Central Oregonian

Crook County is seeing more multi-sport athletes

While more and more athletes are specializing at the national level, CCHS?is seeing a resurgence in multi-sport athletes

Lon Austin

When I was in high school, most athletes played three sports during the school year, and possibly a fourth sport during the summer.

As recently as 15 years ago, it was still common place for individuals to play multiple sports.

However, as athletics have progressed they have begun to take increasingly more time.

Many sports now run year-round programs, and the national trend is for athletes to specialize in one or at the most, two sports.

Even at Crook County that has become more prevalent.

Crook County High School used to give out blankets to anyone who played three sports in each of their four high school years, perhaps they still do. When my oldest daughter graduated from CCHS in 2002, where she was a three-sport athlete, only five athletes received a blanket.

Now, it seems like Crook County is beginning to buck the national trend.

There is a resurgence in athletes playing more than one sport. Even more interesting, is a trend in athletes playing more than one sport during the same sports season.

I first became aware of the trend this fall when four members of the Cowboys varsity soccer team opted to not only play soccer, but to do a second fall sport.

Grayson Munn and Blake George each ran cross country, while Daryel Lopez and Edgar Toledo played soccer while kicking for the football team.

Currently, Makayla Lindburg is playing basketball while also playing volleyball for the Rimrock Volleyball Club.

In addition, Friday evening, CCHS freshman Elsa Harris told me that she is considering playing tennis and running track at the same time.

Attempting to play two sports during the same sports season leads to inevitable conflicts. For example, Munn and George both qualified for the state cross country championships, which happened to fall on the same day that Crook County played a soccer play-in game. With one event in Eugene and the other in Milton Freewater, it was impossible to do both.

Munn elected to run cross country, where he finished 20th, while George decided to skip the state meet and play soccer.

Other conflicts are inevitable. However, as coaches compete to recruit the top athletes in school we are seeing more and more coaches make allowances for multi-sport athletes.

From first-hand experience I know that playing multiple sports is hard work. I lettered in three sports in college, and both my academics and social life probably suffered due to the increased practice time.

However, what is happening at Crook County is very different than my own experience. I wasn’t a star, like many of these athletes are. In addition, the overlap from one sport to another was less pronounced than it is today.

According to recent studies on the national level, specialization has led to burn out. Athletes frequently drop out because of the toll that year-round competition takes on them both mentally and physically.

If playing one sport year round is too demanding for many athletes, then the obvious question is what is going to happen when individuals play year-round in more than one sport?

Right now I don’t think anyone really knows.

Although individuals playing more than one sport during the same season are rare it is still an interesting trend.

A trend which bears watching.