by men talljie aunt » Mon Apr 26, 2010 12:10 pm
Since no one will respond to my request as to how my picks turned out, I will inject my own unsolicited comments into this fracas.
First to the twins' mother I respect your post today about your children and your right to defend them if you feel the need to do so. However, in my own opinion, I think it would had have more meaning if you chose to do so last week, when the comments were made and before the games were played. Doing so after the tournament in which your team did not play its best and was upset by a younger team, may be interpreted as sour grapes by some.
Next, someone made the comment about not being able to run a tournament if teams did not utilize pick-up players because of high school sports. This concept is foreign to a lot of teams in the DFW area. There is a phrase that I think some of you in Houston need to understand....age pure! That is one of the differences between DFW and Houston. Most, if not all of the top first year 14U teams in DFW are "age pure." Meaning their entire roster is comprised of 96 birthdays. There is no loading up on 95's on their roster just because they are a first year team and they want to be competitive. We stay age pure with our girls, and if we take some lumps in the first year of our age level, so be it. We at least stay together as a team and grow and develop as a team. None of the 3 or 4 best teams in DFW have high school players on their team so there is never, ever a need for a pick-up player; save for that rare instance when you have injuries and/or illnesses.
I am not choosing sides in this mess. However, I do have a few opinions I will voice, since that is the purpose of this website. Mr Vaughn, my first comment is directed towards you. Again, you do not know me and by no means do you owe me an explanation or have to justify yourself to me. However, by your own post, it appears you had 11 girls on your team heading into this weekend. One was obviously out with broken wrists, leaving you with just 10. Another player became ill sometime on Friday and left you with just 9 for the weekend. Then your 9th player had to leave for a band concert on Saturday leaving you with 8. My question is did you not know about your 9th player having a band concert? Surely this was not something the parents sprung on you right before they left the ballfields. My point is that you knew you would be short-handed this weekend, and I think most coaches would have tried to get a pick-up player lined up for the tournament prior to Saturday afternoon or whenever this occurred.
I have to agree with everyone, regardless of what team they are with or what age group they belong to, about the issue of picking up players from teams that compete in the same tournament. That simply does not happen. In my personal opinion it just seems unethical.
Mark, does get a certain degree of respect from me. Yes, he comes across as arrogant to me; yes, he comes across as obnoxious to me; yes, he comes across as an azz, and yes I question whether he is a good ambassador for the game. However, he does speak his mind and he has the courage to do so with EVERYONE knowing who he is and the backbone to accept it. Whether he was "outed" or not seems to be a moot point, the FACT is he still posts after the fact and is man enough to take full responsibility for his actions. I mean he could have very easily just gone and created another screen name and posted in secrecy like the rest of us, but he has chosen to stand behind his name while posting.
Finally, here are some parting thoughts to ponder. First, I feel it is unnecessary for all of the younger teams to get on here and boast. Regardless of how much you were slighted, the fact is you were the ones that signed up for the tournament. You were not forced to do so, therefore, I would expect that because you entered the tournament voluntarily, you obviously expected to have a certain level of success, or you would not have entered. My point is you knew what you were getting into. The older teams are in a no win situation. If they had won, it would have been because "they were supposed to." And if they lose, well....all hell breaks loose and you have to deal with those ramifications.
I understand this is all in good fun, but I am also not naive enough to believe that some parents here today are not taking this too seriously. I think it would be a good exercise for all involved in this "discussion" to print out all 11 pages (and counting) of this post and read it word-for-word the day of your DD's high school graduation and see if it doesn't make your stomach churn. As I recall from one of my college classes, respect is not an act or behavior. It is an attitude and a personality trait. Respect is the manifestation of a certain level of emotional maturity....something obviously lacking in all of these posts. You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him. And just to show I have a certain immaturity about me as well, I want to close with a quote from a poem by Longfellow (snicker, snicker, wink, wink):
"Not in the clamor of the crowded street,
Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng,
But in ourselves, are triumph and defeat."
"Here's the deal, I'm the best there is - plain and simple. I mean I wake up in the morning and I piss excellence."