Athletically Inept, in Love With the Game
How I rechanneled my passion for sports after rising — and falling — from my favorite thing in the world.
Story by Connor J. Benintendi
“Connor!”
My dad shouts my name from the downstairs entryway, the inflection in his voice cueing my haste to pull up my cotton crew Nike socks as fast as possible. “Hurry up, we’re going to be late!”
I run down the hallway to the stairwell, tapping my foot to each step I had long-ago memorized the rhythm of. Cleats in hand, I reach the laundry room. I rummage through the twisted ball of dirty clothing, yanking my spandex pants from the dryer and pulling them on.
“I’ll be in the car,” my dad says sharply. “Don’t forget your water bottle.”
I do one final run-through of my mental checklist and proceed out the front door, my gear bag slung over my left shoulder. It’s the first day of football practice.
As we pull into the parking lot, I can hardly contain my excitement. The start of the season means new coaches, players and opportunities. However, in junior football, it also means weigh-ins.
Teams were constructed based on a set of age and weight tiers, ranging as young as third grade and as old as eighth. I was 10 years old at the time, entering my fifth season.
“He’s over the weight limit,” I remember the scale attendant telling my dad. “He’ll probably have to move up a level.”
Those words were deafening. Not because I was upset about my weight, but because I wouldn’t be able to play with my friends.
That was just the beginning of the season’s struggles.
I was to remain in the lower level on one condition: I had to get my weight down by the first game. It sounded simple enough to me. However, my coach’s solution still baffles me to this day.
I had to wear a trash bag under my gear — during the peak of summer — to every practice. The “idea” was that if I sweat more, I may make the weigh-ins. Did this method work? Maybe. I did make it back under the weight threshold before the first game.
Did a 10-year-old kid feel humiliated as the only one who wore a trash bag to practice every day? Absolutely.
For a number of reasons, including not wanting to wear a trash bag, that was my final season playing organized junior football.
According to a jointly conducted 2019 survey by the Aspen Institute’s Project Play and the Utah State University Families in Sport Lab, this is not rare.
Children, on average, quit playing a sport by the time they are 11 years old, according to the survey. Additionally, the simple fact of not having fun anymore was the most commonly cited reason for no longer playing.
While the “fun factor” was undoubtedly hindered by my new mandatory piece of weight-loss equipment, I have to also be honest with myself: I wasn’t good.
I was never all that skilled at any sport I tried, and I played many. Outside of football, I’d participated in T-ball — or baseball for young kids — cross country, track and field, soccer and lacrosse.
My life has always revolved around sports. If I wasn’t playing, I was watching. I became a football superfan at 6 years old when the Seattle Seahawks went to the Super Bowl during the 2005–06 season. The excitement of world-class athletes competing for something significant, yet also trivial in the grand scheme of global importance, had me hooked.
As each year passed, my craving to know everything about football grew. It consumed my thoughts, and I didn’t fight it. Contrarily, I indulged it; pampered it. I gave it the nutrition it needed to grow.
The knowledge, however, did not translate into my ability on the field.
I was falling further behind those in my age group, as I spent too much time fantasizing about NFL statistics, narratives and players to work on my actual skills outside of practice.
When I stopped playing football after fifth grade, I told myself I would focus on lacrosse. I was better at it and thought it had more long-term potential for me. That cheery disposition fell flat, as I was once again a middle-of-the-pack kid on rosters with a ton of young talent.
I quit playing organized sports by my sophomore year of high school. My final string of hope to remain playing was severed after suffering two concussions in as many years while revisiting football in high school.
I was lost. What use was all this information in my brain if I had nothing to apply it to?
Ultimately, I realized my passion for sports was not rooted in playing them. It grew from talking about the game and conversing with others who shared the same interest.
As a result, I tried something new.
I began writing for a website called Cover32. I wasn’t naturally gifted at writing, but it didn’t matter. I had the knowledge. With repetition, my writing improved.
Reporting, writing about and discussing sports for the rest of my life grew into a faraway but attainable dream; I decided to chase it. A few years later, I arrived in Bellingham, Washington, in pursuit of a journalism degree from Western Washington University.
It was a massive step toward reaching the vision I had for my future. Another four years later, and I am one academic quarter away from graduation.
I have covered Western’s sports teams in the student newspaper for four quarters, both as a reporter and editor. In a few months, I will be joining the university’s athletics department as a features writer intern. I’ve loved every second of the journey, just as I thought I would.
After once feeling rejected by sports, I found a home in a different part of town.
I didn’t have to abandon my passion, I just had to channel it into a different medium that better suited me.
The best part about it? Wearing a trash bag is not required to put words on a page.