Backroom Report 9-22-08
(Transcript of feature that aired Monday 9-22-08 at 7:35 AM on NewsTalk AM 1270 - WYXC)
Packed stadiums on Friday night mean one thing… Georgia’s second religion, high school football, is in session. Successful head coaches are treated like royalty… men like Larry Campbell of Lincoln County who leads the state with 417 career wins, and former coaches like Dan Pitts, and the late Nick Hyder are all part of Georgia high school football lore.
Yes, we Georgians love our football… and this is especially true in smaller towns like Calhoun, Dalton, Cartersville, and yes Adairsville… unfortunately, sometimes a few parents love the thought of their sons playing on the local squad more than they care about their school, community, or the other young men on the team. This appears to be the situation in Adairsville.
When a high school brings in a new head coach, the most important step is for the school administration to back up their guy 100% as he works to establish order and discipline in the program.
In 2007 new head coach Mark Arthur was charged with the task of taking over an Adairsville Tiger football program that over the last twenty years had been mediocre more often than not. In his first season the Tigers went a very respectable 7 & 3.
However, this season started out on the wrong foot as the team lost their first two games by large margins. The next week Arthur was dismissed as head coach. A school just doesn’t fire a head coach after the first two games unless something else is wrong and at this point one would have to give the benefit of the doubt to the administration… but this story didn't end here and things got even worse.
Assistant coach Brett Tolbert was brought in to replace Arthur and he led the Tigers to a victory in their third game… only to resign a few days later. Two weeks and two head coaches gone… something is terribly wrong in Adairsville and it appears to center around school principal Stan Lewis and a few disgruntled parents who have managed to yank his chain.
Here’s the background… as the season was getting underway Coach Arthur dismissed a couple of players from the Adairsville squad and a couple of other players quit. Like it or not, a head coach must have the authority to maintain discipline on his team…
According to our sources, some of the parents of those players who were dismissed or quit, put pressure on Principal Stan Lewis who in turn put pressure on Coach Arthur to place these kids back on the team. Arthur refused and was terminated… and was replaced by Coach Tolbert.
Lewis then pressured Coach Tolbert to reinstate the players. Tolbert met with his senior players and asked them if those who had quit should be allowed to rejoin the team. Sources say the seniors told Coach Tolbert that they felt allowing those disgruntled players back on the team would be bad for team morale.
Tolbert met again with Principal Lewis and told him he would not reinstate the players and then resigned. Now we’ve learned that all but seven of the Tiger’s players are refusing to play the rest of the season in protest of the principal’s actions.
Here we are only three weeks into the football season and regardless of what transpires this week… for the Adairsville Tigers this has been a year ruined by crybaby parents and an incompetent administrator.
Principal Stan Lewis is now dodging the press and hiding behind the school superintendent. Supposedly a meeting is scheduled for this morning to try and iron out the problems. For the sake of the school and especially the young men on the team let’s hope things are quickly resolved.
For the rest of us there’s a lesson here… we all love our children and want success for them, but they need to earn that success on their own. Just because mom and dad are members of the booster club, or volunteer for concession stand duty doesn’t mean their little junior should see playing time. You earn the right to play based upon dedication and talent.
Thanks for listening and I’ll see you next Monday… for a complete transcript of this morning’s comments, go to NewsTalk1270.com
Packed stadiums on Friday night mean one thing… Georgia’s second religion, high school football, is in session. Successful head coaches are treated like royalty… men like Larry Campbell of Lincoln County who leads the state with 417 career wins, and former coaches like Dan Pitts, and the late Nick Hyder are all part of Georgia high school football lore.
Yes, we Georgians love our football… and this is especially true in smaller towns like Calhoun, Dalton, Cartersville, and yes Adairsville… unfortunately, sometimes a few parents love the thought of their sons playing on the local squad more than they care about their school, community, or the other young men on the team. This appears to be the situation in Adairsville.
When a high school brings in a new head coach, the most important step is for the school administration to back up their guy 100% as he works to establish order and discipline in the program.
In 2007 new head coach Mark Arthur was charged with the task of taking over an Adairsville Tiger football program that over the last twenty years had been mediocre more often than not. In his first season the Tigers went a very respectable 7 & 3.
However, this season started out on the wrong foot as the team lost their first two games by large margins. The next week Arthur was dismissed as head coach. A school just doesn’t fire a head coach after the first two games unless something else is wrong and at this point one would have to give the benefit of the doubt to the administration… but this story didn't end here and things got even worse.
Assistant coach Brett Tolbert was brought in to replace Arthur and he led the Tigers to a victory in their third game… only to resign a few days later. Two weeks and two head coaches gone… something is terribly wrong in Adairsville and it appears to center around school principal Stan Lewis and a few disgruntled parents who have managed to yank his chain.
Here’s the background… as the season was getting underway Coach Arthur dismissed a couple of players from the Adairsville squad and a couple of other players quit. Like it or not, a head coach must have the authority to maintain discipline on his team…
According to our sources, some of the parents of those players who were dismissed or quit, put pressure on Principal Stan Lewis who in turn put pressure on Coach Arthur to place these kids back on the team. Arthur refused and was terminated… and was replaced by Coach Tolbert.
Lewis then pressured Coach Tolbert to reinstate the players. Tolbert met with his senior players and asked them if those who had quit should be allowed to rejoin the team. Sources say the seniors told Coach Tolbert that they felt allowing those disgruntled players back on the team would be bad for team morale.
Tolbert met again with Principal Lewis and told him he would not reinstate the players and then resigned. Now we’ve learned that all but seven of the Tiger’s players are refusing to play the rest of the season in protest of the principal’s actions.
Here we are only three weeks into the football season and regardless of what transpires this week… for the Adairsville Tigers this has been a year ruined by crybaby parents and an incompetent administrator.
Principal Stan Lewis is now dodging the press and hiding behind the school superintendent. Supposedly a meeting is scheduled for this morning to try and iron out the problems. For the sake of the school and especially the young men on the team let’s hope things are quickly resolved.
For the rest of us there’s a lesson here… we all love our children and want success for them, but they need to earn that success on their own. Just because mom and dad are members of the booster club, or volunteer for concession stand duty doesn’t mean their little junior should see playing time. You earn the right to play based upon dedication and talent.
Thanks for listening and I’ll see you next Monday… for a complete transcript of this morning’s comments, go to NewsTalk1270.com
posted by Chuck Shiflett @ 7:19 PM
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