Participation Declines, But Tradition Lives On

Judging by the recent decline of area teams competing in the Los Angeles Watts Summer Games, apparently not all coaches feel the same as Bort Escoto of Sylmar High.

“We’ll go play anyone, anywhere, at any time,” said Escoto, who has entered a Spartan boys’ basketball team in the Watts Games every summer since he took over the program seven years ago.

Escoto subscribes to the popular theory that the more you play, the more you improve.

And if improving is a goal, the Watts Games provide a great training ground.

“Where else can you play for 50 bucks and get two games?” Escoto quipped.

However, many coaches are skipping the Watts Games, the largest high school athletic competition in the nation. The Watts Games draw thousands of athletes from San Francisco to Calexico to compete in 18 sports.

For reasons ranging from lack of corporate sponsorship to a recent change in bracket format, participation has been declining since a peak participation of 12,000 athletes in 1996.

Teams from the region are following the trend.

For example, 20 boys’ basketball teams from region schools competed in the Watts Games in 1997. This year, Sylmar is one of only 14 boys’ teams.

Promoters for the Watts Games, which begin their 33rd year of competition today, are expecting 7,000 athletes.

That’s quite a drop from four years ago.

Born out of the chaos and strife of the 1965 Watts riots, the first Watts Games were held in 1968 and included 150 athletes.

The idea behind the Watts Games was to break down barriers that divided young people of different ethnic, economic and geographic backgrounds and provide a forum for athletes to interact in a positive setting.

With participation declining the last four years, coordinators this year reduced the brackets in each sport to accommodate a double-elimination format.

Christine Carlin, director of the Watts Games, said the format was changed to honor an overwhelming request by coaches whose teams were often eliminated after a single game.

“It’s what the coaches wanted and what the kids wanted, too,” Carlin said.

This year, only 64 teams were allowed entry into each of the boys’ and girls’ basketball tournaments. Carlin said there is a waiting list.

Basketball and soccer remain the Watts Games’ most popular sports and will feature more than 3,600 male and female athletes. But only basketball is at capacity.

More than 1,200 boys are expected to participate in boys’ soccer, 750 in the girls’ tournament, but there are plenty of vacancies for walk-up entrants.

Football participation has been on the decline. This year’s bracket can facilitate 16 teams, but only 11 were registered as of Friday, none from the Valley or Ventura County regions.

With participation declining and the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce doing all it can financially to keep the Watts Games interesting, Chairman Mark Iles has set his sights on a different clientele: non-athletes.

“I think the growth in the future of the Games lies in linking together the students and parents who don’t compete in athletics with those who do,” said Iles, whose father’s TV repair shop was burned down in the 1965 Watts riots.

Last year a college fair was introduced at the Watts Games, but it was not widely attended.

But Iles, who is running for state assembly, said the college fair is the type of event that helps attract athletes and non-athletes, regardless of where they live.

“It doesn’t matter where kids are from,” said Iles, a lifetime resident of Watts. “Every one of those kids have far more in common with each other than they don’t have [in common].”