PullinGuard

Franklin County rules at the time said that multi-sport athletes can only move on to the next sport once the full season is over, so the kid had no option to go through all of spring football - he showed up the very first day he was allowed to be there (spring football started before the baseball season ended). And the FC athletic rules also said that you have to move on to the sport whose regular season is next for off-season work. So, logically, since the kid was a baseball player (spring sport, of course), he 100% could not have 'seen him in December', neither as a Freshman, nor as a Sophomore, nor any other year. He did not have the option of working out at football while he was required to be working out for baseball, irrespective of whether time conflicts existed or not. He was not allowed to do both, period. I am aware that these rules have apparently changed over the years and kids are doing off-season work for 2-3 sports at a time now. Not so then. To top it off, McCurry did allow other baseball players to finish the rest of Spring football that same year, to go through summer conditioning, and to play the following season. The only difference was that they had played football in the past years - they 100% were not at football in December onward either - it was not allowed for baseball players. So, thank you - I now understand the issue. McCurry had a longstanding policy that was rendered obsolete and inappropriate by the Franklin County athletic rules and he either wasn't smart enough to realize the inherent conflict, or was perfectly willing to sacrifice a kid's entire career because he didn't play as a freshman. The kid absolutely was not allowed to play, ever, under McCurry's rule, unless he first quit playing baseball - something that McCurry didn't require of other baseball/football players. Good coaches can accurately assess a situation and adjust as appropriate. McCurry clearly wasn't able to do that. It's pretty obvious that if a kid shows up to work the very first day that he's allowed to be under the County athletic rules, that probably ought to be enough to then see if he's ready to work or not. I played for a HS coach who built much better programs than McCurry ever did. There's not a chance in a million he would have turned away a hard-working kid like this. You can't build an elite program by arbitrarily (and forever) rejecting a kid who is talented and hard-working enough to become a two-way starter, region superlative, and college prospect in only two years of playing. To the contrary, one of a coach's most important jobs is to get those guys on the team. In fairness, I do imagine McCurry just never realized that he'd told the kid he could never play under any circumstances, other than quitting baseball. That's not a ringing endorsement of him either.

McCurry was let go more out of concern for behavior/character than because of results on the field. I won't speak on the particulars that I've heard, because I don't know the facts regarding those specific concerns. But I will share one story that had nothing to do with his firing, but which is confounding and should have been a concern. A kid who grew up a pretty good three-sport athlete got to FCHS and decided not to play football there as a freshman. Reason was that he was around 5'8" 150, but not fast enough to be a back, not really big enough to be a lineman. Decided he'd just play baseball, where he was really good and where size/speed combination wasn't limiting for him. Fast forward 10 months or so, from the summer before his Fr year to the end of his Fr baseball season. Kid is now 6'0 180, so the picture looks a lot different, and he's interested in football again. Did everything right - talked to an asst football coach (now a college coach), who encouraged him. Got approval from the baseball coach to go to football instead of baseball during fourth block. Went to talk to Coach McCurry as soon as he was allowed to after the end of baseball season (was mid-way through spring football when baseball season ended and players 100% could not practice both). Explained the situation to the coach and McCurry told him no, McCurry's guys had been working and this kid had not, so he had no use for him. Told him he could check back in December (which he could not do at all, since baseball bullpens would be happening by then, as always). If he had instead said check back for summer conditioning that would have been understandable, reasonable, and fine. The Director of Schools even directly asked McCurry if he was completely sure that's how he wanted to run his program. Apparently, it was, so the kid went right on back to off-season baseball work (which he'd been working hard at all the time, contrary to McCurry's characterization). That was the spring before the season when McCurry was fired. What became of the kid? Of course, he had no option to play football as a Sophomore. After McCurry was fired, the kid (now 6'2, 195) was welcomed to the football team by the new coach, Justin Cunningham. There was no spring practice that year (Covid), so he started from scratch in Summer conditioning and then Fall practice as a Jr who had never practiced or played a down in HS. Started his first game a month or so after his first ever HS practice. Started many games that year, some on both sides of the ball. Was 6'3, 215+ as a Sr, started every game both ways (routinely playing 100+ snaps/game), was All-Region, Region DL of the Year, got numerous college offers (both offense and defense), was All-District in baseball, where he led the team in batting average and walked-off 3-4 games in his career. Finished high school with an unweighted 4.0 and $160k+ in academic scholarships. This story is absolutely true and accurate. McCurry's judgment was that this wasn't the sort of kid that FC football was looking for, which says a lot about McCurry's judgment. To this day, I can't imagine what he was thinking. Best guess is that it was just a case of him making a lot of bad assumptions and making a quick/bad decision without giving it any thought or investigation whatsoever. Then, being more interested in not admitting a mistake than correcting it when questioned about it by the DoS.

