When a starter is benched

[ksgovols]

Couldn't help but notice you didn't use your real name either there, Mr. KSGOVOLS. But that's o.k. I'll stand up to my daughter against cowards all day and all night long. This was a STATE event, o.k? You didn't know that it wasn't just a COUNTY event before, so I will let you slide on that one. But now that you know, I would hope that you understand that she had a state and a county obligation to fulfill. I would also like to tell you that she has been playing basketball since the 4th grade, and has missed 4 practices in EIGHT YEARS. She has played sick, she has played with deaths in our family, and she has played her heart out. That is dedication, KSGOVOLS.

You also talk about consistency. I will give you a break on that one, too, since you apparently don't know that other girls got to start even though they had missed prior practices due to sickness. You said yourself that your opinion is that there is NO GOOD REASON to miss, and that consistency is the key. NOW what do you have to say? I personally am GLAD that the girls got to start, and that they won. My kid was thrilled, and only hated that she had to miss the game. Who wants to miss their HOMECOMING game on purpose? I always hate it when people comment when they haven't gotten all the facts. Get your facts straight, do some research, THEN post your comments.

Oh, and by the way...I could CARE LESS if CHAMIQUE HOLDSCLAW starts or not. I'm not HER mother. Further, I don't care what YOU would do, OR WHO you would start or not start.

But thanks for the comments. Keep trying, though. I'm sure you have posted some comments in the PAST that have been accurate, and maybe you will post some in the FUTURE, but you missed the mark TODAY, pal.

You obviously don't know my kid, or her team. She has a great team with great friends. She wasn't even upset that she didn't get to start. She was put in after about 3 minutes into the game. She will be fine. I will be fine. I can sleep at night knowing she did the right thing. Others can't say the same, however.

 

 

XXXXXXXXX. Everybody from my area knows exactly who I am by my screenname as if it makes a difference. What's your last name YYYYYY?

 

I stand by everything I said. I wouldn't start your daughter if she missed practice or a game FOR ANY REASON. That would apply to everyone on the team. I could care less how long she's played basketball, how many career points she has or what other coaches on other teams do. If I'm the coach and she misses a practice or a game, she won't start the next game FOR ME. I don't have to know your kid, your parenting skills or your coach to know what I would do.

 

I never said she didn't do the right thing. I said she wouldn't start for my team the next game if she missed practice doing the right thing. She could go see the president of the United States and recieve a medal for sportsmanship and being an all around good kid...............and she wouldn't start the next game if she missed practice or a game. That would be a team rule that is non-negotiable. I think your daughter has more insight into team sports than you do. That's why she's not upset about not starting. It's not that big a deal. First whistle, she can go in. Punishment over. No harm, no foul. I think there's too much emphasis on starting.

[Dragonmaster]

PLAY NICE

[ShawnaUsesHerRealName]

Keith Seagraves. Everybody from my area knows exactly who I am by my screenname as if it makes a difference. What's your last name Shawna?

 

I stand by everything I said. I wouldn't start your daughter if she missed practice or a game FOR ANY REASON. That would apply to everyone on the team. I could care less how long she's played basketball, how many career points she has or what other coaches on other teams do. If I'm the coach and she misses a practice or a game, she won't start the next game FOR ME. I don't have to know your kid, your parenting skills or your coach to know what I would do.

 

I never said she didn't do the right thing. I said she wouldn't start for my team the next game if she missed practice doing the right thing. She could go see the president of the United States and recieve a medal for sportsmanship and being an all around good kid...............and she wouldn't start the next game if she missed practice or a game. That would be a team rule that is non-negotiable. I think your daughter has more insight into team sports than you do. That's why she's not upset about not starting. It's not that big a deal. First whistle, she can go in. Punishment over. No harm, no foul. I think there's too much emphasis on starting.

 

Hey, MR. KEITH SEAGRAVES. "NO HARM, NO FOUL?" You are lost. You said, "Punishment over." Then you said, "No harm, no foul." Which is it, Mr. Seagraves? A "PUNISHMENT", or "NO HARM"? You obviously don't realize that punishment IS harm. Bless you. You are looking awfully silly when you continue to contradict YOURSELF.

