McGavock team has broke up

[Rebelsman]

AAAAAAAAAmen!

[TnBball]

You know I've heard of this before. I think its great that the coach took a stand..Just look at Duke University, although their players wear tatoos but you very rarely see wrist bands, NO headbands at all, and the players hair are cut the same.

 

I've heard of a coach allowing his black athletes to wear a mustache or keep the sideburns but shave them up and keep the face clean because he (White coach) felt that was part of the african american culture. But he would make his white athletes cut all facial hair because he just felt they wanted to look "cool". But he did not allow braids, tatoos, wrist bands, and they all wore long socks with their TEAM shoes. I think thats great. I've always loved Bobby Knights philosphy as far as team concepts. Its just good to set the rules from the start and either you want to play or you dont..its just that simple!!

[CoachF]

Many of you saw the post under tman3eagle yesterday and I am sure like myself you were very upset. I sent a message to coacht about it to have it removed. I just want to set the record straight about the young man that uses that name. He is an 8th grader at my school. He is a good young man and he did not post that vulgar message. He made the mistake of using a computer at the East YMCA and did not log out. The post came at 3:47 pm and at that time he was in the middle of basketball practice. He made a mistake in leaving his name on the computer. Nothing more and nothing less. Panthergam is one of the most respected coaches in the state and a very good friend of mine. I am sorry for what happened but I wanted to clear the air. It was not the registered user known as tman3eagle.

[mchsballer]

hmm-cut or be cut! sorry,i just had to say that,its too funny.

[thedude]

After all the summer league games and workouts this and that.Harris just to throw something like this in the kids face 2weeks before the season starts,thats not easy for the kids to just say "yeah i'm about to get my hair cut" harris should have said something about cutting their hair in the summer thats not right,and he knows what kind of team he has.Harris has not had a very good season since i dont know when ,then as soon as he gets a team to have a very very good season its messed up.All i can say is coach Harris if your team cut their hair God is with you but, if they dont come back to the team i feel sorry for you for even tryin to think about going to the state

[answerking]

so if Coach H sees that his offense isn't working, he has to check with the players in advance before he can change it? Maybe team discipline was way down, maybe the players forgot who the coach is, maybe the players were running the court more worried about how their braids bounced. Who knows why he instituted the rule, but he is the coach and if you want to play for him you have to follow his rules. Rule changes dont need the approval of anyone except the coach as long as they are constitutional and the Supreme Court has said that hair rules are constitutional. If these guys are such babies that their choice of not cutting their hair has kept them from playing basketball, then they didnt have a chance at state anyway. It takes a more mature player to win at that level.

[Dice1550]

Well as for hair rules being constitutional and what not, have you ever heard of Ex Post Facto? As in you can't make up a rule after it's already been broken? Such as if a player does something the coach doesn't like, but it wasn't a team rule, then the coach couldn't go and make a rule saying that what they did was wrong and kick them off the team for it. I know that this may not be what happened, but it seems close. If the players want to have braids, so what? I have yet to see a team torn apart because they had different hair styles. And what is this crap about people with braids being drug dealers and getting suspended for disrespect? It sounds to me like a lot of stereotyping is going on. I still haven't seen anyone respond to the person who asked what would happen if a coach decided to make all of his players wear braids. It's the same principle and I bet that a lot of you wouldn't be having the same feelings about a situation like that as you are about this one. I understand that the coach runs the team and he makes the rules, I just don't understand why the coach would make a rule well into practice right before the games are started, that is not a fair choice to give to the players. You also said that the young men had the choice to play or quit and that since they CHOSE to quit then they shouldn't be getting on here whining about how they can't play. I haven't seen any player from McGavock on here complaining about how they can't play so I don't see your point. It might not be that their hair is more important to them then the team, but their rights are and they may not want to play on a team that is going to infringe on their rights in such a manner. Besides, every player has the right to some individuality, if all the players were the same the game wouldn't be fun and the teams wouldn't be any good. Every players individual aspects brought together for the whole of the team is what makes a team truly special.

[CrazyVol]

Thank you Dice for saying what I was having a hard time saying. Someday cooler heads will prevail.

[ParisRiverRat]

The coach is the coach, and the players must respect his rules. The problem here sounds like he is having to play parent as well. There is no place in athletics for thug-like behavior. This is so ridiculous, if these boyz want to play, then they will follow TEAM rules. Only in the hood, this rarely takes place anywhere else.

[Opperman]

Dice...is he punishing them ex post facto? If I'm a coach and I tell you, effective tomorrow, you will not play basketball wearing 'rows, then that's not ex post facto. Ex post facto is if you shaved your head yesterday and I say tomorrow that nobody can play with a shaved head. If you re-shave it, it's not ex post facto, but if you let it grow back, it's not.

[Guest Bluetorn25]

"Hair leds to wrist bands to tatoos to destruction" Whoever said this needs to wake up. Hairstyles, tattoos, and wrist bands do not lead to destruction. When is the last time a team won a championship when at least one of their players had none of those listed above? I'm not saying all teams who do not have these things do not win championships, but I am saying that more often than not, championship teams have all three of those listed above.

 

Someone else said that the rule put in by the coach was good because those hairstyles gave the team a bad image. Big deal, you can't go around in life worrying about what other people think of you. That would be just plain stupid. If a team cannot play well together because one or more player(s) have a certain hairstyle, then they'll never be able to play well together. Great teams will not let something like that bother them.

 

Tattoos and hairstyles are forms of expression, and the coach is taking that away. Personally, I think it's wrong and that he needs to worry more about coaching and winning than whether or not some people might think they look like "thugs" for having them. Why does a certain hairstyle or a tattoo make someone a "thug"? Their actions make them thugs, not their hair or tattoos.

[Dice1550]

First of all, who said that having braided hair makes someone a thug? Or that having your hair-braided is thug-like behavior? So if I see a white player with a shaved head can I say that is showing racist behavior? So many problems in the world today come from stereotypes, and that's what half of this thread is based on. Opperman, in my post I said that may not be what happened, but it seems close. I still think it seems close, and the example you used could still be considered ex post facto. I mean if the players already made the team and when they were already on the team without the rule of not being able to have braids, then the coach tells them that they will have to cut their hair, that seems like ex post facto to me. That's making a rule that wasn't there in the beginning, and to tell the players that to be on the team they will have to cut their hair without having knowledge of such a rule when they decided to be on the team isn't fair.