Life of Reilly
There are some games where cheering for the other side feels better than winning.
by Rick Reilly (ESPN the Magazine)







They played the oddest game in high school football history last month down in Grapevine, Texas.

It was Grapevine Faith vs. Gainesville State School and everything about it was upside down. For instance, when Gainesville came out to take the field, the Faith fans made a 40-yard spirit line for them to run through.

Did you hear that? The other team's fans?

They even made a banner for players to crash through at the end. It said, "Go Tornadoes!" Which is also weird, because Faith is the Lions.

"I WOULDN'T EXPECT ANOTHER PARENT TO TELL SOMEBODY TO HIT THEIR KIDS. BUT THEY WANTED US TO!"

It was rivers running uphill and cats petting dogs. More than 200 Faith fans sat on the Gainesville side and kept cheering the Gainesville players on—by name.

"I never in my life thought I'd hear people cheering for us to hit their kids," recalls Gainesville's QB and middle linebacker, Isaiah. "I wouldn't expect another parent to tell somebody to hit their kids. But they wanted us to!"

And even though Faith walloped them 33-14, the Gainesville kids were so happy that after the game they gave head coach Mark Williams a sideline squirt-bottle shower like he'd just won state. Gotta be the first Gatorade bath in history for an 0-9 coach.

But then you saw the 12 uniformed officers escorting the 14 Gainesville players off the field and two and two started to make four. They lined the players up in groups of five—handcuffs ready in their back pockets—and marched them to the team bus. That's because Gainesville is a maximum-security correctional facility 75 miles north of Dallas. Every game it plays is on the road.

This all started when Faith's head coach, Kris Hogan, wanted to do something kind for the Gainesville team. Faith had never played Gainesville, but he already knew the score. After all, Faith was 7-2 going into the game, Gainesville 0-8 with 2 TDs all year. Faith has 70 kids, 11 coaches, the latest equipment and involved parents. Gainesville has a lot of kids with convictions for drugs, assault and robbery—many of whose families had disowned them—wearing seven-year-old shoulder pads and ancient helmets.

So Hogan had this idea. What if half of our fans—for one night only—cheered for the other team? He sent out an email asking the Faithful to do just that. "Here's the message I want you to send:" Hogan wrote. "You are just as valuable as any other person on planet Earth."

Some people were naturally confused. One Faith player walked into Hogan's office and asked, "Coach, why are we doing this?"

And Hogan said, "Imagine if you didn't have a home life. Imagine if everybody had pretty much given up on you. Now imagine what it would mean for hundreds of people to suddenly believe in you."

Next thing you know, the Gainesville Tornadoes were turning around on their bench to see something they never had before. Hundreds of fans. And actual cheerleaders!

"I thought maybe they were confused," said Alex, a Gainesville lineman (only first names are released by the prison). "They started yelling 'DEE-fense!' when their team had the ball. I said, 'What? Why they cheerin' for us?'"

It was a strange experience for boys who most people cross the street to avoid. "We can tell people are a little afraid of us when we come to the games," says Gerald, a lineman who will wind up doing more than three years. "You can see it in their eyes. They're lookin' at us like we're criminals. But these people, they were yellin' for us! By our names!"

Maybe it figures that Gainesville played better than it had all season, scoring the game's last two touchdowns. Of course, this might be because Hogan put his third-string nose guard at safety and his third-string cornerback at defensive end. Still.

After the game, both teams gathered in the middle of the field to pray and that's when Isaiah surprised everybody by asking to lead. "We had no idea what the kid was going to say," remembers Coach Hogan. But Isaiah said this: "Lord, I don't know how this happened, so I don't know how to say thank You, but I never would've known there was so many people in the world that cared about us."

And it was a good thing everybody's heads were bowed because they might've seen Hogan wiping away tears.

As the Tornadoes walked back to their bus under guard, they each were handed a bag for the ride home—a burger, some fries, a soda, some candy, a Bible and an encouraging letter from a Faith player.

The Gainesville coach saw Hogan, grabbed him hard by the shoulders and said, "You'll never know what your people did for these kids tonight. You'll never, ever know."