You are right about one thing...my daughter is a wonderful team player and has immense insight into the game. And Keith, I sincerely hope you are not coaching anyone's kids. It is obvious you are narrow-minded, have very little insight into the feelings of young children, and don't care to get on the bandwagon and bash a kid for doing the right thing. What if she were honoring a veteran or a person who has passed away? You don't think she should be excused for any of those things either? Nothing is worth more than a game??? What about bringing a person to Christ? That wouldn't be excused either? Wow, Keith. You really have shed a lot of light on what is important to you in your life. I am sure that your fellow community members already know what you stand for, though. Good luck to you, Keith. I mean that with all sincerity. I won't further debate with you. I am making people see you for your true colors, and that just doesn't feel right, Keith. I feel badly enough for you as it is.

[ksgovols]

Hey, MR. KEITH SEAGRAVES. "NO HARM, NO FOUL?" You are lost. You said, "Punishment over." Then you said, "No harm, no foul." Which is it, Mr. Seagraves? A "PUNISHMENT", or "NO HARM"? You obviously don't realize that punishment IS harm. Bless you. You are looking awfully silly when you continue to contradict YOURSELF.

You are right about one thing...my daughter is a wonderful team player and has immense insight into the game. And Keith, I sincerely hope you are not coaching anyone's kids. It is obvious you are narrow-minded, have very little insight into the feelings of young children, and don't care to get on the bandwagon and bash a kid for doing the right thing. What if she were honoring a veteran or a person who has passed away? You don't think she should be excused for any of those things either? Nothing is worth more than a game??? What about bringing a person to Christ? That wouldn't be excused either? Wow, Keith. You really have shed a lot of light on what is important to you in your life. I am sure that your fellow community members already know what you stand for, though. Good luck to you, Keith. I mean that with all sincerity. I won't further debate with you. I am making people see you for your true colors, and that just doesn't feel right, Keith. I feel badly enough for you as it is.

 

 

It's obvious to me that you don't know about putting team before self or you have never been a part of a team perhaps. Have you ever had the responsibility of fielding a team of young people and what it takes to bring a mixture of different personalities into a team and make them into a unit? The first thing you have to establish are some ground rules for the sake of the team. Perspective is something that I have learned as a coach of young people. The big picture. What I might demand from my Tee Ballers that are just getting into team sports and what I would of high schoolers that will be out on their own in a few short years are two different things. I've also found that young people are starved for discipline and team rules for the most part. A structured environment that tells them before they make their choices what the consequences will be. Then they make their choice and take their medicine and move on. A lot of the teams that my kids have been associated with after they've become teenagers require them and their parents to sign contracts stating the team rules and the consequences if those rules are broken. I see nothing wrong with that. I've said, fairly consistently I think, that not starting is a 'mild punishment'. I don't think it's too severe and it provides a base upon which the principles of 'team' can be reinforced. There will always be other commitments, better things to do, responsibilities that a team member may not be able to overlook. Fine. I get it. It's tough being a member of a team.

 

P.S. I've not personally attacked you or your child. I don't even know you guys. Not real sure which team you represent. For you to make insults and personal attacks against anyone that doesn't follow your line of reasoning speaks volumes YYYYYYY.

[ecu]

/roflol.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":roflol:" border="0" alt="roflol.gif" />

This is getting to personal. There are exceptions for everything. If you are always black and white you will eventually get burned by your own rules. If a player is missing they should have to do something,but use common sense. Heard of a situation where a kid was going to Hawaii with his parents during Christmas and was going to miss a tournament. What would you do?

[AlwaysTruetoVB1]

Amazing thing is she does work with our children, she is our volleyball coach ..............lucky for us. Her daughter is always better than our children, at everything. We watched it all volleyball season. Nice to have a Coach like her ruining our system.................................................................. because her daughter is the BEST!! and can do NO WRONG!! We all know the real deal!!

[ksgovols]

What would I do? That's been pretty clear I think, but what's more is I guess this is something I just take for granted in our area. Two examples:

 

1. A child goes with his family as luck would have it, Hawaii, to watch his parents renew their wedding vows on a once in a lifetime trip. His mother has been through some medical problems and this was an emotional family event.

 

He didn't dress the first game after he came back because he'd missed several practices and a few games. He then resumed his normal routine with the team. He knew going in what the consequences would be AND expected no less.

 

2. Our only senior blows out her ACL early in the summer. Rehabbed like heck and got back around Christmas time after working out and practicing with the team for several weeks. This is a girl that's got colleges looking at her.

 

She didn't start her first game back. She came in after the first dead ball to one of the most emotional ovations I've ever seen at our school. But she didn't start right off the bat. She had to play her way back into that role.