FC has had basically all their kids in fourth block for football for several years. So, FC football has started about 1:30pm for at least the last 6-7 years. So, they've had every opportunity to have plenty of time for practice while getting the kids out in time to manage their other responsibilities. So, admin support isn't as bad here as it once was, but hard to believe there's any real alignment with the admin as a whole. As I've mentioned, the pay has been very low compared to similar schools and also low compared to smaller area schools. I don't know the new principal at FCHS nor her views regarding football, but she is very new - think she was promoted within the previous year. Director of Schools has been in place about a year and a half and, while he is originally from FC, he does not live in the County, so it's reasonable to wonder whether he's in it for the long haul. I know the AD a bit and like her, but she absolutely has her hands full trying to manage the chaos from the program, nevermind get it headed in a good direction. The problem I see with a young, capable and energetic guy being the plan for FC is that I can't see why a guy like that would take this job over any others that are open, given the low pay, lack of admin alignment, state of the program, and the current talent level. I should mention that I don't immediately recall any of the previous 5-10 coaches staying more than 2-4 years, and four years is probably the bare minimum for FC to just get back to respectability, imo. If a young guy takes the job and isn't given sufficient time to succeed against the real headwinds, he may not get another good chance. I think that'd be a real consideration for many candidates who have other prospects for a job. So, I think your ideal candidate for FC would be great, I don't see it being a very likely achievable hiring scenario. I do imagine you could find a young assistant who would take it, but it's going to take a really special guy to take it with no exp as a HC and turn it around within the historical timeframe that a coach has gotten here. There is quite a bit of talent leaving middle schools this year, but I imagine many of those kids will find somewhere else to play football (some in this class already have). FC would be competing with all other schools with open jobs for a HC and they are just not in a strong position to hire a qualified guy at this point. That's why I would scour North Alabama for a newly retired guy - FC would only be competing with other nearby border counties for coaches in the double-dip market (and I don't think there will be openings in Lincoln/Giles Co this year, although Fayetteville will potentially be hiring a new guy). That would mitigate the effect of FC's low pay as well. And a guy who's already retired in AL isn't too worried about damaging his long-term prospects should the rebuild just be too daunting in the end. This hiring strategy is certainly a long shot as well, but at least is would logically mitigate many of FC's current weaknesses.

I wonder if the TSSAA is looking into penalties for FC, given the incident at Shelbyville and then the brawl last week. Especially when you also consider their previous two-year playoff ban that was reduced to one year (2020-2021). If so, that could make it even harder to hire a new coach. I do imagine that Spring Hill will get that Region win tonight. Talent is way down at FC compared to last year, even further down compared to 2022. Also well below where it was for the 4-5 years before that - this year's team might have the least talent ever at FC. Talented FC kids are going to other schools during or after middle school very often these days - that's been an issue for quite a while, but it's worse now than ever. I can't blame those kids or parents. Given the problems on and off the field I imagine they'll have to make a change, but they will have a lot of trouble attracting even a competent coach, let alone a good one. They historically pay very poorly compared even to other rural schools, including those at lower classifications. A great, great coach could probably have them competitive in 3-5 years, but I can't see a guy like that remotely considering the job. I don't see any established coach going there due to lack of money/talent. I don't see any up and comer (Lower-level HC or sought-after assistant) going there due to talent and the likelihood that he'd torpedo his own career by taking the job with the program in this bad of a state. Maybe a competent coach who is very near retirement and who has a soft spot in his heart for FC would consider it, but I don't know of anyone who might fit that description. Their best bet, should the job become open, is to scour North Alabama for a competent coach who has reached AL retirement age, who could then drive from his AL home to FC and double-dip for a while. I don't like the idea of a guy not living in the community, but that might be the only hope of hiring a qualified and competent coach to get the program off the mat. Always possible a guy like that would consider moving, assuming he can double-dip, at least. The county to FC's west has had tremendous success with that hiring strategy over the decades. Hopefully, something like that could allow FC to be in a position to hire without so many constraints next time. History suggests that the route that will be taken is that a hire will be made of someone from Franklin County who is willing to take the job for very low pay. Normally, you wouldn't consider elevating from the current staff, but I wouldn't bet against it this time. Unless they can thread the needle with an AL retiree, it's likely the candidate ultimately chosen will not have been a head coach at the HS level before, given the extreme headwinds for an FCHS hire. Hopefully, one of those two strategies will result in a coach that can at least elevate the program to a better level than where it is today. I vastly prefer the AL retiree approach if were to be possible.

100% correct. Ejected player misses entire next game, regardless of when the ejection occurs (in HS).

*********FYI****** Thunder Radio 107.9 FM 8m · BREAKING NEWS Coffee County head football coach Doug Greene has resigned, effective immedietely. Roger Haynes will oversee football operations for the remainder of the football season. More details soon to this developing story.

