Coaching kids on any level isn't easy. Sportswriters and fans only see the three or four hour result of eveything that takes place during the week. A basketball coach has to deal with fifteen different kids from fifteen different homes. He's their home away home from mom's chocolate chip cookies. He's a mentor, taskmaster and sometimes, sympathetic listener. For some he's the only dad they've known. A coach being a human being messes up. I can attest, as a former high school coach of twenty years, I messed up much more than I desired. It's not that I woke up every day and said, "Gee, I hope I do or say something really stupid today that might get me fired." I may be dumb but I wasn't that dumb.
I was thinking about situations in my coaching career that might have gotten me in a jam if I was in the profession today. In 1974 I was the basketball coach at a Catholic HS in Davenport, Iowa. We were playing our arch rival, Davenport West. At the end of the first half we went in the locker room and I was looking at the stat sheets. Our best player was our post man. He also happened to be Black. He was a great kid(still is today). I looked at the rebound stats and for Matthew they read one rebound. I said, "Matt, one board. That's pretty good". I paused then continued, "For a dead man." If I had made this comment in 2015 I would have been cancelled out for making this statement to a Black kid. I also would have been chastized for making him feel badly. Know what? In that period of time I could have said, "If you don't get your butt in gear I'm gonna send you back to the plantation." And everyone, including Matt, would have had a good laugh.
This brings us to Coach Gregg McDermott. He's the head men's basketball coach at Crieghton University in Omaha. He has a long and storied career. And, he's been extremely successful. His team this year is ranked in the top twenty.
Gregg McDermott in a team meeting following a close loss made the following statement to his team and immediately after apologized.
"On February 27th, after an emotionally tough loss on the road, I addressed our student-athletes and staff in the postgame locker room and used a terribly inappropriate analogy in making a point about staying together as a team despite the loss. Specifically, I said: ‘Guys, we got to stick together. We need both feet in. I need everybody to stay on the plantation. I can’t have anybody leave the plantation."
End of story right? Wrong! McDermott has been suspended indefinitely by the school, a Jesuit one at that. Oh, when I hear these stories what comes to mind is, "He who is without sin cast the first stone." I'm sure Jesus meant to add on this piece of wisdom: "Unless you happen to be a college basketball coach. Then you're screwed."
I'm almost certain most of you are sickened by the cancel culture. If not it'll soon come to a home near you then you'll be out in the streets wailing, "Who will come to my aid?"
It's going to be more than interesting to see where this cancelling leads us. Who is going to stop it? What will it take to knock some sense into the brains of the cattle going to slaughter?
I'm glad I happen to be the way I am. At age 75 if I'm admonished for not being one of the acceptables-------well, let me tell you what occurred when I went into a restroom at a local golf diving range sans mask. A kid in there started yelling and cursing at me. Wait!--------I can't tell you. It's unprintable. I wouldn't want to be indefinitely suspended from writing this blog.
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