 

It floors me that folks think it should be any other way. I'm not saying basketball above all else. They're teenagers with a lot of fun things going on in their life, BUT it's not a birthright to have a starting spot on the basketball court. That could even be a game to game thing depending on what's going on at practice, during games and off the court. Nobody has a problem with players being held accountable for grades. To me, that's just one of the ground rules that a team has to have. Otherwise, a coach is interpreting the rules all of the time and deciding what's an acceptable excuse to miss practice or games and what is not. I mean at our school if they are sick and miss school they don't play that night. That's an excused absence from school. Doctor's note, whatever. Let's make this easy. Miss a practice or a game and you don't start the next game if you're normally a starter. If you're a sub and wouldn't see the floor anyway, here's some extra running or conditioning that you can do to make up the lost time. It's not going to kill them. It makes them accountable for their choices and responsible to their teammates.

 

There are very few exceptions, a lot of excuses. If I have 5 to put on the floor to start, that's what I would do, so I guess the one exception I could think of would be not having 5 members of my team that obeyed all of the team rules before a game.

[ShawnaUsesHerRealName]

/roflol.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":roflol:" border="0" alt="roflol.gif" />

This is getting to personal. There are exceptions for everything. If you are always black and white you will eventually get burned by your own rules. If a player is missing they should have to do something,but use common sense. Heard of a situation where a kid was going to Hawaii with his parents during Christmas and was going to miss a tournament. What would you do?

 

Thank you so much, ECU. /thumb[1].gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":thumb:" border="0" alt="thumb[1].gif" /> That has been the most intelligent comment I have read up to this point in this discussion. You are so right when you said that 'there has to be exceptions' for certain things. Otherwise, a coach's own rules become incoherent, confusing, and purely egotistical. The idea of punishing a child for fulfilling school-authorized obligations is just plain egotistical, when another child can start a game when she has missed because she was sick. Consistency is the key. Nobody should be punished because she was unlucky enough to catch a virus, or unlucky enough to have a State Fair Convention on her Homecoming night. Having a virus

and/or missing Homecoming is punishment enough in and of itself.

There has been a virus going around. We all know that ballplayers are very susceptible to 'sharing sicknesses' due to the nature of the beast. Girls don't want to miss ballgames! They live for these games. But sometimes, they have to miss. The team as a whole has been through a lot of sickness. So I say, find out if she really is sick, and don't punish her for it. Find a way to let her make it up, just like if a child really does have a school-excused function.

As a coach, if a person is smart and works in the school system, that person knows when a kid is really sick, or when a kid really has a school function, or when a kid really did have a close family member to pass on. Like you said, "Use common sense." /flower.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":flower:" border="0" alt="flower.gif" />

Make that child run to make up for the missed game/practice, or make her stay in the weight room an extra 2 hours, or SOMETHING. I have helped coach my own kids, I have coached other people's kids at the elementary and the high school level, and I can guarantee I was smart enough to know if a kid really did have a dentist's appt. 3 different times in the same week, or if she was really just riding around town with her boyfriend. I mean, it simply isn't that hard to figure out who is dedicated to the sport, and who isn't. All the players on my daughter's team are good kids, and they all work hard. They deserve to be recognized for that, and they also deserve to not be punished for fulfilling obligations or for being unlucky enough to catch a virus. They need a mentor to say, "How are you feeling?" or "Hey, good job representing our county. This is what you have to do to make up the absence(s)." Then lay out the rules to make up the absence. A dedicated player will adhere to however many super sevens the coach says, or whatever he says. My daughter knows that the more she runs, the better athlete she becomes, and the more hours in the weight room, the more strength she has under the goal.

As far as the trip to Hawaii, well...I'll tell you. As a coach, I would be physically sick if the girl or boy was a valuable player and this was a tournament, but things like this come up. Personally speaking, I'd let the kid go, and I would make him/her promise to send me a postcard. /tongue.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":P" border="0" alt="tongue.gif" /> We aren't guaranteed tomorrow in life, and this might be the kid's only chance in her entire lifetime to go to Hawaii. Some might say, "Yea, but her parents could have planned that trip for summer when ball season was over." Yes, indeed. Maybe they sure could have. But I don't think the KID should be punished for it. Unless he/she makes the decisions in the household, or pays for the trips. Maybe the child had little or no input into when the trip was going to be. Should he/she as a child be punished for the plans and vacations her parents enforce while she is underage? I say no.