I'm not that surprised by Shelbyville. They were the smallest 6A school last year and are now just about the largest 5A school, and are in the second year with their new coach. I expected a jump from them. As another poster mentioned, FC lost a ton of talent by graduation and also had a (very late) HC change. Another significant issue is in the coaching staff - the offensive staff (at least) is very thin these days. The departing HC should be viewed as having been the OC or at least the co-OC last year. The other co-OC from 2022 is now a part-time only coach due to job changes, so I assume he's no longer involved in game-planning/play calling. In fact, over the course of the last three or so years, they have lost at least four coaches who were the primary offensive play callers at one time or another and are now on the fifth. To my knowledge, none of these departing coaches were replaced at all. I'm not going to mention any remaining coaches by name, because the fact is that there are just a few offensive coaches left trying to do the work of an offensive staff that was about four coaches larger in 2021. At some point, a staff that small is just not going to be able to get everything done that needs to get done. I was told that they wanted to hire more guys last year and were denied the money/budgeting to do so, but cannot confirm that. It's very clear they haven't been able to hire asst coaches for two years for some reason, regardless. It's hard to understand, because they certainly had a full staff in 2021. They also seem to be down a defensive coach or two from 2021. They have a pretty good QB and two other good offensive weapons. The OL is mostly pretty experienced but has under-performed as a unit this fall. They're having trouble running the ball and also can't protect long enough to throw it effectively. If you can't run it, can't protect enough to throw it, and don't have some sort of a wizard at OC, there are going to be big problems. They are routinely splitting one of their best targets to each side of the formation. With the limited pass pro, this means they only have one real target available on each passing play. They're going to have to consider putting them both on the wide side of the field and hoping they can get one of them open in the very limited time the QB has to operate, because there is zero chance that he can scan both sides of the field in the time he's getting. It's a longshot to help - if you can't run the ball and can't pass block, no amount of scheme is going to help a whole lot. But I think you have to start by being sure that both of your best options have a chance to be involved.

Man, it could be a barn-burner - you just described Coffee Co, too! Coffee's defense may be 'ok' to 'pretty good'. Need more evidence to know where they actually are on that scale.

I saw Franklin Co vs Coffee Co. Both offenses were bad. Defenses looked pretty good, but have a feeling it was more offenses being bad than defenses getting much done. Franklin Co struggled up front to move folks in the run game and to protect in the pass game. They have one very young OT, but the rest have played a lot. Based on that, they could improve some, but not a whole lot, imo. FC had two bad long snaps (one punt, one FG), that arguably cost them 6 points. So, there is a spot that there is a lot of room for improvement. Young OL is LT, and he could improve as the season goes along. Lots and lots of operational issues for FC (Delay of game, false start, procedure, bad clock management), so one would hope that would get better as well. Unless Coffee was well above average on the DL (3 DL plus one rush LB, typically), FC is going to struggle offensively this year. Oddly enough, that was expected to be a strength. Defense played pretty well - 2 or 3 LB's were good, DL was ok to good, DB's were ok. Offensively for FC, the OL struggles painted most of the picture. QB running for his life, not much push up front from the group as a whole. They do have one really good OT, but that doesn't matter much if there are missed assignments elsewhere, of course. Region is who we thought they were, going 2-5, with narrow wins over a 1A and a 2A team. I'm still thinking Shelbyville/Col at the top, Tull/FC next, Lawrence Co, Lincoln Co, Spring Hill 5-7. We'll see.

Well, that doesn't sound good. Maybe they should be the '5', or they and the other LC fight it out for 5.

I'll go: 1. Columbia 2. Shelbyville 3a. Franklin Co. 3b. Lawrence Co. 3c. Tullahoma 6. Lincoln Co 7. Spring Hill Think Columbia always has players, but had a bad one-year experiment at HC last year and will rebound. Beating CPA in a scrimmage was a surprise. Going Shelbyville at the two just because they are so much bigger than most of these schools - almost 50% more enrollment than many of the others, and think that last years' results had a lot to do with being the smallest school in 6A. The enrollment and fact that the new coach is now in year 2 suggests to me that they'll have a chance to begin recovering from their own HC experiment from 3-4 years ago. Next three in line are close - throw a blanket over them. FC has some pieces for sure, but do they have enough and can they come together quickly enough? Tullahoma doesn't appear to have a passing game and that'll hurt them, but I'd expect them to play better than last year. Lawrence Co had a good year last year, but history suggests they run out of horses at some point. Lincoln Co doesn't seem to have enough Seniors and athletes in general to compete at the top. Spring Hill is still struggling mightily. I don't know much about Lawrence Co. They could def be better than projected here if they didn't lose much from last year, as a poster indicated above.

Found the Tennessean prediction for all: Class 5A Region 5-5A: Lincoln County, Columbia, Shelbyville, Franklin County, Tullahoma, Lawrence County, Spring Hill. I suspect that any of the top five could turn out to be the winner. Need way more info to see who can pull it out. Among those five, I think all are either have new coaches, or coaches in their second year.

Thanks, checked out some clips on him - looks like he has some talent and is working hard. With that said, I only saw about 3 Sr's listed on the online roster. Now, those are often wrong, but if they have fewer than even 10 Sr's, that's normally a problem for teams.