Basketball coatch suspended after unsporting win

[barmar]

I understand that basic concept but disagree with it. I suck at ping pong but still like playing it when I get the chance. My win/loss percentage is probably in the single digits. I don't mind losing but I usually do get pissed off when my opponents are clearly letting me win or letting me back in the game by playing with their left hand or eyes closed (thankfully neither of those happened yet but you get my point) or anything like that. Of course I understand that beating someone 11-0 or 11-1 all the time is also not fun, so we usually just agree not to play. I know other people disagree with this but I don't think I'm alone in my version either.

Imagine a contest or sweepstakes where you won a chance to play tennis (or ping pong) against a national or world champion. If the pro played the same as they would at Wimbledon, they'd probably serve ace after ace against you. The champ could easily score a total shutout, I'm sure. Neither of you would find this any fun -- you might as well be hitting the ball against a wall. To make it interesting, he'll dial down his game; he'll still win, of course, but at least you'll get a few decent volleys in.

 

Of course, a league game is not the same as an exhibition game from a contest. But I'll bet that in the early rounds of Wimbledon, the top seeds don't play as hard as in the late rounds, because they don't need to, and this allows them to conserve their strength (but if the opponent is doing well, they'll ramp up).

[barmar]

Full court press is not all that rare. It is a standard tactic that all teams practice, as they may need it if behind late in the game. Many teams will employ it for short stretches. Few use it all the time, partly due to stamina issues, and partly due to tendency to accumulate too many fouls.

That's what I was assuming -- it's a tactic you pull out when you need it, not something you would employ routinely.

 

I'm reminded of the "Karate Kid" movie, where the "evil coach" had his students shouting "No mercy!". Teenage, amateur sports is supposed to be friendly competition, not war. (Personal trivia: I went to high school with Ralph Macchio, who played the original Karate Kid).

[Bbradley62]

then we probably have several mutual childhood friends.

[mike777]

That's what I was assuming -- it's a tactic you pull out when you need it, not something you would employ routinely.

 

I'm reminded of the "Karate Kid" movie, where the "evil coach" had his students shouting "No mercy!". Teenage, amateur sports is supposed to be friendly competition, not war. (Personal trivia: I went to high school with Ralph Macchio, who played the original Karate Kid).

 

60 minutes had a segment where a science geek, was called to coach his daughter's team. He knew nothing about basketball BUT THE science told him to go full court press 100% of the time. They won a lot more than they lost.

[MrAce]

Perhaps I am way too simple minded. Imho there was only one coach to suspend (firing him would be better) and that was the coach of losing team for not doing the job even remotely that he is being paid for. He probably should not have put his team on the field at the first place. But that would require admitting the guilt about how he had done his job. He did not, instead he decided to let the kids down and had the nerves to blame other team's coach. I still think it is pretty laughable.

[blackshoe]

I don't know that the losing coach is to blame for this. Did he arrange the match, or was it someone else? I would think whoever arranged the match is the one who should get fired.

[Bbradley62]

Different schools have different priorities and different histories, etc. I'm sure there's a reason why one of the two teams plays in the highest tier and the other team plays in the 9th tier (of 11) offered by their area's high school athletic association.

 

The primary people who should be reprimanded are the representatives of each school (maybe athletic directors, maybe coaches) who arranged to put this game on the schedule, since it was not a league-required game. The winning coach's comment was "The game just got away from me"; that sounds like he was admitting to failing to handle the situation in a responsible manner.

[Mbodell]

That's what I was assuming -- it's a tactic you pull out when you need it, not something you would employ routinely.

 

I'm reminded of the "Karate Kid" movie, where the "evil coach" had his students shouting "No mercy!". Teenage, amateur sports is supposed to be friendly competition, not war. (Personal trivia: I went to high school with Ralph Macchio, who played the original Karate Kid).

 

I still think that misrepresents it. It is much more like a mini-nt in bridge. Most people don't play it. Some people play it only occasionally (pairs near me include: 1st and 2nd favorable; just 3rd; just white), many people don't play it at all (or would only open a 10-12 nt as a psych fooling partner too), and some few play it all the time. There are basketball teams that play it all the time. For these teams it isn't an occasional tactic, it is part of their system.

