catfever

Oh, and by the way.  The board voted against the grievance brougth against Coach Jost just a few months ago.  I don't know how you get they were running him out of here.  They approved his contract and voted in favor of him in the hearing.  Sounds like they wanted to keep him.  Maybe somebody else wanted him gone.  Besides, Marble Falls is a step up.  4A job in the hill country.

Feel free to run.  There will be 4 spots up for re-election.  Put in all those hours up there with people criticizing the decisions you help make without any pay.  They try to put every student or athlete's interest in mind.  Each one of those employees of the district had issues that went far beyond the school board.  I am sure that if you would ask outside of your own little circle, you would find these issues.  None of which need to be brought up on this board.

Foreman will not apply for this job.

It will be posted, but I have heard that they are wanting to move quick.  There will probably be some in house candidates.  Not sure who will be on the hiring committee since they currently don't have a superintendent.  It will be interesting.  I am sure whoever they get will instill discipline, work ethic, and teach all those things that Coach Huck taught.  He isn't the only one out there that can teach that.  He did a great job at winning at football, but their numbers were way down.  They only had two teams the past two years.  Maybe some of those kids that walk to hallways will come out and play now.  Talking to some friends, I know that there is a new excitement among the staff and kids.  The next few weeks should be interesting.  Who do you guys think should get it.

It will be interesting to see what current head coaches in the area apply.  I wonder if there will be any surprises.  It is a good small school job where you can be successful.

Some of those big time high school players might go to different schools if the current Freshman were staying.  For instance, if Anthony Davis, Kidd-Gilchrist, Teague were having to stay in school would those other 3 ESPN100 kids still sign with Kentucky or maybe another school.  Who knows, but either way it would make things better.

Nobody ever said anything about doing away with football.  Football is a wonderful sport and makes kids more mentally tough and many kids love it, but what about the kids who don't like football.  The intention of my previous post and how athletics need to progress with society is that you can't keep doing things the way it was done 10, 15, 20 years ago.  Kids should practice skills on their own, yes, but if they are not going to, we can't just throw our hands up.  We have to weigh the importance of what needs to be taught (weights, speed, skills) and teach that.  It may change with any given group of kids.  Some kids may love to lift weights and will do it on their own, so you can work more on skills during that 50 minute period of time.  The opposite might be true as well.  That is what I meant by progressing.  Athletics has to be willing to change.  I am not about ME, I am about WE.  I look out for those kids who often get overlooked and what might be best for them.  I also disagree with you on the fact of Orangefield being competitive in all sports.  I believe they can be, but I do not think it will happen if things don't change.  Their fundamentals in baseball and basketball will get worse and worse and they will not be able to compete.  I went to many subvarsity basketball and baseball games this year.  It is already a problem.  I have even attended some baseball practices and just basic things are not known but there is not enough time to teach it during the season.  It needs to be addressed during the offseason.  Is Orangefield going to contend for state championships, probably not.  I do believe that they can compete for playoff spots and then in some years maybe district championships.

Many skills from all sports can be taught in 50 minutes.  My belief is that the Head Coach of the sport should be allowed to decide what days to lift weights, what conditioning or agility drills would benefit his kids, and what sport specific skill drills could help his sport.  Most coaches want to build something within their sport so they would want to get better in the offseason.  It is hard to do that when you have no control over what the kids do in the offseason.  Many people have gotten on here and said that kids should be motivated enough to do it on their own.  I completely agree and when I was younger we were like that.  Are we really naive enough to think that very many of them are going to do that today.  Kids have changed.  They don't live outside anymore to throw the ball around or shoot hoops.  Society has changed and athletics needs to adjust as well in order to progress.  Somebody mentioned the 2010 Bobcat baseball team.  That team had three young men who really knew how to work and were gifted with many natural talents as well.  They were very driven.  Those kids don't come around very often.  Not many teams have 3 Division one athletes on one team at the 3A level.

I refer back to my previous post.  All the other 3A schools in 21-3A have a class or are allowed to practice their sport during the athletic period.  This would include baseball, basketball, and football.  During any part of the year, they may use the 50 minute period allotted everyday to practice however they like (team, individual, weights, conditioning, etc.).  They may not practice after the school day except during their season as set by the UIL. 

Bridge City has a baseball and basketball.  WOS has baseball and basketball.  Silsbee has basketball and baseball.  HJ has basketball and baseball.  Who knows what the new AD at HF will have, but with a certain board member on the nomination committee and his kid play bball, they will probably be able to do thier sport.  So OF will be the only one in 21-3A that doesn't.  All of you are correct.  Kids should learn the basics of all sports in the youth ages, but the sad part is there are more and more that are not being taught, and without those individual skills, the team will suffer.  Dove wasn't Universal offseason one of the things that you griped about when your boys were at HF.  Do they practice skills at Ozen now.  Also, there is 50 minutes allocated during school that they can practice as a team.  It is after school that they cannot do this until their season starts.  The coach can design any workout during this 50 minute period all school year. Also, I never said kids couldn't practice football during this time.  That should be completely up to the Head football coach if he so chooses.

