WA private HS school team has 3 forfeit wins this season

[PatriotsReign]

Using analogies and references to sports that have strict weight classes is counter productive to your argument

I compared similar situations. I played high school football and I wrestled. Our football team got its arse kicker quite often and I know the players, coaches and parents never would have considered forfeiting a game even though we played the best teams in eastern Massachusetts

In wrestling you can get a chubby goofball that has to wrestle a guy the same weight who is all muscled and ready to toss bodies around.

Did you play football?

 

[PatriotsReign]

I thought you said there are no contests in life.........so in which thread are you talking out of your ass?

I'm a vantrilloquist and I'm actually talking out your ass!

I said there aren't any contests in the game of life. Sports aren't life my friend.

Is that all you wanted to comment upon?

 

[IllegalContact]

It makes no sense becaus3 you don't want it to. You're basically saying if we don't have kids we can't opine. Which I think people have been considerate enough to accept that it's a parent and/or child's choice. There's no right or wrong answer. Just differing values

You can have an opinion, but you have zero knowledge of being in a spot of making an important decision about your child.....you can assume you know what it's like but you don't .... do it doesn't make sense .... I have 4 kids so I k ow much more about it

 

[IllegalContact]

I'm a vantrilloquist and I'm actually talking out your ass!

I said there aren't any contests in the game of life. Sports aren't life my friend.

Is that all you wanted to comment upon?

Sports aren't life? That's a pretty dumb statement

 

[PatriotsReign]

Sports aren't life? That's a pretty dumb statement

Semantics....sports don't define our lives. Just as our jobs, the money we make or don't make or where we live don't define us.

The way we live and how we treat others are the only things that define our lives

Deep thoughts

 

[convertedpatsfan]

You can have an opinion, but you have zero knowledge of being in a spot of making an important decision about your child.....you can assume you know what it's like but you don't .... do it doesn't make sense .... I have 4 kids so I k ow much more about it

I'm not questioning you as a parent, but just pointing out that having a lot of kids doesn't necessarily guarantee you're a good parent. Having more kids doesn't mean knowing more. Heck, some parents can't even remember all of their kids' names...



But seriously, I do understand what you're saying. The truth is that nobody really knows for sure what the right answer is. Both sides could be right, because it also depends on the child. Every kid is different. For some kids, it's a chance to hide from doing something tough and they would benefit from being forced to grind through and develop character. For other kids, it might foster a sense of helplessness knowing it's an unwinnable situation. For other kids, they might take the challenge too far and try to do too much.

There's no "one" answer that fits every kid, and that's why each parent may come to different but equally correct decisions. There's way too much *****ing and judgment in parenting these days. Too many people think they have the magic formula for all kids, and it simply doesn't exist. I've seen parents do things I would never do, but it works. And then I see it fail sometimes too. And I've seen parents do things I think are smart, and it fails. But then I see it works sometimes too.

Let's be honest, we're all just making it up as we go. And it's difficult enough without everyone trying to decide what is "right" or "wrong" for everyone else.

 

[neuronet]

I think it's fine if someone doesn't have a kid to have an opinion. E.g., before I had kids people would be hitting their kids telling me "Wait til you have kids then try to say corporal punishment is bad" as if I needed to have kids to know how much it screws them up (plus, I was a kid once and knew how much it screwed me up). Now at least I have a kid so can tell them [edit: such parents, not my kid ] to STFU and say, yes it is hard sometimes because kids can be as annoying as hell, but I still don't use corporal punishment and still say it is generally a bad idea.

point is people with and without kids can be reasonable here, I evaluate based on the reasoning you are using not whether you have a kid. Of course if someone is showing weirdly callous disgregard for a kid's well being, and not showing protectiveness toward a child, then that suggests they don't quite get it. But I think most people even without kids do understand that, maybe from watching over a little brother or a friend's little kid or just plain empathy...

Someone who would send in their kid to die in a game, tell them never tap out in a judo match, then there's just something wrong with them in the head. Like Ricky Bobby's dad.

 

[mosslost]

Man I know it's easy for me to say but I'm a competitor. I don't care if my opponent is 8'5 and 578 pounds, he's going to have to show up to beat my ass. And he very well may easily beat my ass but forfeiting? Not in my dictionary. But these are teenage kids and all with parental concern. I can't judge them or their parents

Throwing out "I'm a competitor" with respect to this scenario is ridiculous. No way any kid 5 foot 8 117 should be playing football with kids three times their weight. It is stupid that team is not in some different division or something, maybe private schools or something.

 

[mosslost]

It's a reflection of how times have changed. Back in "the day", the team forfeiting would have been called out for being a bunch of ****ies. Today, their parents are cheering their decision.

You can apply that throughout a whole lot of U.S. society.

Back in the day people didn't think about the concussion syndrome either. Forfeiting this game was the absolute right decision.

 

[mosslost]

I don't even like the argument of how big the other players are. Are they high schoolers? That's the only qualification to me. One team is going out of its way to recruit better players, that's the reward for the effort they put into recruiting. If you don't want to compete then kick rocks.

Again, I say this at risk of sounding like an internet tough guy but it's just one of my core values

silly

 

[mosslost]

This isn't college or the NFL. This is a high school game. As much as i like to compete there is no point sending obviously over matched kids out there in such a physical sport.

It is not about building character. If it were a team with better athletes but the same weight class who were likely to out score them 60-0 no one would care but this is not that. This is the simple fact of physics and if you allow it to play out and someone gets badly hurt or permanently hurt that is something everyone who supported the game has to live with. Not to mention the kid hurt and the the one who injured him. Imagine a kid gets a brain injury if this game happens. How would we argue to his parents that it made sense to play this particular game?

