Youth athletes must separate equipment and performance

The athletic world is heavily intertwined with that of the sporting equipment industry, and advancements in the quality of the equipment has a profound effect on the mindset of athletes. In teenage sports, coaches need to take the lead in curbing a growing trend of mental reliance on sports equipment.

As sports have become increasingly competitive, they show a parallel rise in commercialism. The sports sponsorship market is estimated at a rapidly increasing value of 77.69 billion, a significant leap from 2018’s 17.61 billion. Sports company ads have become seemingly ubiquitous on television, always advertising the latest leap forward in sporting equipment, such as shoes, new injury products (kt tape, compression sleeves etc.), bats, and mitts. In many sports, technology has become extremely prevalent.

This rise in equipment quality filters into youth, especially high school sports where teens are greatly influenced by the images of those around them, yet old enough to make their own decisions. Alongside the rise, athletes often internalize standards of equipment that are mainly constructed from the examples of their fellow athletes. They establish a link between their peers’ performances and their better equipment. In many scenarios this leads athletes to believe that equipment can define their overall performance.

Equipment, especially expensive and highly regarded equipment, adds further financial strain on households that already have to cope with the cost and time investment of competing. In equipment-heavy sports such as soccer and baseball, it can cost over a hundred dollars to acquire what is considered “good quality” gear.

Company advertising strategies and peer pressure in competition often create the myth that higher price and higher brand reputation is automatically equivalent to greater effect, hurting families that already struggle to fund competition.

Highly regarded equipment has become dependent on the reputation of the brand it is marketed by, relegating lesser known brands to lower standards. On the flip side, wellknown brands coerce consumers into deals with promises of high quality. Expectations of products are raised, and while in use, an athlete’s success can be attributed to the equipment rather than the individual, validating the often expensive purchase and expectations of the product. In this way, a false “placebo effect” is introduced.

Peer examples also contribute to the normalization of sports applicable products, used preventatively, or unnecessarily, rather than reactively. Products such as KT tape and advil are becoming more widespread in athletic communities, and represent a shift towards product/equipment reliance in many younger athletes’ mindsets.

The sports equipment and medicine industry has been around for many years, but only in recent times has it seen such a vast increase. With respective CAGR’s (compound annual growth rate) of about 19.6 percent and 7.5 percent, both industries are rapidly increasing.

While today’s young generations have grown up with much of the kind of advanced sports technology that creates advanced equipment and medicine that is available now, other older generations are unaccustomed to the shift. A common trait attributed to older generations is independence from technology. Youth mindset is catching up with technology, albeit overestimating the effect it has, to the point of dependence.

In sports, especially youth sports, athlete mental health has been an often overlooked factor for much of the duration of competitive sport leagues. A study by BASES found that 10 percent of athletes experience burnout, one of the leading causes of youth athletes quitting sports. The traditional coach’s role in sports does not go beyond the boundaries of training, and connections that can be used to assist athlete’s mental growth are frequently dismissed by the stigma around mental health problems in the athletic world.

Coaches’ unique experiences are needed to balance out the effects of this youth mindset. Their perspective and sole positions of influence are inaccessible to guardians, and extremely dependent on an athlete’s development. Discussions between players and coaches would foster a healthy team environment, and provide understanding to players. With other educated sources of judgment, players can determine what they really need in order to compete,