As an athlete, taking accountability helps a team be more successful. When a person doesn’t take accountability they end up hurting their team, a person’s performance as a team can become worse and team chemistry can be messed up.

Taking accountability in a sport means owning up to mistakes and playing the role the team needs. The opposite means blaming others such as coaches or teammates. Not taking responsibility for accidents can make teammates doubt a person’s abilities and this may hurt teamwork and communication. Blaming others such as teammates can also hurt your the since the blamer is putting teammates down even if they were the one who made the mistake. Being accountable helps everyone on the team, by owning up to and acknowledging that they made a mistake. Not only does this help someone’s teammates do the same, but it helps them bring their self-esteem up.

While also helping others take accountability, teammates also have to make sure others do the same. When someone loses a match or does poorly in one it isn’t good to always blame teammates. If someone starts blaming teammates or coaches too much they’ll become less trusted by the team, people might not realize when they make mistakes, or they’ll continue to perform poorly.

Although people shouldn’t be hard on themselves they should always own up to mistakes. Most of the time “There’s not any excuses to make mistakes,” said freshman varsity soccer player Alex Luna. Varsity soccer is having one of their best seasons in recent times. A big reason Luna said is because teammates don’t make excuses and if they do it doesn’t make the team feel good. When a part of a team people always have to do a role, and as people play they’ll always make mistakes even if they’re small. If they come up with excuses then it’ll become harder to focus on their weaknesses since the excuses just become blaming others. It’s always important to take accountability for actions since it helps the team win more games and helps athletes improve. This applies to every sport.

We can see that many athletes agree that people should let teammates know when they may have made mistakes but don’t bring teammates down. When asked, students on varsity sports teams have voiced their opinions on this issue. “It’s important for everyone to reassure whoever made the mistake,” said varsity volleyball player Josephine Torrey. When someone makes a mistake it’s good to let them know that they’ve made mistakes but that doesn’t mean being rude to them. When athletes drag others down, teammates could start disliking or trusting them less; and in most sports teamwork and communication is one of the most pivotal things in order to succeed. By holding others accountable teams can start to work on errors that people may have made during the game while also helping to keep these teammates positive. When teammates actually work together instead of just blaming each other, results end up being better and teams win more games.

In sports it’s always important to take accountability for actions since it helps the team win more games and helps athletes improve. This doesn’t apply to just team sports as well. When someone plays a sport where they compete individually they still shouldn’t find something else to blame. If someone performs poorly in a match they should look at what mistakes they can improve.

When an athlete wants to win, “[They] have to be able to trust [their] teammates and work together,” said Josephine Torrey, and in order to do this athletes have to take accountability. Adding onto that she says “[people] can’t just harp on one person for a mistake that they made, that just ruins the vibe of the game,” blaming teammates isn’t something that’s going to win games. Being responsible for a person’s mistakes is important in sports, and athletes should start being more accountable in order to start winning more games.