The post went up on a Tuesday. Her teammate in a college hoodie, big block letters: COMMITTED. Fourteen years old. And your daughter has been quiet ever since, doing math in her head that nobody assigned her. She thinks she's late to a race she just started.
I'm Sammy, and you found the Hey Sammy Podcast. One real letter a day from a real sports parent, answered the way a friend would.
Today, recruiting at 14, and the comparison spiral it sets off in every other kid on the roster. This one's from Angela in Raleigh. She writes, "My daughter's teammate is getting recruited already, and she's only 14. Now my daughter thinks she's behind. How do I talk to her about this?"
Angela, let's start with what that hoodie post actually is. Because it's a lot less than it looks like. Early commitments at 14 are rare, mostly informal, and reversed all the time. Coaches change jobs. Offers evaporate. Bodies and games change enormously between 14 and 18.
The recruiting industry has stretched its timeline earlier and earlier because attention is the product. That post is marketing. Your daughter is treating it like a rankings list.
Now, the word "behind." I want you to help her interrogate it, because it falls apart under one question: behind on what schedule? There's no schedule. There's a story the internet tells where every scholarship kid was anointed at 13.
The real rosters tell a different one. They're full of late bloomers who got serious at 16 and passed the early stars. Development isn't a line. It's, um, a scribble. And here's the part that matters most: the girls who make it aren't the ones who commit first. They're the ones who keep loving the game long enough to get good at it.
Comparison is the fastest way to stop loving anything. So how do you actually talk to her? Not with, "don't worry about it, you're not behind." Reassurance bounces off a 14-year-old. Evidence doesn't.
Sit with her and build the only comparison that means anything: her versus her from six months ago. What can she do now that she couldn't do in the spring? Be specific. Her first touch, her left side, her reading of the game, her minutes... Watch her face while the list grows. That's what progress actually looks like, and she's been too busy scrolling to see her own.
Speaking of scrolling... The commitment posts, the recruiting accounts, the highlight reels, that feed is a slot machine for teenage self-doubt. You can't ban it, she's 14. But you can name it. I have a rule at my house: no rankings talk at the dinner table. And I extend it to my own phone.
Ask her how she feels after 20 minutes on that feed. Kids can tell. Feeling behind after scrolling isn't information about her game, it's information about the feed.
And Angela, do a quiet check on the adult side of the car too. Comparison is contagious, and kids catch it from us before they catch it from any feed. If we're, um, refreshing club rankings or asking about other girls' offers, she notices.
The house sets the scoreboard. Make yours measure things she can control. Effort. Courage. Whether she tried the hard pass.
When the house scoreboard is sane, the internet one loses its power. And one more truth for your back pocket: four years from now, half those early commitments will have quietly unraveled. Nobody posts the uncommitment. The feed only shows beginnings. Never the middles.
Oh, and one small thing with a long reach: help her congratulate the teammate. For real. A text, a hug at practice, something true. Not because it's polite. Because envy shrinks when it has to say congratulations out loud and mean it.
That girl in the hoodie is still her friend underneath all of this. Comparison tried to turn a teammate into a measuring stick. Turn her back into a person.
And if she really does want to play in college someday, tell her this: The work that matters at 14 isn't exposure. It's skills, strength, grades, and keeping the fire lit. Exposure finds prepared players. It rarely works the other way around.
Your homework this week is one line on paper. Have her write down one thing she does better than she did six months ago. Stick it on the bathroom mirror. Done.
And that's the episode. Somebody in your bleachers is quietly fighting the comparison monster too. Send them this one.
Questions go to hey@heysami.com.
