ATLANTA — While team sports have been put on hold due to the coronavirus, local leaders with the nation’s largest youth sports league are working to help keep kids in their area stay active.
The team with i9 Sports North & Central Gwinnett County and i9 Sports Forsyth & North Fulton County have gone digital while they wait to take the field in the future. Both leagues serve over 1,000 children in their respective areas and rely predominantly on volunteer coaches.
In recent weeks, those coaches going above and beyond to create and post content for children to continue to practice while in quarantine. Program directors have also been developing interactive games for parents and children to play using common household items, as well as tips to create diy t-ball stands and other sports equipment.
North & Central Gwinnett County Program director, Craig Magram says during the interim, they have been working to illustrate a plan for what the future of their youth team sports league will look like.
"It's not just i9 Sports, but all recreation team sports leagues will have to figure out what their new normal is going to be. For us, we can have up to 600 kids playing in an area at one given time. That's just not going to work in the future," explained Magram.
Program director for Forsyth & North Fulton Counties, Pegah Jimenez, adding that team sports are about more than just about physicality.
"The skills you learn from team sports have to do with comradely, discipline, teamwork...and those are the things we can't control at the moment so we're just trying to control what we can and create some way for children to not skip a beat," stressed Jimenez.
Jimenez and Magram are just two of the nine Atlanta area i9 program directors working to bring team sports solutions to their local families. Both hope to have their sports teams back on the field by June.
Team sports leaders talk future
"We just don't know what's going to happen, but we're all in this together. There's going to be big changes from every youth sports team league and we just got to make sure we're working as a team to get through it," added Magram.
i9 Sports North & Central Gwinnett County offers youth sports programs to children in Lawrenceville, Buford, and Suawanee. i9 Sport Forsyth & North Fulton serves those in Cumming, Alpharetta, and John's Creek.
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