I learned as much playing sports in highschool as I did in classes. They helped me mature greatly and were a great fit with my adolescent frustrations and anger

I learned as much playing sports in highschool as I did in classes. They helped me mature greatly and were a great fit with my adolescent frustrations and anger. My mom tried to keep me out in 7th grade because she thought I'd get hurt. In 8th I had grown so she let me play. She says this was by fat the best decision she ever made, change was marked in weeks. For context had pretty heavy ADD (still do) and was pretty large and had a temper. I was able to channel and leverage those in sports and figure out how to be productive and not just an angry ass. In college sports (D3, which is a different ballgame and likely closer to what most people would imagine as "clubs") I learned a bunch as well, about leadership, organization, time management etc. We actually did much better in class during season because we had -5 hours a week of free time due to sports. My university's sports are all funded through a calculation they did on alumni donations. Those who played sports are most likely to give money, so they keep the sports going as it has a marked impact on donations.