The 1986 and 2024 Boston Celtics both won NBA championships.

The '86 team had 3 assistant coaches working for the head coach, compared with a whopping 10 for the '24 group.

That's a staggering figure for a roster of just 15 players!

In 2020, the Premier League began limiting their soccer teams to 'only' 17 coaches, trainers and other essential staff on match day.

This trend is the same most other college and pro sports, too.

Specialized expertise, personalized coaching, and deeper analysis, the main drivers of why staff rosters have exploded in size, aren't just for pro teams any more.

The trend has trickled down to youth levels.

With two key differences.

First, youth athletes are not highly paid professionals expected to dedicate their whole lives to their sport.

School, social life and family time all take up a good chunk of their time, as well.

The other major difference is how utterly disorganized development is for any individual athlete playing below the college level.

Because of how jumbled things are right now, there's a sea of opportunity for parents to make a huge impact.

Athletes play their sport, train, and recover.

Coaches guide, inform and motivate.

Parents support, coordinate and plan.

When everyone is in it together, executing their roles properly, the kid benefits immensely.

Their time is spent where it has the greatest impact, leading to more rapid progress which in turn fuels their drive to work even harder.

But like I said, youth sports coaching staffs are far more disorganized than the pros.

Too many athletes don't know how to use their time effectively, don't know what would make the greatest impact, and because of it they continue to play below their true potential.

Sport coaches, personal trainers, skills coaches, and any possible medical support (physical therapists, orthopedics) rarely, if ever, talk to each other.

Which is where parents can be so valuable.

As a sports performance coach I know it's a hundred times easier to write effective workout programs when I have specific recommendations from sport coaches.

What's hardest for them out there?

What's holding them back?

A coach can provide insights that we could never get in a gym setting.

Same goes for rehabilitation, where parents must be the go between due to HIPPA privacy laws.

Taking it a step further, imagine if a sport coach knew an individual's specific sprinting or cutting flaws, and helped reinforce better technique in practice.

Or if a deficit in coordination, balance, or strength that's causing someone to struggle with a sport skill was identified and addressed both in training and practice.

The possibilities are endless, but the result would be the same every time.

Better progress for the athlete.

This may seem like wishful thinking, but we see it play out in our prep school strength and conditioning program every year.

When the communication between athletic trainers and strength coaches is strong, players return quicker from injury.

When sport coaches meet with us to lay out a plan for both the team overall, and individuals, the players benefit by having a greater year of development.

Of course, at this school the athletic trainers work three doors down from the gym, and sport coaches regularly get face time with our strength staff.

Most kids have club or AAU coaches in one location, personal trainers in another, and PT's at a third, so it's nowhere near as easy.

Rarely do we ever even know each other's names, much less talk to discuss anyone's developmental goals.

Which is why a parent acting as a liaison is so powerful.

Don't think of it as over-parenting or any other negative stereotype when you take an active role in your son or daughter's athletic development.

You are the one who has relationships with the entire support team. You're the only one in position to create a pro-style coaching staff for your kid.

We should all be in this together - the athlete, parents, and all the various coaches who work in their respective areas of expertise.

Just because there are endless camps, clinics, and workout programs today doesn't mean there can't be structure, and a plan, just as a pro would receive.

The better the communication regarding how to best maximize someone's potential, the more successful we all are.