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Who is running the football team at DB, the athletic director & coaching staff or a group of alumni and fans that wouldn't know a football from the UFC?

Is there any chance that the decision making folks over on Lebanon Road in Hermitage will take a close look at the Merit System? IMO, we will not see the TSSAA do anything until after the BA case is settled. I can't beleive that the TSSAA is going to continue the fight after they lost in the US Supreme Court, but I guess they had no choice but to spend some more the the tax payers money. The schools need to ban together and pass a rule that the Board of Control has to pay for any financial losses due to legal bills out of their personal checking & savings accounts. The Board of Control should spend the money as if it were their own dollars and sometimes we all must cut bait and get on with our life.

Who is recruiting Marco?

What are the top 10 teams (everyone together no D1 or D2) and the top 4 individuals in each weight classificaton. Keep the D1 & D2 out of the rankings.

With their great facilities & tradition my guess is the honeymoon is over for the 1st year coach. Let's not forget that the former Apopka, FL coach didn't last long @ Valdosta but when you make $100,000.00 per season to coach high school football people demand that you win championships.

Weak Schedule!!!!!! This takes place every season with the DB fans talking about how good their team is but they never get out of East Tennessee much less face the good Middle Tennessee teams. If DB is to ever win a state championship they must upgrade their non region schedule. What happened to the game they used to schedule against MBA? Take a look at Ravenwood's non region schedule, can we say tough?

While I have not seen all of the high school athletic facilities in Tennessee, I have seen quite a few and no one has what I would refer to a great facilities when compared to what is in some other states. Take a look at what Valdosta High School in Georgia has and you will really be shocked.

One way to find out who the best is would be to place everyone back together and use the "MERIT SYSTEM" for football classifications.

Is it smack talk or is D2AAA football that much better than D15A football?

Laz, Everything sounds great but I would have 4 classifications for football, basketball, and baseball. Tweak, rework (or whatever you want to call it) the divisions every 4 years so that teams can have the home & away schedule and it be even. It would be great if each league, region or district had 6,7 or 8 teams in them so that each school could schedule 3,4 or 5 games outside of the mandatory schedule. This would also allow for a team to schedule very tough teams if the know that their league is weak. I like the idea of placing everyone back together and taking the top 16 teams in each division to the state football playoffs.

Coacht, Why are so many people against the "MERIT SYSTEM" that has worked well in other states? Do the people in Tennessee feel that they have superior brain power and just want to show the world how smart they are by inventing a new system that has never been proven to work? Could it be that the TSSAA Board of Control is scared of change like most people in the world so they are going to try and stick their head in the sand and hope that the problems go away?

Why will it not work on a large scale? Give it a chance because what we are using now is truly not fair to the rual public school or small private schools. Show me where I have ever complained about the multiplier. My response is that while it may not be the solution, everyone needs to stop complaining a get to work. The TSSAA needs a long range plan to solve this and several other problems but I don't feel that they have to leadership to solve any problems. They have knee jerk a reaction to most every problem instead fixing the problem. The TSSAA acts and conducts business just like any other government agency that has ZERO competition.

Give the "MERIT SYSTEM" a chance and see who is crying!!!! It would be fair for everyone which is good unless you want to control the situation and wish not to be fair.

Have you guys been going to the Mouses Ear???????????????????????

The Clinic Bowl is a way to raise funds for Vanderbilt Childrens Hospital. When the TSSAA State Championships were held at Vanderbilt the final games were called the Clinic Bowl. Before the playoffs they would play a game (may have been Thanksgiving Day) between two good high school teams and the game was refered to as the Clinic Bowl. It seems like they would get the best "city team" and have them play the best "county or rual" team" @ Vanderbilt and call the game the Clinic Bowl.

You talk of sports being the only way out of poverty for some poor athletes and I have a problem with that. Sports may be the easy way out for those athletes but EDUCATION is the best way out of poverty for those same athletes. Athletics is a quick fix but in the long run those with the most education will make more money and have a much better quality of life. Those same athletes have a much better chance of being admitted to medical, law or graduate school than they do of playing professional sports if they worked on academics. We often hear of how some kids from the housing projects play basketball ten or twelve hour each day but I ask you just how smart would they be if they worked on academics for five or six hours per day? How many times have we heard of the ex professional athlete that was broke and on the streets when they were in their 50's and beyond? Never under estimate the power of education.

Larry, What would be wrong with using the "MERIT SYSTEM" for all schools and placing everyone back together? By using that system everyone would be on a level playing field and politics would be eliminated from everything. No one school (public or private) would have an advantage. Use the system, place everyone back together in four classifications and the attendance figures will begin to rise again because a state championship will be more valuable and cherished. Everyone knows that the Tennessee state championships have been watered down. JMO, some schools and communities will fight the use of the "MERIT SYSTEM" because they political clout within the TSSAA will evaporate. This is nothing more than a turf war between adults/communities trying their best to receive some type of athletic advantage over all of the other schools.

Yes, public schools could ask to be placed in D2 but that would be for all sports and not just for football.

My personal opinion is that if Jeff hangs around "G" much longer he will begin to smell like the backside of a mule and Jeff is much to smart to allow that to happen. The best thing that could happen is for Jeff and Carlton to swap jobs. The "G-Man" and Carlton are one and the same and deserve one another.

Bingo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You won the Grand Prize!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Let's not forget that McGugin took an assistant coaching position at the University of Miami to gain some college coaching experience. Who would blame any coach for leaving Franklin Road Academy for MBA. FRA refuses to make the commitment necessary to win in football.

If you are willing to use the "MERIT SYSTEM" for the open zoned public schools why not put everyone back together and use it for everyone? Oh I forgot, you don't like private schools so you are trying to get them kicked out of the TSSAA.

What ever happened to the old Antioch coach Billy Whitaker? I heard that he now has a nephew coaching in Nashville.

1. Brentwood Academy 2. Maryville 3. McCallie 4. Ooltewah 5. Alcoa 6. Ravenwood 7. Smyrna 8. Riverdale 9. Goodpasture 10. Hillsboro

I could see Rutledge leaving MBA (very few people like working for the "G Man") but I am not sure that BA would be willing to pay him $165,000.00 per year and that is probably what it would take. It has been reported that he makes $150,000.00 as the AD and football coach @ MBA and no one changes jobs without a 10% pay increase. It's probably more likely that Rutledge would take a college or professional job.

If you really want to get all of the private schools out of D1 you must use reverse pshychology on the 4A & 5A schools. Get all of the small schools to push for the D2 schools back into D1 and watch how fast they rush to help you with your cause. The most economical and fair way to get control of the situation is to put everyone back together with 4 classifications and use the MERIT SYSTEM (like Ohio) to determine who qualifies for the playoffs. The problem is that 99% of the people could care less what is fair, they want to tilt the playing field in their personal direction so that their school has a major advantage. If the TSSAA is going to make it another ten years they need someone to take charge that will clean house and place people in charge that will treat all schools fairly.