Grundy County Football

[PurpleGrad]

I realize Mr. Grad of Purple that you never answer me but I'd ask why would you be surprised at a misplaced importance on sport over academics? You are a coach yourself. You have to have seen this countless times. It's just the lay of the land isn't it? It's how things are almost everywhere. How can you be surprised at this?

 

I'm not joking at all.

Just because it's the "lay of the land" doesn't mean one has to advocate that type of mentality. Fans and parents are often too thick headed understand that the vast majority of high school players have no chance at playing the next level and therefore the academic success Is greater than the athletic success. That is the exact reason that I have an academic requirement for my team that is more strengent than the county-wide minimum requirements for passing. My #1 job is to see that they get an education. Edited October 15, 2013 by PurpleGrad

[MountainDillard]

In all seriousness good for you. That is what's most important.

[mtngoatbilly]

Just because it's the "lay of the land" doesn't mean one has to advocate that type of mentality. Fans and parents are often too thick headed understand that the vast majority of high school players have no chance at playing the next level and therefore the academic success Is greater than the athletic success. That is the exact reason that I have an academic requirement for my team that is more strengent than the county-wide minimum requirements for passing. My #1 job is to see that they get an education.

Good post Grad. What most of these people do not realize is that football is just a game. A game that some people take way to serious. Most of these young men will never have the opportunity to go and play at the college level or much less the pro level and get paid for playing. They are out there because they love the game and want to have fun. But the fact of the matter is first and foremost these young men need an education. If our county would put as much emphasis on education as they do on sports we would set these kids up to succeed in life and not just on the field.

I am as passionate of a fan as you will ever meet. I go to all the games. I cheer from the 1st quarter all the way till the horn sounds at the end of the game.(winning or losing) I want to see us win every game! But I will tell you this story. I was talking to a parent of a young man who plays and he was relating to me something his son told me recently. He said no matter what I am going through I can always depend on my coaches to be there for me and help me. He was not talking about football. He was talking about life! As a fan and as a parent who has a kid in this school. I would gladly sacrifice a couple of wins for the sake of my child getting a good education and learning how to succeed in this game called life. Anyone who does not feel that way.......well........I am sorry for you.

That's all I have to say about that.

[mtngoatbilly]

Here is some positive and possibly promising news for the Grundy County fans on here. In the most current 3a playoff standings listed on the TSSAA website, out of the their current 32 total projected playoff teams, yall are only 6 spots behind/below the last team that is projected to make it in on their list. It appears that if yall was to win 2 out of your last 3 remaining games you would stand a very good chance of getting into the playoffs as a 8 seed. I think yalls next two games are very winnable.

Thanks for sharing this Tiger. That is encouraging. I would agree, the next 2 games are very winnable.

[DCTIGERFAN]

Thanks for sharing this Tiger. That is encouraging. I would agree, the next 2 games are very winnable.

Best of luck in your remaining games. I know this season hasn't gone as many thought it should have went for Grundy County, but the door isn't completely shut on you just yet. If yall can salvage your season by stringing together a couple of wins, you will have a decent shot at landing a spot in the playoffs.

[mtngoatbilly]

Best of luck in your remaining games. I know this season hasn't gone as many thought it should have went for Grundy County, but the door isn't completely shut on you just yet. If yall can salvage your season by stringing together a couple of wins, you will have a decent shot at landing a spot in the playoffs.

It has been disappointing but I have seen alot of improvement over the past 2 games. I think we do have a shot to salvage this season.

[Beavcleaver]

Good post Grad. What most of these people do not realize is that football is just a game. A game that some people take way to serious. Most of these young men will never have the opportunity to go and play at the college level or much less the pro level and get paid for playing. They are out there because they love the game and want to have fun. But the fact of the matter is first and foremost these young men need an education. If our county would put as much emphasis on education as they do on sports we would set these kids up to succeed in life and not just on the field.

I am as passionate of a fan as you will ever meet. I go to all the games. I cheer from the 1st quarter all the way till the horn sounds at the end of the game.(winning or losing) I want to see us win every game! But I will tell you this story. I was talking to a parent of a young man who plays and he was relating to me something his son told me recently. He said no matter what I am going through I can always depend on my coaches to be there for me and help me. He was not talking about football. He was talking about life! As a fan and as a parent who has a kid in this school. I would gladly sacrifice a couple of wins for the sake of my child getting a good education and learning how to succeed in this game called life. Anyone who does not feel that way.......well........I am sorry for you.

That's all I have to say about that.

I will put it like this, as an educator and an adult it's our responsibility to guide our young children and teenagers in the right direction. That's our god given duties! I agree with education should come before athletics I agree on grads policies of him setting his standards higher than the required policies. And I like and support that. But folks I am sorry when it comes to agreeing on keeping the current staff in place. If I am not mistaken we have had kids in the past 2 or 3 years getting letters from colleges there junior year and that fizzles away time senior year gets here. We have some student athletes that could play at the next level but we don't have a staff that helps these young men try to succeed at that level and pushes them. That's like our RB #1. You play these cream puff teams and instead of letting him pad his stats you go away from him and use him as a blocking back? Do we help these kids by sending out high light tapes? Etc. put kids in positions and let them shine at doing what they do best! Don't take opportunities away from them just because little Johnny doesn't get to play or get his carries. We need to push our athletes to be the best they can be on and off the field! Be role models! At the high school level you wouldn't believe the elementary kids that look up to these athletes. As I have always said, as a coach your job is to win games! Losing is suppose to hurt! winning is a reward that you get for all your hard work you put into it. This day and time things are different it doesn't bother a kid And there parents to lose anymore!! When you don't get hungry and want to go the extra mile and work harder for that then what exactly are you teaching these kids? Failure and losing should be unacceptable it's not how many times you get knocked down. It's how you respond to getting knocked down? This is how things are being looked at here in GRUNDY now by some if the post I have read here. Losing is ok here apparently a long as we can keep this current staff. I'm sorry but in my book losing sucks! Period and is unacceptable! You strive to be better than you were the day before and if you work hard and are determined and have heart any given day anyone can win! IMO 5 years is long enough, we haven't seen any change. I have no problems with the character of any of this staff. Bottom line is winning games as a coach. Sorry....

