Players attacking opposing high school coach? What is happening with youth sports?
UPDATE: The AJC has reported more details on this story today, including that the Warren coach was injured when he intervened in a post-game fight between players at the Hancock stadium. Please read the updated story, in which the Warren superintendent contends that more than 30 Hancock players attacked Warren players, and the Warren coach tried to intervene and was “smashed in the face with a helmet.” Warren school chief Jean Carey wants the GBI to investigate but the Hancock sheriff has declined to bring in the GBI. The GBI says it can’t open a probe at the request of a school superintendent.
This is the second story in a week that makes me wonder what is happening to youth sports. The AJC is reporting that Warren County head coach David Daniels was attacked after Friday night’s game against Hancock Central High School. Warren County won the game 21-2. Daniels was allegedly attacked by players from the Hancock team.
The Warren County superintendent has asked the GBI to file criminal charges in the attack, which was so severe that Daniels is in the hospital with head injuries and has undergone major reconstructive surgery to his face to deal with crushed bones above and below his eye.
I would hope that Hancock Central High is taking a strong stand and doing its own review of what happened and whether its players assaulted Daniels. If so, their football careers at the school should be over.
Last week, police in Carroll County said parents tried to fight 11- and 12-year-old football players. Parents reportedly rushed the field after a call that they didn’t like. The parents yelled obscenities at the children, and one held a child down and tried to remove his helmet so another kid could slug him, according to police. Police issued citations to three coaches for disorderly conduct and obscene language.
These stories are so depressing that I am not sure what to say. If we wonder where kids learn violence, we don’t have to look to TV or movies. In many cases, they are learning it from their parents.
–from Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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154 comments Add your comment
Jackson Truitt
October 20th, 2011
8:38 am
Please, none of the players involved will lose a scholarship. Look at all the thugs playing pro sports now. They still get the big bucks even when guilty of assault, rape and cruelty to animals. Do you really think they weren’t thugs while going to college on scholarships?
Competitive, physical sports aren’t the problem, parents reliving glory days aren’t the problem. The problem is that we, our society, have lowered our standards to the level of the gutter. Anyone who practices honor, integrity and responsibility are ridiculed as unsophisticated yahoos or punished for being uppity. And we let it happen just like the people decades ago in NY who sat in their apartment and watched while a women was raped in the ally.
Football teams shaking hands under police watch. Are school sports programs broken? | Get Schooled
October 20th, 2011
11:44 am
[...] to the post-game handshake to prevent mayhem. That is what Richmond County decided in the wake of the Warren-Hancock game that ended with the Warren coach in the hospital for facial surgery after being struck in the face with a [...]
RTS
October 21st, 2011
9:05 am
There are a lot of interesting comments on here; however, the one thing I cant understand is HOW in the world no one has ben arrested for this. For someone to be injured to that extent and no one has been arrested is a pathetic example of law enforcement in that county. There were plenty of eye witnesses that should be able to identify who used the helmet to hit the coach. GBI or not…the local law needs to do there JOB!!!!! That is regardless of who the person involved is. I know how small towns work (I live in one) and it should not be this way, it gives small towns a bad reputation.
Rena Ball
October 21st, 2011
9:48 pm
My mom told be about an incident not as bad, but still serious that happened between her high school and a rival school when she was in high school in the late 1960’s. This kind of stuff isn’t new.
The other school is around 30 minutes away in the neighboring county. Her junior year the basketball game between the schools was at her school and the rival shot an arrow through her school’s paper mache owl (her school’s mascot). Two students from her school then sprayed tear gas on the rivals booster bus, sending a few students to the hospital. Those two students were suspended from school, but returned to school as heroes. The following year my mom went to the basketball game between the two school’s at the other school’s gym. She said there were police officers everywhere. After that, both schools decided it wasn’t worth it and paid to break the contract to play each other in basketball. I don’t know if they’ve started playing each other again, but it was at least many years before they did. My mom still doesn’t like that town to this day though.