Why exactly is the Mercy Rule in place? Whatever happened to just playing the game and teaching boys (or girls if they play the game which some do) that sometimes a huge loss is just that -- a loss. Character is built when you teach kids how to lose gracefully. Your idea that this league is about you as a coach, dad, mom or league President, or Board member is flawed. No one cares what you do, don't do or how you perform. The ultimate question is whether your child is improving, having fun and becoming a better man/woman because he can handle the losses with the wins. If you as a coach, dad, mom, league President or Board member harps on these alleged atrocities so much so you seek to "punish" others . . . you are only teaching your kids to be complete failures, complainers and ultimate losers in life. Your kids will be the ones with their hands out begging for favors b/c they are inadequate in every respect.
I would imagine this rule was put in place based on a gentlemen's agreement or understanding that no coach would intentionally run up the score. I have read the by-laws and "definition" of the "Mercy Rule" and no where does it allow for this board to meet out a punishment of any sort, let alone to tell a man he is put on a lifetime probation. No where does it outline what any alleged punishment would be either -- it was left undefined b/c no one ever expected this type of result. If you want to continue with these decisions, please know that the rules are so vague and lacking in definition that they do not call for the use of "evidence" (such as videos), let alone using video and then not letting the accused party to view it in his or her defense. If you want to start holding "ethical" boards and meeting punishment, you better have some protocol and particularly defined violations in writing in addition to what is required to constitute a legitimate vote to punish a coach and/or vote off a Board member.
This board needs to be a little more pensive in how they act in the future. They are skirting on the brinks of a discrimination lawsuit. One in race given the 2 coaches they put on probation are African American (a repeated pattern I regret) and now sexual. This I am afraid is coming from a white mother who is tired of listening to all this bantering of pathetic men. You seriously kicked off of the one women who is on this Board? I have no idea what she did to warrant such action but, again, where do your by-laws allow for such action? You guys are fooling yourselves if you think your "punishments" have any real consequence other then defaming and libeling certain individuals. These people have no legal impetus to follow your punishment other than they are trying to be respectful to the league and the kids -- which this is all about and kudos to them for not fighting back. Be careful what you say to disparage other individuals on this forum and elsewhere. The internet has a strange way of coming back to bite you in the --- (anonymous or not). Things that are said on these forums can be used in discovery and in litigation.
Stand up and be real men and teach your boys to be proud losers or winners, no matter how the chips may fall and no matter how bad you think you have been cheated (truth or not). You aren't teaching your kids squat if you helicopter and try to outdo their "failures" all the time. Life lessons people -- get real.
