All-Star Nca Updates

[Mom2Cheergirls]

Trash talk is the nature of sports, sometimes it can be healthy. I remember years of HS games and being fueled to beat the team that talked smack on Twitter the night before. I remember taking a loss with grace, and being taught not to participate in any of the noise on social media.

No one like to lose. No one likes to feel like they're hard work means nothing. But being rude will not change anything. Our sport is a subjective sport. We get up compete and hope for the best. We should be raising our athletes to be accountable and take a loss and move on and get stronger.

Im sorry that sounds very two sided raising our athletes to be accountable and take a loss and move on and get stronger but trash talk can be healthy? I have to disagree with you on the trash talk because I agree with the rest of your other statement.

Trash talk is not always the nature of the sport it is for some and that is a shame that some feel it is good and appropriate. You shouldn't be fueled to be a team because they were being nasty on social media. You should be fueled to win and be your best if it makes you angry and you want to beat them more so because of their smack talk I get that.... but it in no way is healthy for smack talk to happen and more gyms need to get it in control. That is where it will inevitably make a difference because some not all parents keep an eye on social media (they should). BUT if an athlete is representing your gym on the mat and talking bad about other teams it reflects on your brand and your name and as an owner or coach that only makes you look bad. Some gyms have a policy of kicking people off when they do that... only takes one to be kicked off to shut that down for athletes that truly love the sport.

 

[Nikki Moore]

CPs team competed this weekend and to us it looked like one of their best performances of the season. When they placed third, everyone was shocked and a lot of the girls were crying. It's a lot easier to justify not placing high if you have a drop. The only thing we can think is the other teams had higher difficulty.

When CP got home, she posted a pic of her and two of her teammates and said something pretty corny like: even though we didn't win, I'm always winning when I'm with them

Glad she was able to deal with the loss pretty well... It never makes it better to put down other teams because you couldn't beat them..

 

[Pebbles49]

I have to admit, I love the trash talk BEFORE going into a competition and when I competed at a sport kind of amped up the team and pushed us to focus more and the trash talk was never mean spirit...However, I think all the trash talk AFTER the competition is meaningless and borders on poor sportmanslike behavior...BEFORE ccompetition, yes... AFTER competition, no!

Btw, the coaches or team staff should never indulge in trash talk with the athletes or anybody else, period.

 

[Josiejo]

In cheer we are at such a disadvantage to other sports as our scoring is so subjective and as a spectator there isn't always a clear cut winner, which almost always leads to athletes, coaches and fans feeling robbed. IMO, it would be beneficial if full scores were released to the public so we could see where teams have lost points and understand the logic behind judges decisions.

 

[catlady]

I have to admit, I love the trash talk BEFORE going into a competition and when I competed at a sport kind of amped up the team and pushed us to focus more and the trash talk was never mean spirit...However, I think all the trash talk AFTER the competition is meaningless and borders on poor sportmanslike...BEFORE ccompetition, yes... AFTER competition, no!

Btw, the coaches or team staff should never indulge in trash talk with the athletes or anybody else, period.

100% I expect coaches to reinforce the basic lesson of lack of control and technology have real life consequences. Colleges and HR are realizing when immaturity and poor judgment are used on social media they can expect the same on campus and in the workplace, and it only takes one post to lose control. There is a big difference between playful jabs, and someone not being able to control and withhold their anger when it comes to loss, a bad grade, constructive criticism, disagreements, break ups, controversy, etc.

 

[MissCongeniality]

100% I expect coaches to reinforce the basic lesson of lack of control and technology have real life consequences. Colleges and HR are realizing when immaturity and poor judgment are used on social media they can expect the same on campus and in the workplace, and it only takes one post to lose control. There is a big difference between playful jabs, and someone not being able to control and withhold their anger when it comes to loss, a bad grade, constructive criticism, disagreements, break ups, controversy, etc.

100% Truth! Kids are losing scholarships and not getting admitted based on their social media posts. Employers screen social media posts as well. Any parent/coach who is not monitoring/advising their kids/athletes is doing them a disservice. No "not fair you won and we didn't" is worth losing your chance to get into the college of your dreams or job of your dreams!

 

[cheerisloving]

Im sorry that sounds very two sided raising our athletes to be accountable and take a loss and move on and get stronger but trash talk can be healthy? I have to disagree with you on the trash talk because I agree with the rest of your other statement.

Trash talk is not always the nature of the sport it is for some and that is a shame that some feel it is good and appropriate. You shouldn't be fueled to be a team because they were being nasty on social media. You should be fueled to win and be your best if it makes you angry and you want to beat them more so because of their smack talk I get that.... but it in no way is healthy for smack talk to happen and more gyms need to get it in control. That is where it will inevitably make a difference because some not all parents keep an eye on social media (they should). BUT if an athlete is representing your gym on the mat and talking bad about other teams it reflects on your brand and your name and as an owner or coach that only makes you look bad. Some gyms have a policy of kicking people off when they do that... only takes one to be kicked off to shut that down for athletes that truly love the sport.

