By Tim Peterson
Attention coaches, namely assistant coaches: You aren’t going to win a CIF championship by winning a lineman competition or a passing league. It’s good work for your players and gives them a chance to compete before the real season starts in September. That’s it. So lay off the people that are running it.
Years ago I saw some officials verbally abused at the SGV Shootout at Arroyo. These were all assistants at Arroyo, some on the lower levels that were taking time on their day off to help out. No, they weren’t getting paid. It was all voluntary. Yet, a few coaches on the competing teams felt the need to yell, scream and complain on nearly every call. Most of the calls by the way were correct but didn’t happen to go the way of the offended parties. Finally the volunteer officials had to threaten ejections for them to calm down. That worked for awhile. Remember this was a passing competition…in shirts and shorts…in July.
The Schurr Lineman Competition Saturday was good for everybody. Seven teams showed up and got in some great work. It was good for the coaches, good for the players and good for Schurr who got a chance to showcase its new field. Good for everybody except for one guy. He didn’t like the rules and continually let the Schurr coaches (all volunteers) know about it. This guy (an assistant coach) complained loudly and even went as far as to tell the Schurr assistant that his system “is wrong”.
The Schurr coaches calmly explained the set up to him multiple times but he continued to complain delaying the competition as other players and coaches looked on.
Mind you, this was a free competition for all of the schools that participated. Nobody was forcing them to be there. Again, there wasn’t going to be a CIF banner hung for the winning school.
These events are great. Cheer and root for your players all you want. Encourage and continue to coach them. But get off the back of the volunteers running the event. They’re doing you the favor. You should be thanking them before you go home.
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The Schurr coaching staff looks like a Spartan reunion. Former receiver Carlos Arredondo and Quarterback Aaron Cantu are on staff along with former lineman Ryan Castro. Castro is a couple of years older than Cantu and Arredondo and played on the Schurr CIF championship team led by Elvin Dick in 2006. That Spartan team lost to Alhambra 55-22 on the last game of the regular season but then went on to win four straight in the playoffs including a 40-22 win over Santa Fe in the title game.
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Almont League contenders Bell Gardens and Montebello also have had brand new fields installed in the off season.
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Ted Clarke is in the process of putting together his staff at Gladstone. Former Arcadia HC Chris Long has joined the staff along with Daniel Hollingquest (San Dimas, Ganesha, La Verne Lutheran) who will be OC. Former Whittier College assistant Dave Harrington will work with special teams.
That’s my principle.
Tim can be reached at tim@midvalleysports.com or on Twitter @tspeterson40.
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