport. As athletes grow older, they will most likely begin to feel pain from all the things they have put their bodies through. However, because athletes who participated in multiple sports allowed their muscles to rest, the pain will be minimal compared to the pain felt by single-sport athletes. Single-sport athletes, especially those who maintained serious injuries from their sport, will not be as mobile as multi-sport athletes. All of this goes back to examples of overuse injuries and how cross-training can aid athletes by decreasing their risk of serious injuries (Duffek).

Think back to Deion Sanders. He is now a legend because he accomplished what was thought to be impossible. He competed in multiple sports and because of this, he was able to have a career most athletes only dream about. Athletes, coaches, and parents, think of the athletic feats that can be accomplished if more athletes follow Deion Sanders’s example and participate in multiple sports. Now I am not saying every single athlete has to play at least two sports at the professional level, but I am saying playing multiple sports, at least through high school, will increase an athlete’s physical abilities, lengthen his career, and provide a greater passion for his chosen sports. Even if you are not an athlete or a parent of an athlete, you should still be able to see the importance of this issue purely from the medical evidence. If there is a way to help athletes avoid serious injuries, should we not encourage it? Why do we stand by and watch young athletes experience ACL tears or crumble under the pressure of expectations? I challenge all of you to speak out against sport specialization, especially when it is affecting our young athletes, and encourage the athletes of tomorrow to become multi-sport athletes. Parents, allow your children to experience different sports at a young age and be open-minded to their preferences. Coaches, encourage your team to play different sports during their offseason and inform athletes of the benefits of doing this. Athletes, if you are not a multi-sport athlete already, give it thought because many experts agree with me when I say it is beneficial to your health and overall skill.

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