This topic would probably get a more accurate response on the baseball and basketball forums.  IMO, yes it does help.  They can get better at individual skills that are a must in order for a TEAM to be successful.  They still need to work on throwing, batting, and catching in baseball and dribbling and shooting in basketball.  I agree that kids don't need to specialize at the 3A level, but lets face it, some kids aren't football players, just like some are not baseball or basketball players.  Why should the kids who just aren't football players, not be able to get better at the sport they like to play.  If done properly, this would not encourage kids to specialize, it would just benefit the ones who do.

I have one question.  Is he getting all this support from the community because the football team is doing better than under the previous coach?  I would think that most head coaches/athletic directors would teach about discipline, morals, mental toughness, etc.  I would just like to know if this would be any different if he had only won 2 or 3 games a year the past three years and the football numbers were as low as they are. 

So a team, that by your own admission, had not won at any level, accomplished something that hadn't been done in decades and they were allowed to work on basketball during the athletic period and still lifted weights.  So it isn't impossible.  I would think that baseball could also do this and the fieldhouse walls would not come crumbling down.  Hmmmmm.

I am all for the coaches being able to coach.  That is what I want ALL of them to be able to do.

You are right.  Skills should be taught at a young age.  You know that there are many situations where this is not done.  Skills are still taught at the junior high and high school age at every sport.  This cannot be done after school because the coach cannot instruct the kids except during the season.  How do the athletes get better skills in the offseason, except during the period.  They also need to lift, but skill improvement is a must in order to compete with the more athletic teams.  I guess we will just trust that the kids will do it on their own.

In a previous thread, Bobcat05 said that when he was in school, they were allowed to work on basketball some days during athletics.  This seemed to benefit them since they ended up going to the playoffs for the 1st time in decades.  I also believe at that time, the football team had gone a couple rounds deep in the playoffs.  My question is, did allowing them to work on basketball 2-3 days a week, divide the school and the program.  How many football teams did the have?  Did kids want to quit football since basketball was getting to get better at skills.  I guess I just don't understand why this would be so bad.

Let him do his job is correct.  Lead athletics.  Let the head coaches design workouts that benefit thier athletes.  Why is that so difficult.  The principal doesn't go into every classroom and tell them how to teach.  Nobody is asking to not lift weights, condition, or do agilities.  I am not going to change your mind and you are not going to chane mine. There is more than one way to skin a cat.  I guess that is my point.

If she allows the basketball and baseball coach to design their own offseason and inseason programs, it is a great thing. 

I've got it. Make huck just the head football coach and principal becomes ad. Best of both worlds

The basketball record before Huck got there was better.  OF made the playoffs one year and lost in a play-in game the next year.  I am pretty sure that both of those years, they got to do basketball workouts.  The year he got to OF, they finished 4th, last year 5th, and this year they tied for 3rd.

I guess you misunderstood what I wrote.  During the football season, the basketball and baseball players lifted a workout ONCE a week.  After football season, everyone started lifting twice a week.  That is news to me about the basketball program being too lenient.  My son was a part of it, and never thought that once.

I guess that should be up to the Head Coach to implement into the baseball or basketball program. 

Also, you can do all the research you want.  There is a huge difference between a football weight workout and a basketball weight workout.  There is also no reason you should lift More in the offseason than you do during your season.

Answer this question.  What would be so bad with letting the sport that is in season work on their sport during the athletic period?  They could still lift.  They would just do it when the HEAD coach of that sport wanted to.  Is that some sort of crime.  I believe that is what most other 3A schools do.

If the discipline is an issue, then why wasn't this done last year after the punishment was handed down.  Why didn't they go after the basketball coach, who turned the kids in.  Why didn't they go after the principal who handed down the punishment.  It is easy to blame it on the discipline and not dig and realize that maybe the running of he athletic program is the issue.  The first poster hit the nail on the head.  The kids that don't play fooball, don't like doing football workouts.  Go figure. I have had a kid in this program all three years Huck has been here and the comment about it being the same way all three years is completely untrue.  This year for instance, the athletic period changed from last period to in the middle of the day.  This was done so everyone could go through the same workouts all year.  The only problem was, everything changed once football was over.  During basketball, which my son plays, they had to go through offseason workouts, except on game days.  How gracious.  It wasn't this way last year.  Why did it change.  I guess after school practice is the only time that they get to work on the sport that is in season.  How many other schools that are in our district work their programs this way. I guess the bottom line is, he is a great football coach, but there are more kids who don't play football than do.  Why is the athletic program centered around the season of one sport?  It doesn't matter to me, my kid is now done, but don't blame it on three kids discipline when that probably has nothing to do with it.  Dig a little deeper.