Sports thoughts
Iwant to thank all the readers for your nice remarks on the Timmie Phillips story. Your texts and emails were generous. However, I have a critic that doesn’t like anything I write. I believe he wants sports news that is current and real, not sentimental or nostalgic. Sports topics that we face everyday and have some meaning.
Let me describe this constant critic — a pseudo intellectual who could double as Grumpy from the Seven Dwarfs — or better yet a fly in the front seat of your car who won’t leave no matter how many
windows you put down.
There are some real stories out in the world of sports, here are a sampling. The AIA has just reported there were 241 boys and girls ejected from basketball games this past season. To put this in perspective, in 35 years of coaching basketball I had two players ejected.
Coaches say refs are looking for a reason to throw players out. Refs say players are more verbal and physical. Referees say fans and particularly parents are abusive verbally from the start of games. Lets not forget that 111 coaches were ejected this fall and winter in Arizona. Football did a little better this season; there were only 40 punching ejections. You might wonder why there are a shortage of referees in the state. Could this carry over to the classroom, our state is only 2,000 teachers short?
Let’s look at the financial side of high school sports. My good friend Randy Hoeft of the Sun, recently reported that participation fees were being raised locally to $45 a sport. “Off Road” Randy, I remember when schools took care of kids, but that’s nostalgic. Today we do things differently. By the way, Yuma’s participation fees are low compared to the rest of the state.
We live in an age of club sports. Specialized teams that get tons of games, compete nationwide, have personalized coaching and can cost between $10,000-15,000 a year. My goodness, what’s the old adage “the rich get richer and the poor get screwed.”
Let’s talk a little about the kids that play. We now have “free range children” — yes, when I first read it I thought they were talking about Perdue chickens. Yes, some kids will be able to legally explore their worlds without penalizing their parents. I wonder how many “helicopter parents” are aghast. You know, the folks that hover over their kids constantly. The ones that believe everybody but their child is at fault. The ones that believe in participation trophies rather than championship trophies. What a joy high school coaching must be today.
Some more real sad news, many school districts across the nation are contemplating or have already done away with high school football. There are many reasons, but financial and participation are the main two. Districts can’t even pay their teachers, let alone provide money for the most expensive high school sport. Kids in certain areas are not going out in the numbers that a previous generation did. In many districts where funds are low, administrators put most of the financial burden back on the parents.
I’ve given you some real news and most of it stinks. That’s what our papers and net report. Many sports fans relish in scandal and controversy. Well readers, you can get all the bad news you want easily, but from now on I’ll try to stick to humor, sentimentality, nostalgia and feel-good stories. Your Sunday mornings should start with a smile. Oh, and by the way, I’m still trying to get the fly out of the front seat.