Column: Gov. Pritzker? The kids want to play.
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Though Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has shut down many youth and high school sports in Illinois during the coronavirus pandemic, young Illinois athletes are still going to play.
Just not in Illinois.
They’re playing this weekend in Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Wisconsin and other states that have established protocols to make things as safe as possible. They’re playing soccer and volleyball and other sports. Why?
Because even though the lockdown monarchs such as Pritzker have forgotten what it’s like to be a kid forced to stay indoors and attend school by video screen, kids themselves haven’t forgotten what it’s like to be kids.
They live in the moment.
Let them play, governor.
There is risk in everything. And parents should make that decision, not an elected official or a columnist. My sons grew out of high school soccer. And I’m locked down in an apartment. But I feel for those kids who aren’t allowed to play their chosen sport.
Most of the young athletes driving across the Midwest for their club team games are lucky to have the means, and parents who can pay to put them on clubs. But what about the students from families without means, kids whose future might depend on an athletic scholarship, who live to play sports and need football?
Illinois lockdown politicians might allow boys high school football and soccer in February. That’s crazy. In February? Why not play on concrete? And perhaps basketball with masks. Currently there are some high school sports permitted, cross country and golf and girls tennis. I think horse jumping is allowed.
But most team sports are suffering. And without being able to expend all that anxiety that comes with being a teenager, without coaches as mentors, without the discipline of a season, some kids will go down a wrong path.
“There’s a big tournament in Indiana with about 300 teams, and 290 of them are from Illinois,” said Philip Richardson, director of operations for the Northern Illinois Soccer League. “And there are other tournaments in other states. But not here in Illinois.
“Club teams can scrimmage. But they’re not allowed to play games,” Richardson said. “So they go to other states for tournaments in Indiana and Wisconsin. But not here.”
I’m not saying there is no risk. The coronavirus is serious. States such as Wisconsin are seeing spikes in the numbers of cases, and nationally, most states are not seeing the decreases we hoped for. In Illinois, the seven-day average of positive tests has climbed to 5.1% and Pritzker said Friday, “I am deeply concerned.”
“Let me be clear, we are in a new wave here … rising positivity all across the nation, not just in the state of Illinois.”
Healthy young athletes do contract the virus, but most endure it without symptoms. And there are other risks to locking down the young that are also serious.
Depression, serious anxiety, lower physical activity levels. The kids stay inside. They sit on the couch. They play video games.
It can break the spirit. If you can’t understand that, maybe you’ve never had young athletes in your home, kids who were serious players, kids who trained every day and dreamed and lived for getting on the field.
And what about the kid who isn’t a star, who isn’t sought after by the top club teams or the AAU basketball teams? That boy or girl who would just barely make their high school team, and sit on the bench, or the junior varsity. What about them?
“It’s about balance,” Dr. David Smith, medical director of the youth sports medicine program at the University of Kansas, told me over the phone. In Kansas, like Missouri, Indiana, Wisconsin, and other states, they’ve established protocols to mitigate spread of the virus. But they still let the kids play.
“We can’t eliminate all risk. To the youth our message is: Take this seriously. This is not a hoax.
“But to completely shut down sports just does not make sense. You shut down sports, they’ll go elsewhere for their socialization and they won’t be monitored. They’re just out there. And without sports, you think of anxiety, depression and other issues,” Smith said.
But Illinois is a one-way street.
One of the reasons for the sports lockdown in Illinois is squabbling between Pritzker’s Illinois Department of Health and the Illinois High School Association. Pritzker has left some of it up to the school districts. But absent leadership from the governor, without protection from legal liability issues, superintendents aren’t willing to put their schools in legal jeopardy.
“School districts don’t want to be hanging out there when the coronavirus lawsuit comes,” said one educator I spoke with.
The sports lockdown bureaucrats of Illinois sit and wait, while other Midwestern states play ball. And kids lose seasons that they’ll never get back.
Dave Ruggles, of Wheaton, tried to organize Illinois parents to put pressure on the politicians to let them play. But on Friday, his son informed his high school coach that the Ruggles family is moving to Indiana.
“He’s a good basketball player, yes, but this isn’t just about basketball,” Ruggles said. "Kids need to be in school in person, not on a screen. We can do it, so we’re leaving for Indiana. But I worry about all the kids who can’t go, kids in the city who need basketball and football.
“As far as I’m concerned all these politicians have been incompetent cowards, from the governor on down,” Ruggles said. “And who are the victims? The kids.”
Let the parents decide, governor.
The kids want to play.
Listen to “The Chicago Way” podcast with John Kass and Jeff Carlin — at www.wgnradio.com/category/wgn-plus/thechicagoway.
Twitter @John_Kass
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