Injuries can happen as any time and we must accept it but you don't tempt fate. The same why you don't have a 140lb boxer fight a 210lb boxer you should not have these kids play each other. The chances of something going very badly sky rocket. Even if you tell the private school kids to take it easy it is possible a few get carried away (they are kids after all). I don't see the point of risking it.

Anyone on here who thinks those kids should have played the game are nuts.

 

[mosslost]

If contact is too much for your kid to handle, don't have them participate in tackle football. Proper alignment of divisions should absolutely be enforced, but the coddling of the young today is going to bite us in the ass tomorrow.

I was a late bloomer, and my growth spurt didn't happen till late high school, but no matter the size difference, no one I ever faced thought that facing me was a cakewalk no matter what the size difference. TBH, lots of those bigger folks underestimated me, and never sufficiently adjusted after the initial shock. I know for a fact I'm not the only one to whom that applies. Don't live life in fear.

Is tackle football too violent for HS kids? Maybe, that is the parents role to decide. The reality that their kids may be facing much larger opponents should be considered before they ever sign them up.

This is not coddling at all. This is a common sense move. That team has received three forfeits for a reason. Something is really wrong.

 

[neuronet]

This is not coddling at all. This is a common sense move. That team has received three forfeits for a reason. Something is really wrong.

Obviously, this team needs to be in a different division/league.

 

[mosslost]

And?

If you're worried about injuries in football, don't play football.
If you're worried about injuries in chess, don't play chess.

But, in either of the above, once you've decided to play, don't cry and whine about an individual game that's fairly in your league.

very silly post

 

[A Defiant Goose]

Anyone on here who thinks those kids should have played the game are nuts.

Football is a dangerous sport and these childrencould have suffered terrible injuries!

Oh but, uh, the other teams they actually have a chance against? Yeah let em play them.

 

[mosslost]

Football is a dangerous sport and these childrencould have suffered terrible injuries!

Oh but, uh, the other teams they actually have a chance against? Yeah let em play them.

For you to be harping on "them having a chance" against proves you are not even comprehending the issue at hand here.

 

[mosslost]

Because typically you're playing against people roughly in the same weight class as you. Sure, some schools might have 1 or 2 abnormally large players, but not an entire roster like this school has managed to put together

Pop warner they protect the players with weight class divisions.. in Highschool it's sort of the same thing with JV and Varsity, but this Avon team is an anomaly, not the norm

There is a ton of risk in playing the sport and most parents acknowledge that and make their decision accordingly, but this team increases that level of risk by so much that it's not common sense to subject your team to it

Full grown men playing in the NFL are 300 lbs.. it would be negligent to put kids who weigh 1/3 of that against an entire roster 18 year olds that size

Exactly. It is negligence absolutely to let those kids play that game.

 

[WaterfallJumper]

The more I read this thread, the more I'm convinced that worry has outweighed the facts. No one has gotten injured playing this team. Many of the players on the team are normal sized. Yet everyone is acting like they're a dangerous killing machine.

 

[PatsFanSince74]

Any parents who let their kids play a contact sport are consenting to a certain level of what they are willing to define as acceptable risk.

This case raises the issue of where a line can reasonably be drawn between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" risk.

Forfeiting a game against a team because it has more talent or is better coached than your team is against the spirit of sport...getting whipped by a superior team is part of the growth experience of sports.

But forfeiting a game because the conference in which your child is playing is poorly managed and has allowed a disparity in the core profile of the teams to arise is not against the spirit of sport and is certainly consistent with responsible parenting.

Something is clearly off in this case. The whole point of a Division or Conference is to have teams that are (relatively) evenly matched, not as to talent (which can be coached or found in any kid at random) but as to the height and weight profile of the teams. Sounds like the Conference in which this team is playing has some work to do.

The parents of students on the other teams have a legitimate interest in having the issue addressed in a more productive manner than putting them in a position where they feel they have to forfeit games for the sake of their children's safety.

Perhaps there is another conference in which that larger team can play, where it would get to test itself against its true peer group, i.e., someone "its own size." Or perhaps the conference should put in a height and weight profile for its players.

As the parent of a 13 year old, who's a scrapper but also already had one diagnosed concussion, there's no way I'd let him play any contact sport against a team that belongs in another "division." Therefore, I'm not at all critical of parents who won't let their kids play that team. But, that's a suboptimal way to address the deeper issues.

 

[mosslost]

Any parents who let their kids play a contact sport are consenting to a certain level of what they are willing to define as acceptable risk.

This case raises the issue of where a line can reasonably be drawn between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" risk.

Forfeiting a game against a team because it has more talent or is better coached than your team is against the spirit of sport...getting whipped by a superior team is part of the growth experience of sports.

But forfeiting a game because the conference in which your child is playing is poorly managed and has allowed a disparity in the core profile of the teams to arise is not against the spirit of sport and is certainly consistent with responsible parenting.

Something is clearly off in this case. The whole point of a Division or Conference is to have teams that are (relatively) evenly matched, not as to talent (which can be coached or found in any kid at random) but as to the height and weight profile of the teams. Sounds like the Conference in which this team is playing has some work to do.

The parents of students on the other teams have a legitimate interest in having the issue addressed in a more productive manner than putting them in a position where they feel they have to forfeit games for the sake of their children's safety.

Perhaps there is another conference in which that larger team can play, where it would get to test itself against its true peer group, i.e., someone "its own size." Or perhaps the conference should put in a height and weight profile for its players.

As the parent of a 13 year old, who's a scrapper but also already had one diagnosed concussion, there's no way I'd let him play any contact sport against a team that belongs in another "division." Therefore, I'm not at all critical of parents who won't let their kids play that team. But, that's a suboptimal way to address the deeper issues.

Every last person on this board who questions the parents/team decision here is nuts.