And as the bus pulled away, all the Gainesville players crammed to one side and pressed their hands to the window, staring at these people they'd never met before, watching their waves and smiles disappearing into the night.

Anyway, with the economy six feet under and Christmas running on about three and a half reindeer, it's nice to know that one of the best presents you can give is still absolutely free.

Hope.

As you know, I am a proponent of kids learning and participating in as many sports as possible until they are at least sophmores in high school. The folks at Athletic Management wrote up a nice article on how to create the incentives for kids to do so and to involve parents and coaches.

When next season means another sport, and not the start of club, the multi-sport message is getting through. But how do you do it? The keys are offering incentives to athletes and convincing arguments to parents. Find more of this articles at
Athletic Management Magazine.

Two high school coaches are going back to court in upstate NY regarding their inactions regarding a hazing incident that took place on a bus trip. Like the captain of a ship, coaches are responsible for the activities of the minors (their athletes) when on official travel representing their school. Even though they were unaware what was going on (which I find hard to believe on a school bus...), they are the adults entrusted with the welfare of those children.


While coaches cannot be reasonably expected to see everything that goes on, where were the team captains or other leaders of the team to stop this hazing? If anything, the coaches should be held in negligence for creating a leadership environment that created the idea that this hazing was permissable.


Copyright 2008 The Buffalo News
All Rights Reserved
Buffalo News (New York)


December 3, 2008 Wednesday
NIAGARA EDITION


SECTION: LOCAL; Pg. B1

HEADLINE: Coaches in hazing case will face charges;
Wilson justice denies motion to dismiss

BYLINE: By Thomas J. Prohaska - NEWS NIAGARA BUREAU

DATELINE: WILSON


Town Justice George R. Berger on Tuesday refused to dismiss charges against two suspended coaches in the Wilson High School baseball team hazing case.

Berger issued a ruling denying defense motions to throw out the child endangerment charges against Thomas J. Baia and William M. Atlas.

That means the coaches must return to court Jan. 13. "At that time, we'll start talking about trial dates," Assistant District Attorney Robert A. Zucco said. "I'm happy with the result."

Baia and Atlas face up to a year in jail if convicted on misdemeanor charges of endangering the welfare of a child. They were on the bus when three junior varsity baseball players allegedly had fingers and cell phones thrust into their rectums through their pants by three varsity players during a bus ride home from a game in Niagara Falls April 17.

The three varsity players, originally charged with felony sexual abuse, now are charged with various counts of forcible touching and hazing, which range from misdemeanors to violations. They are due back in court next Tuesday for legal arguments in their cases.

Defense attorneys Robert Viola and Herbert L. Greenman had argued in court Nov. 18 that the charges against the coaches should be dismissed because, as they saw it, the legal definition of endangering the welfare of a child requires the defendants to have actually done something. They argued that Baia and Atlas couldn't be charged with that because the allegation is that they didn't do anything to stop the incident.

Berger didn't see it that way. His ruling said that while the law uses the word "acts" as a verb in one paragraph -- the one Viola and Greenman relied upon -- it uses the word as a noun in another paragraph.

Thus, the law criminalizes inaction, the judge ruled. He wrote, "[It] clearly encompasses both acts and omissions to act."

"I don't think that's what the cases say," Viola said. "I'm going to look at the decision and sit down with [Greenman] and see if he views it the same way I do, see if there's room for reargument the way that's written."

Greenman did not return a call seeking comment.

Another key word in the law is "knowingly," and the defense attorneys argued that the evidence doesn't show the coaches knowingly endangered the JV players. Berger wrote, "The court finds this element is sufficiently alleged and is a matter to be properly decided by the trier of fact."

In other words, it would be up to a jury to make that ruling, unless the defense chooses a nonjury trial and calls on Berger alone to render a verdict. Viola said he hasn't given any thought to trial format options.

Berger did order Zucco to give the defense a bill of particulars listing the names and addresses of all witnesses questioned by police or prosecutors, the specific acts that constitute an offense and how those acts endangered the alleged victims.

Berger's ruling implied that he is prepared to hold a hearing to rule on Zucco's attempts to use "prior uncharged bad acts" as evidence against the coaches.

The prosecutor has explained that he wants to present information about other hazing incidents in previous seasons.

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