Its late 2018. A young coach shakes his head in despair, wondering if he’s made a mistake. Wondering if all the effort put into building a kids paintball team will be wasted. There’s a dozen or so members on the newly formed Swamp Monkeys team, which officially began back in March, but they’re not cohesive. They’re not coming together as a unit, or as friends, in the manner he hoped. Starting a youth team from the ground up has taken way more energy than anticipated. But he’s not giving up.
Flash forward to today. The Swamp Monkey kids scenario paintball team, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization for kids ages 10 to 16 years old, is thriving. With over 40 active members and dozens of supportive parents, coaches, and volunteers, the team celebrated its five-year anniversary in March 2023. They’ve played 20+ scenario games since inception, including several events outside their home state of Florida. The team is sponsored by Dyzana, Social Paintball, and its home field Outdoor Xtreme Battlefield Orlando. They receive generous donations from local businesses and supporters. They host raffles to raise money for team friends and family members going through tough life situations. Last year, parent volunteers even created the newly minted Swamp Monkeys Speedball faction, which played their first major tournament at the 2022 NXL World Cup Youth Division. The kids are building lifelong friendships, skills, and morals.
The Swamp Monkeys team is committed, first and foremost, to investing in the youth, and helping young people develop into compassionate and well-rounded adults. The paintball portion, though an integral part of the team, comes second. And while that might seem backwards to some, it is these foundational roots that allow the coaches to focus on the growth of the individual players as human beings. The importance of building respect, integrity, honesty, confidence and self-worth in children cannot be overstated. Creating trust between players of all ages and using paintball as a tool to learn and develop these skills is exactly why the team came together. The Swamp Monkey vision was to introduce the wonderful sport of paintball to today’s youth while actively building better members of society at the same time. As we look to the youth for our futures, so we must begin by investing our time, resources, and energy into those children today. And with these major focuses in mind, the Swamp Monkeys have achieved over and beyond its original expectations.
During practices, the coaches focus on building core paintball skills. From snapshooting and proper form, to stamina and accuracy, hand-swapping abilities and on field communication, the kids are taught fundamentals. It is these fundamental skills that allow the kids to grow into better players, and to better apply certain life skills – trust, communication, and integrity – to the game. If a child communicates with their teammates in a rough battle situation, they are subconsciously learning to communicate with others outside of the sport. If a child is taught to call their hits from an early age, it reinforces good morals and that cheating and lying is wrong. If a child works with a teammate to move up the field and cover each other from bunker to bunker, they are learning to trust their fellow teammates, which translates to placing trust in others. Humans are social beings, and understanding how to productively work together toward a common goal will serve the kids team members for years to come in their future careers and relationships.
The Swamp Monkeys are doing exactly what that young coach envisioned all those years ago. The battle to get here was hard, but well earned. From conceptualization to implementation, every step received the necessary resources and attention to launch the team forward into its next phase. Starting from that treacherous first year of the unknown, when the kinks and bugs had to be ironed out, to the record-breaking membership of its fifth year, and through every stage in between, the team has grown immensely, and it’s not slowing down anytime soon.
Of course, the team hopes to be a leader in its own right, on the frontier of a concept that’s not new, but has never been part of paintball the way it is in other sports: youth leagues and clubs. Every other major sport has some kind of kid’s league, team, or club that children can join from an early age. But that has never been the case with paintball; in fact, kid’s teams and leagues are not very common in paintball at all! As the Swamp Monkeys have grown these past five years, we are starting to see a breakthrough in this arena, the NXL adding a youth division being one example. The team hopes to see other fields create and support their own youth teams, keeping the kid’s growth and development at the forefront of their focus. The hope is that, eventually, paintball youth leagues and recreational play can become as commonplace a sports activity as any other – for the growth of the sport as well as the growth of the individual player.
You can help too. Any paintball player, anytime and anywhere that you step onto that field, can be a guide for our youth. Teach them. Run with them for an objective. Work with the youth, and you will see exactly how attention and support from adults can influence their actions, and ultimately, their growth. If we all help our children be better today, then we will see a massive shift in the youth of tomorrow.
The Swamp Monkeys welcomes any and all kids between the ages of 10 and 16 in central Florida to join the team, whether they’re a seasoned paintball player or have never stepped foot onto a paintball field. Their homefield is located in Orlando, Florida at Outdoor Xtreme Battlefield Orlando (1251 S Co Rd 13 Orlando, FL 32833) and hosts practices every other Saturday from 9am to 11am. You can request more information by email: swampmonkeykids@gmail.com.
Lady Jenji Writing & Design 