[DCTIGERFAN]

It has been disappointing but I have seen alot of improvement over the past 2 games. I think we do have a shot to salvage this season.

Yeah both games should be a battle of two equally matched teams.

[PurpleGrad]

Beav... I do agree with a lot of your last post. The idea that losing is ok in my opinion comes from little league sports where everyone gets a trophy for just participating. It also develops from parents who move their kids from team to team and start new teams just because they don't like the coach or little Johnny don't get to play the right position or isn't the "star". I don't see any of that changing.

 

As for the winning is most important part... I disagree. Learning to overcome adversity, dealing with defeat and maintaining a positive attitude are life lessons that high school sports teaches and are far more important in my opinion than winning. Last year we had a brutal schedule. The only Class A teams that we played were our district opponents. All of the others were one, two, or more (Ga teams) classifications bigger than us. With nine games left to play we lost our leading scorer to a season ending injury, ironically vs GC. We finished the regular season with a 7-18 record. Not good at all if you think "winning" is important. What you can't see from that record is that when our leading scorer went down, new players stepped up and filled his role scoring and defensively. He was averaging 21 ppg but in his absence we kept our scoring average the same. Also, when we were losing games, the players never got down on themselves because we knew how hard we were working, how tough our competition was and we kept our sights set on winning the District Championship. My guys always kept fighting every game and they never gave up. Life lesson. We limp into the District Tournament with 7 wins and a #4 seed. No one gave us a chance to win it. No one except for us. First game was a nail biter that we had to hang on in the final seconds to win. Semi final game we had to come from behind in the fourth qtr to beat the #1 seed. In the Championship game, we were down 11 points to the #2 seed team with 2:30 remaining in the 4th qtr. I called time out and when the guys came off the floor the first thing one of them said was "we got this". Because we had been battle tested all year long, there was no panic among the players. There was a true feeling that we were still going to win the game. We tied it up and won in OT. Now, if you go with the "winning is everything" mentality and you see our 10-19 record you'd say we weren't very good. I say that was the best team that I have ever coached and those guys learned more about perseverance and positive attitude than they would have if we had won 20 games last year. My point is, you can't judge a team, coach or program simply by looking at win/loss records.

[mtngoatbilly]

I will put it like this, as an educator and an adult it's our responsibility to guide our young children and teenagers in the right direction. That's our god given duties! I agree with education should come before athletics I agree on grads policies of him setting his standards higher than the required policies. And I like and support that. But folks I am sorry when it comes to agreeing on keeping the current staff in place. If I am not mistaken we have had kids in the past 2 or 3 years getting letters from colleges there junior year and that fizzles away time senior year gets here. We have some student athletes that could play at the next level but we don't have a staff that helps these young men try to succeed at that level and pushes them. That's like our RB #1. You play these cream puff teams and instead of letting him pad his stats you go away from him and use him as a blocking back? Do we help these kids by sending out high light tapes? Etc. put kids in positions and let them shine at doing what they do best! Don't take opportunities away from them just because little Johnny doesn't get to play or get his carries. We need to push our athletes to be the best they can be on and off the field! Be role models! At the high school level you wouldn't believe the elementary kids that look up to these athletes. As I have always said, as a coach your job is to win games! Losing is suppose to hurt! winning is a reward that you get for all your hard work you put into it. This day and time things are different it doesn't bother a kid And there parents to lose anymore!! When you don't get hungry and want to go the extra mile and work harder for that then what exactly are you teaching these kids? Failure and losing should be unacceptable it's not how many times you get knocked down. It's how you respond to getting knocked down? This is how things are being looked at here in GRUNDY now by some if the post I have read here. Losing is ok here apparently a long as we can keep this current staff. I'm sorry but in my book losing sucks! Period and is unacceptable! You strive to be better than you were the day before and if you work hard and are determined and have heart any given day anyone can win! IMO 5 years is long enough, we haven't seen any change. I have no problems with the character of any of this staff. Bottom line is winning games as a coach. Sorry....

Beav...for the most part we do not agree on much. I want the coach here.....you dont.....blah blah blah....

However I do want to commend you for a very well thought out post here. I can't say I agree with you a 100%. But I can tell you put some though into it and it was a good read.

[Beavcleaver]

I know in 07-08 and 08-09 and 09-10 there were winning seasons there. How many years have you been there? I am unaware. But I think after 5 seasons if you can't turn around a program then it speaks for itself? Most of the players you are referring to here in your post are they underclassmen? Also this, if you go 10-19 every year for 5 plus seasons and never finish .500 you should keep your job? You really think you deserve to keep a coaching job with those kinds if results? I understand why you are defending the staff here now..........

Edited October 15, 2013 by Beavcleaver

[PurpleGrad]

I know in 07-08 and 08-09 and 09-10 there were winning seasons there. How many years have you been there? I am unaware. But I think after 5 seasons if you can't turn around a program then it speaks for itself? Most of the players you are referring to here in your post are they underclassmen?

My first year as head coach was 06-07. Yes, we had winning records in those three years but that is exactly my point. Last years team was better in terms of teamwork, attitude, effort, academics, coachability, and social behavior than any of those three teams but our record wasn't as good. Which is why win/loss record is not a valid method for determining effectiveness of a team, coach, and program.