[FBALL]

I knew that FBALL would eventually bring this up.

Here is the other end of the spectrum....:::

When we played JFL inthe 6th,7th and 8th grade we had NUMBERS and I am talking 1100-1200 kids in the high school, now we had around 650,, you can not tell me that this is not a reason for the kids not coming out.... So I hav prepared a list of other issues::::

1. We do not have the number in the school system like we used to. Almost cut in half, now with the layoffs and the economy, ARMCO and other companies I see this to continue....

2. When we played JUNIOR JFL, the high school did not have a Soccer team, no fall baseball, No video games, No Academic team, Boys did not cheer !!!!!!. We had baseball and track in the spring, basketball in the winter and Football inthe fall. Thats IT.


3 Now if you look at the Freshman team this year, they had low numbers,, but they have had low numbers from the beginning, no surprise there...

4.We had 75-80 kids onthe varsity team when I played with no freshman, the band had 100-150 kids in it!!!! We just dont dont have the numbers..

Now we can sit around and gripe about playing time or "My boy does not get to play and he should, The coach does not know what he is doing, he is killing my kids ego about starting......OR playing..... Well we can see both side of the arguement but we need to focus on a solution that is best for everyone in the long run.

Breaking the Middle school team down to JFL teams is not the Ultimate Answer, and here are some reason why:

1. 1990-1998- RHS had a record of 73 wins 33 losses, with the JFL
2000-2008- RHS had a record of 87 wins 21 losses, with 6,7,8th grade ball.

In 2000 we had an enrollment of 700 kids in the High school.
This year average is 660. it has dropped to as much as 652 average in 03-04 year. And I say again, the numbers are not there and they are dropping.

The current Middle School numbers is 493 students, 6,7,8th grade.

2. I can only answer for myself and the team I coached this year, the kids got more playing time this year in 6th grade than any other year in football.
TRUE !!!!!!!??????

3. Our 6th graders learned every high school football play inthe playbook, pulling guards, motions, passess, reverses adn everything was ran the same as High School. The 6th grade DEFENSE was taught the same defense the high school uses, same nomenclature, same stunts,same names for positions, same calls from the sidelines evertything was the same as high school. Kids learned and ran multiple positions and learned the blocking schemes from every position. So in reality we had 4 QBs, 12 running backs, 8 ends,and 15 linemen.

On the other side of the argument I also had kids that would not go in when you tried to put them in. I can name 5 kids right now that only wanted to stand on the sideline and wanted a jersey, They would tell you that they did not want to play and that the only reason they were there is that their parents made them play. These were the kids that hid behind kids, stood at the back of lines and did not want to play. YES THERE WERE THOSE KIDS TOO !!!!!!!

As a coach you play the best kids in each position, if you are not the QB and you can play end and play it well, then play it. If someone is better than you then they play the position. If a kid does not practice hard and pay attention, goofs off and does not ask a question when he does not understand, then when it comes time to do a job, he will not know what to do and he will stand out........

We can argue both side of the fence all day long but here is an answer to Middle School Football:

8th grade plays 20 games
7th grade plays 20 games
6th grade plays 20 games...... Sound rediculous until you look at this.

30 kids on a team each grade has a Varsity and JV game. Divide the number of games in half, all kids get to play. If you complain becasue your son does not play in the varsity game then you have no arguement about playing time, it is something else entirely.

Each team can play, work it out with the coaches of the opposing teams and I am sure that they would love to do the same thing to get there kids the playing time too.

There is no restrictions of how many games you play in Middle School, there is no governing body that restrict who you play or how many games you play.

The new KYMSFA is a great thing and allows the teams to play for a state championship at 7th and 8th grade level. They make sure that kids are eligible, by grade and by age-(hold back issue). They oversee it and take care of it.

They do not restrict the number of games either. BELFRY 8th grade team played 20 games this year, how do think they get there kids playing time?? They do it by playing more games.

Of course if you restrict the team to only playing 10 games, playing for a championship then you play to win with the best kids you have. if there was another game to get kids in for playing time and it makes your team better then why not do it??

I know that teams we played this year wanted more games and wanted to play 2 games back to back, we see it right now.. we agree and play. Morgan Co, Boyd Co. Lawrence Co. were local teams who wanted more games, Greenup Wurtland wanted to play us 5 times in a season becasue we taught our kids how to play,,,, ( we beat them everytime we played them and they knew that beating us would be tough but they wanted to play us anyway because of competition, they lost 5 games total in their season we were 3 of them)

SO a way to correct the issue is have more games which can be done easy, it makes more money for your league and helps the kids overall.

DRAWBACK to playing against each other as in JFL:
1. Kids dont want to play against their friends, they want to play WITH them.

2. Kids would fight in school in Pee-Wee league becasue they would be playing against each other coming up. This destroys friendships and does not build a team. Look at Greenup Co. They have more that one middle school and seperate teams. They are combining their teams next year in middle school. They will have a 6th a 7th and an 8th grade team combined from both schools. They are working on building team togetherness and know that NOT playing together has destroyed their high school program. It Shows !!!!

3. You only get as good as your best player, You can be a big fish in a little pond or you can learn to play together and play other schools.

In closing: My opinion......
Breaking down the Middle School teams into JFL teams will not cure the problem and will only create more problems in the long run.

We have plenty of numbers for four JFL teams. When you and I played there were six.

Don't use that argument about the economy. I work for AK. I know the situation much better than you. That doesn't change anything about the kids that are currently here and the ones who have quit teams because of the playing time issue. There are a bunch of them. Even some off of the 6th grade team this year. Want to bet there won't be nearly as many of them playing in 7th grade? I'll take that bet.

We had soccer when I played. It had just started though. The fact that there are more options for kids shows even more reason to keep the ones that want to play involved so they don't quit and go to another sport.

If you want to complain about playing time or egos or "your boy" thats up to you. My concern is for the Football program at Russell as whole and every single kid that is involved with it.

Sorry but most people and parents did not want to play 20 games. They do not want to travel all over the place when you can get just as many games and just as much playing time playing at home without the travel and expenses.

You may have had a Utopia in the 6th grade. But the 7th and 8th grade did not. They practiced together and half of the time you ended up with kids standing for an hour at a time doing nothing but watching. Not just one kid but all of them. You want to tell that kid he wasn't paying attention when he was standing doing nothing for an hour?

Kids like to play against their buddies. It does not cause problems and it does not destroy friendships and destroy teams. If anything it promotes better sportsmanship and competition.

Do you really want to use Greenup County and their feeder system as an example? I sure wouldn't. How about we use Ft Thomas as an example. The play in league against each other. They get more kids than any other school their size in the state.


My opinion. Break them down into JFL teams and keep the numbers that we have to start with. Yeah they all will not continue to play. But many more of them will and provide greater depth for the highschool program.