Franklin County

[SouthernTNguy]

It appears that Coach Hayworth will be back ,  but changes or additions to his staff for 2025.

https://portal.tssaa.org/common/bulletinboard/index.cfm?category=position

 

New Franklin Co. High School (Winchester, TN) 24 hours old

Franklin Co. High School is seeking high quality assistant football coaches. Coachingpositions will be determined based on qualifications, experience and abilities. At this time allteaching certifications will be considered for possible future openings including an immediateposition as a “Fundamentals of Construction” teacher. Interested applicants can submit theirresumes to Head Coach, Tracy Hayworth: [email protected], Athletic Director, KellyKennedy: [email protected], and Assistant Principal, Brad Cowan: [email protected].

[PercyPeabody]

7 hours ago, SouthernTNguy said:

It appears that Coach Hayworth will be back ,  but changes or additions to his staff for 2025.

https://portal.tssaa.org/common/bulletinboard/index.cfm?category=position

 

New Franklin Co. High School (Winchester, TN) 24 hours old

Franklin Co. High School is seeking high quality assistant football coaches. Coachingpositions will be determined based on qualifications, experience and abilities. At this time allteaching certifications will be considered for possible future openings including an immediateposition as a “Fundamentals of Construction” teacher. Interested applicants can submit theirresumes to Head Coach, Tracy Hayworth: [email protected], Athletic Director, KellyKennedy: [email protected], and Assistant Principal, Brad Cowan: [email protected].

Very surprising but hope some good comes out of it 

[Raider1234]

9 hours ago, PercyPeabody said:

Very surprising but hope some good comes out of it 

🙁

[PullinGuard]

On 10/31/2024 at 3:28 PM, Pizzpatriot2 said:

Neither the administration nor boosters supported him. Add in some of the parents of the time doing nothing but going against him, they got what they deserved. The administration should have recognized that the parents were only going to be supportive for a few short years but the program will be there much longer.

I am a fan of his. Except for the stupid shish at Marion, he was a good coach and knew how to maximize the most out of his players. 

That's okay. People learn something new every day.

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.  

[apsugov7]

12 hours ago, PullinGuard said:

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.  

Its always been his policy, if you do not go through spring then I’ll see you in December. Only way to build a program, if not then kids will just come out when school starts.

[PullinGuard]

On 11/16/2024 at 12:13 AM, apsugov7 said:

Its always been his policy, if you do not go through spring then I’ll see you in December. Only way to build a program, if not then kids will just come out when school starts.

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.

 

Edited November 18, 2024 by PullinGuard

[PullinGuard]

16 minutes ago, PullinGuard said:

Delete

 

 

 

Edited November 18, 2024 by PullinGuard

[PullinGuard]

4 hours ago, PullinGuard said:

 

 

 

Edited November 18, 2024 by PullinGuard