Growing up fast

Jane Weaver Health editor • Profile • E-mail

The debut of 14-year-old soccer player Freddy Adu in a Major League Soccer game on Saturday may not have shown the world the young phenomenon's best moves, but it was a historical moment nonetheless.

The West Africa-born Adu, called an upcoming American Pele, has become a national celebrity since signing to play professional soccer last year, appearing on talk shows and being featured on "60 Minutes." Entering in the second half of the season opener last weekend he became the youngest player in a major American league in more than 100 years.

Adu is one of a growing group of athletic prodigies who are entering professional sports at ever younger ages. At a time when parents push their 5- and 6-year-old children into competitive sports leagues and the sports marketing machinery rewards young stars with lucrative endorsement contracts, it's not surprising that teenage athletes are increasingly going for the pros.

This new breed of juvenile athlete includes such teenage superstars as Michelle Wie, the 14-year-old, 6-foot-tall golfer with the 300-yard swing, and basketball wizard LeBron James, who was just 18 when he was drafted for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Then there are the boy wonders of the extreme sports world like Luke Mitrani, a 13-year-old snowboarder signed to a soft drink contract.

The prodigiously talented Adu impresses many sports experts with his maturity and apparent ease in handling the crush of public attention. The hope is that Adu and other teen phenoms might inspire kids to turn off the TV and video games and get more involved in athletic activities.

Nam Y Huh / AP file Fourteen-year-old Michelle Wie is the most hyped young golfer since Tiger Woods. Here, she tees off at the seventh hole during the first round of the LPGA 2004 Kraft Nabisco Championship at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, Calif.

Others say the adulating attention paid to these sports prodigies could result in more physically burned-out, overtrained kids who don't make it to the pros and are psychologically left with little else to get by.

In the high-stakes world of these ultra-athletes, the question is how young is too young?

Good enough but old enough?
For some in the professional world, it's not just the physical health of teen pros that is debated. There are also concerns about the intense pressure to perform and fears that could lead to drug abuse or emotional problems.

With more basketball players trying to skip college, National Basketball Association commissioner David Stern wants to prevent teenagers from joining the league, and instead require players to wait until they are 20 to be drafted. His reasoning? He doesn't want 10-year-olds to fantasize about being the next LeBron James, skip college and likely end up "left with virtually nothing."

The National Football League, which has resisted the young craze in professional sports, is in the midst of a legal challenge to the league's rule that a player has to be out of high school at least three years to be eligible for the draft. A recent court ruling says the NFL will have to allow younger players to butt heads with the grown-ups.

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