Why Hold Your Straight-A Student Back a Year? To Get a Better Endorsement Deal

[Mosby]

Michael Cancelleri, an entrepreneur in San Clemente, Calif., has poured tens of thousands of dollars into his son’s baseball career—club team fees, tournament travel and top-of-the-line equipment.

As high school approached, Cancelleri decided that wasn’t enough. He paid about $20,000 for his son, a straight-A student, to repeat a grade at a private middle school sports academy.

“The draw to it [was] just giving him a little bit of extra time to develop and mature,” said Cancelleri, whose 15-year-old son, Carter, has grown about 3 inches since August and hopes to be a strong competitor next year as a high school freshman.

Sixty other boys are repeating a grade at the same academy, The Togethership, where coursework includes throwing mechanics, game film review and nutrition along with traditional subjects such as Algebra and English.

Holding kids back in school for an athletic edge has existed for decades on the elite fringe of prep sports. In recent years, it has exploded in popularity for middle school boys.

Fueled by the lure of Name, Image and Likeness money in college, families are delaying high school so their sons can get bigger, stronger and more recruitable. The practice, known as “reclassifying,” “reclassing,” “bridge year” or “gap year,” is spreading fast in football, basketball, baseball, lacrosse and other sports where height and strength are key.

WSJ

[underpants]

1. "redshirting" became a thing when my daughter was about to start school

Kids born July - September are on the cusp of starting school. Parents will hold the kid back so they are 8-11 months older than their classmates so they have an academic advantage in maturity and an athletic advantage in size and growth. This was asked of us by other parents if we were going to hold her back. We didn’t. She was the youngest in every grade and sports team growing up.

It’s mostly in affluent (not really us) communities. Primarily with males to make them LEADERS. I remember seeing a story about a woman in Houston whose own daycare was shocked she was sending her kid to kindergarten as scheduled. Chicago schools shut it down completely, if your kid can go to school they do (unless you go to a private school).

Cooper Flagg rescheduled UP a year because the next college basketball recruiting class was seen as stronger than when he was eligible. He’s 1/2 way through his rookie NBA season at 19. He turns 20 in December so he’s 19 and 2 months right now.

This all came from Malcom Gladwell’s 2008 book “Outliers”. He did include a study showing slightly older kids doing better in math and science but what really caught on was his analysis of Canadian hockey players. At the time , every Canadian in the Hockey Hall of Fame was born July - September (I think). Gretzky Lemieux etc. hockey drafted after the 7th or 8th grade. The kids basically go into a minor league system at clubs often staying at host homes. They get better coaching, equipment/facilities, and competition. The have a big advantage over kids left to public school and local club programs. I’ve heard Gladwell say that he had no idea people would take that out of his book.

[Auggie]

2. I was born in mid-August, and among the youngest in my class

Had I played sports, an extra year would have benefitted me as I added inches after graduating high school, but I would have hated it.

Does anybody bother to ask kids what they want?

[Mosby]

3. Here's a kid who said no to his parents.

Not every talented athlete decides to hold back. Fourteen-year-old Rourke Julio of Murrieta, Calif., is around 6-foot-3 with an 84-mile-an-hour fastball and basketball skills he hopes will carry him to the NBA.

Club teammates in both sports opted to repeat eighth grade. After seeking advice from coaches and researching it online, his parents told him they thought it was the right move. Rourke refused.

“‘I don’t take shortcuts,’” he said he told them. His mother, Kimberly Julio, said she burst into tears: “I was like, ‘Why are you more mature than I am?’”

As a freshman this year, he was the fourth-string quarterback on the freshman team, played JV basketball and started for the varsity baseball squad. He said that when other players ask if he held back, he feels pride telling them, “I’m 14. I’m in the right grade.”

[Auggie]

4. Thanks