That's more of what I'm saying. Trash talk exists in sports. I think a little pre-game trash talk can be good. Especially if it isn't disrespectful, and more friendly. Think Bring On when Torrance and Isis tell each other to bring it.

I think cheer is so different than other sports because of our pre-existing stigmas and the fact that teams of a certain caliber are being watched 24/7 and rivals are across the nation. And those big teams are the biggest reps of the sport and gym. Smack talk isn't just-we had them on defense or they can't make a shot, it's more personal and vindictive. But again, I will say I have never seen other athletes of HS age talk smack about their opponent after losing. I guess it's because when you lose in other sports it's clear and harder to dispute, but cheers subjectivity makes leaves room for question.

 

[UCFKnights07]

unfortunately parents arent much better. regardless of what the drama is, but when a parent is tweeting encouragement to said child for dragging someone on social media, you know that the apple doesnt fall far from the tree.
i thankfully didnt grow up in the day and age where there were so many social media platforms. I think during my time there was myspace, and facebook was still in the early days of a very small amount of people using it.
i personally dont like the way teens treat each other online, i went through it first hand when i was young. But when adults join in and favorite, like and respond to their kids ridiculous comebacks, its quite sad.

 

[Mom2Cheergirls]

That's more of what I'm saying. Trash talk exists in sports. I think a little pre-game trash talk can be good. Especially if it isn't disrespectful, and more friendly. Think Bring On when Torrance and Isis tell each other to bring it.

Telling another team to bring their best is not trash talk that is we want you and all of you. That scene in particular was about respect and asking for respect from the other team by each only bringing their best to the floor. Trash talk by its very nature is disrespectful. It is saying a team is no good, that they win only because they have a big name, and much much worse and much more personal. It isn't owning up that they are competition and darn good competition at that. It is making excuses for a loss. It is poor sportsmanship. Sadly it happens far to often. But fortunately there is a lot of gyms and teams and athletes and parents committing to being positive. I think it would be worthwhile for USASF or the cheer magazines to create such a campaign to push for these cheerlebrities to come out and publicly present that behavior and message. Ignoring trash talk does not create change but I have seen first hand when a gym says no go on it and holds firm it changes the dynamic for the better.

 

[fierceprincess]

The Medium Senior group chat has been around since Majors 2016. It is full of love. They have been friends for over a year=)

Med Sr has been full of love for each other for a long time- it's not new at all! Some of my very best friends were my competitors in my Lady Jag days (we started the peach/lj friendship at the first comp of that season) and I will never forget how much love we felt at worlds from almost EVERY top 10 team on that awards stage. Med Sr. has always been a little different from the other divisions in that sense, I've really never experienced anything quite like it.

 

[Keep_Believing]

Extremely impressed by the awesome sportsmanship and positive support CA Wildcats has shown to SOT Reign. They compete against each other, but I have seen several CA Wildcats share SOT Reign's Gofund and offer encouraging words of support on social media.

 

[j4z0n]

Really?! Are we discussing unsportsmanlike behaviour from the coaches..? Come on. It needs to stop..especially from "that" gym. If a team cannot accept the fact that they lost, look at the scoresheet! You're given detailed breakdowns. It will enlighten you as to why you lost. I don't care if it varies from comp to comp. Y'all should already have an idea as to which areas you're weak at or inconsistent. Take all those pointers in and apply those in your routine. No one should really blame another team for beating yours. Its a freakin competition for crying out loud so everyone is gunning to win. Hope that team prove themselves on the mat next time and not on social media. Let your skills do the talking.

 

[SparkleSpankies]

unfortunately parents arent much better. regardless of what the drama is, but when a parent is tweeting encouragement to said child for dragging someone on social media, you know that the apple doesnt fall far from the tree.
i thankfully didnt grow up in the day and age where there were so many social media platforms. I think during my time there was myspace, and facebook was still in the early days of a very small amount of people using it.
i personally dont like the way teens treat each other online, i went through it first hand when i was young. But when adults join in and favorite, like and respond to their kids ridiculous comebacks, its quite sad.

I was working an event this past weekend, and right in front of the judges stand after a team performed, there were parents from that org complaining... then another one of their teams went and they were complaining again. I would hope they didn't go to social media, but it was obvious complaining after each team and they were plastered w/ their gyms gear. So I'm sure it filters to the kids....

 

[luv2cheer92]

That is helpful. Thank you. I still have hours of number-crunching ahead that probably won't happen today.

Rankings, in a basic sense, represent the final goal of our sport. However, they do not remotely tell the whole story and can be very misleading without proper context. I love a win as much as the next guy, but some of my proudest moments of the weekend came from teams that didn't win or necessarily even place super-high.

Unless there is a huge data nerd that loves this type of thing (and has a lot of free time), I may hire someone on fiverr or similar to transfer all of the scoring PDFs into a database/spreadsheet for later analysis. Typically PDFs like the ones NCA puts out don't copy/paste into spreadsheets very easily.

Have you been able to get this done? If not, I can send you what I have.

 

[BlueCat]

Have you been able to get this done? If not, I can send you what I have.

I have not been able to devote time to this yet.