I had a kid who missed almost 2 weeks of practice this past summer because she was on a trip to Washington D.C. It was a school-related function because she had been elected as our Congress representative. I hated the fact that I couldn't utilize her in practice for that long. The girl was a senior, for crying out loud! But I wished her well on her trip, told her to have a great time, enjoy all the Smithsonian had to offer, and that I would see her when she got back. I was happy for her, and she did in fact have a great time. I wouldn't have wanted her to miss the trip for anything. It was rough without her, but such is life. I'm so glad I did the right thing, and I'm so glad she had the opportunities that she had. Just like I am so glad my daughter spent 3 days at the state convention to accept awards for our county, even though SEVENTIESEAGLE only posted that she was at a stupid pageant and that the team played better without her. Which is not only a complete falsehood, and made people think that it was not SCHOOL-RELATED, or EXCUSED, which it MOST DEFINITELY was, but it was also directly bashing a 17 year old kid! I am not worried about the comment that the team played better without her. Anyone can check the stats and/newspapers and see what a valuable player she is, or just come to one game. Everybody knows she is an excellent athlete.

Anyway, thanks for your comment. /roflol.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":roflol:" border="0" alt="roflol.gif" />

[ShawnaUsesHerRealName]

Amazing thing is she does work with our children, she is our volleyball coach ..............lucky for us. Her daughter is always better than our children, at everything. We watched it all volleyball season. Nice to have a Coach like her ruining our system.................................................................. because her daughter is the BEST!! and can do NO WRONG!! We all know the real deal!!

 

If you are AlwaysTruetoVB1, then why are you so jealous of my child's success? Why can't you congratulate her on being such a dedicated athlete for our county? If you really loved our county, you would be happy to see her on the court.

Listen, I'm sorry that you are jealous of my daughter. I'm sorry that you are jealous of me. I am sorry that you are so vicious toward a young person. I'm sorry that you have to hide behind a fake name to make comments about an underage child. But mostly, right now, I just feel sorry that you obviously have so much hatred inside. Let me clarify something. I have always wanted my child to be treated fairly, not differently. I will continue to ask for fairness when I see fit.

Your comments are so outrageously childish. Want to give all of us your real name? I'm guessing not. You and SEVENTIESEAGLE keep hanging in their together, o.k? Good gracious. Some kids just happen to be good athletes and have high conditioning that she receives from her father.

You are really bashing her for what she inherited and what she has achieved? No comments back to you until you tell the world who it is that is jealous of Shawna and her kid. You are truly a sad case.

[ksgovols]

In 50 words or less, what's so bad about not starting a game if you've missed practices or a game prior to the next game? Is your daughter going to put 'started every game of high school career except the one where I went to 4H Congress' on her resume'? No. It's one game. I only have a problem if the consequences aren't the same for all the members of the team. Nobody's stopping any of the girls from doing anything that they want to do outside of basketball. The first 2 minutes of a basketball game is 1/16th of the game. Not a big deal and EVERY player on the team has value. You prove that by enforcing team rules uniformly across the board. If you don't, there is no team.

[seventieseagle]

All of this is definitely not what I intended when I first posted. My whole intention was simply to support our coaches and their decisions and I most certainly did not mean to harm a child in any way. I love all of our players and would never do anything to puposefully harm one. Everything about this girl that has been posted today is true. She is a team player, she is a wonderful young lady, and she is without a doubt a very exceptional athlete. Her display in the 3rd quarter against MTCS was dominating and I definitely understand that we need her to be as successful as possible down the stretch. I obviously overreacted in my attempt to support the coaches I guess because I've been frustrated by what I felt was unjust criticism. I was actually trying to stay away from negativity toward players, but I guess I did not accomplish that. I know it does not completely fix all it has apparently caused but I have edited my entire post to convey what I truly wanted to say along - support of our coaches and players. This includes you during volleyball season as I want all of our sports to be successful.

 

With all sincerity please accept my deepest apologies. I only want our team to be successful down the stretch. I hope we both can cheer for the same cause without animosity.

[Coach_B]

To summarize since I write too much /dry.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="

 

1) Arguments attacking the person are good for politics but invalid normally.

2) Your daughter is an excellent post player that will be vital to our teams success.

3) I bet you will find good coaches on both sides of the not starting argument.

4) At best this thread doesn't help your daughter or her team. At worst it hurts them.

5) Criticizing a coach is fine if done constructively.

 

Forrest in the tourny we either play a higher pressure man where we cut the floor in half & then in a 4th & cut off the passing lanes, or we pack it in a two-three zone & hope they can't hit from outside. I don't believe coming out in our regular man is going to work against them since they will run their offense until we get out of position & they get a shot near the basket. We all have opinions. I don't think its wrong to give them as long as they are given constructively.