[gwnn]

Imagine a contest or sweepstakes where you won a chance to play tennis (or ping pong) against a national or world champion. If the pro played the same as they would at Wimbledon, they'd probably serve ace after ace against you. The champ could easily score a total shutout, I'm sure. Neither of you would find this any fun -- you might as well be hitting the ball against a wall. To make it interesting, he'll dial down his game; he'll still win, of course, but at least you'll get a few decent volleys in.

 

Of course, a league game is not the same as an exhibition game from a contest. But I'll bet that in the early rounds of Wimbledon, the top seeds don't play as hard as in the late rounds, because they don't need to, and this allows them to conserve their strength (but if the opponent is doing well, they'll ramp up).

I would simply not like to play that match against Federer. I'd refuse to participate in the sweepstakes but if I somehow won it without me knowing about my participation, I'd try to sell my winning ticket. Of course hitting a few balls with Fed would be awesome but once we started counting points it would stop being fun for me.

 

I'm ok with handicaps but that would be part of the agreed rules (and both players would play to their best abilities after agreeing to those rules), not something out of the stronger player's arbitrary degree of mercy. That's just humiliating/awkward to both parties I think.

[cherdano]

Perhaps I am way too simple minded. Imho there was only one coach to suspend (firing him would be better) and that was the coach of losing team for not doing the job even remotely that he is being paid for. He probably should not have put his team on the field at the first place. But that would require admitting the guilt about how he had done his job. He did not, instead he decided to let the kids down and had the nerves to blame other team's coach. I still think it is pretty laughable.

 

Oh come on. An 11th division coach might be someone who played some pickup basketball in their past, and agreed to help out by playing a little bit of a coach in their spare time. Or maybe they have practice just once a week since his players have other interests, too, and none of them are planning to become WNBA rotation players.

[billw55]

Of course, the tiers/divisions are almost surely based on total enrollment at each school. Perhaps they have some multipliers, for example for private schools, but mostly the gap in divisions means that the winning team was from a much larger school. I can imagine the 9th tier being a school with only a 300 or so enrollment. Budgets are often tight at such schools, and the coach may be volunteering.

 

Still, this particular small school team had multiple huge losses to bigger schools. Whoever scheduled those games had to know what would happen. Was it the coach? Possible, but I doubt it. I suspect someone higher up the chain, such as the athletic director, principal or even superintendent. Why? Well, in college big schools often pay small schools a substantial sum to come get pounded. Was this small school trying to make some money? If so, is that necessarily bad? A lot of questions.

[Trinidad]

Of course, a league game is not the same as an exhibition game from a contest. But I'll bet that in the early rounds of Wimbledon, the top seeds don't play as hard as in the late rounds, because they don't need to, and this allows them to conserve their strength (but if the opponent is doing well, they'll ramp up).

That's not what I see. The top contestants want to win every game, in order to make the match as short as possible, to preserve energy.

 

This is because tennis is not a timed event: It lasts until someone has won 3 sets. That makes tennis incomparable to high school basketball. But yes, in professional soccer, with very busy programs, you can see that the team that has the upper hand substitutes their star player out of the game.

 

The reason, however, is not because it would be unsportsmanlike to "run up the score". (If anything, it is considered unsportsmanlike not to try and run up the score. The fans have paid for their tickets.)

The reasons are:

to give the player some rest

to give the "man of the match" an "honorary substitution": take him out of the game 10 minutes before the end to focus all the attention on him, to give the crowd the opportunity to respond with an ovation.

 

And, of course, it is only human that players lose their drive when they are 5-0 ahead when opponents haven't had anything close to a scoring opportunity, as compared to a 1-1 score with every possibility to pull of a win (and having to prevent a loss).

 

Rik

[billw55]

That's not what I see. The top contestants want to win every game, in order to make the match as short as possible, to preserve energy.

 

This is because tennis is not a timed event: It lasts until someone has won 3 sets.

I don't entirely agree. While the top players do want to conserve energy, shortening the match to the fewest games is not the only way to do this. If Djokovic, Nadal, etc can win in straight sets exerting only 75% effort, that would probably be worth playing a few extra games. Also, if up a break, they might not try so hard when receiving, instead relying on closing out the set on serve.

 

I any case, I really don't think they are playing all out against qualifiers. They would not say so to the media of course, but I bet you could get an honest answer from McEnroe.

[ArtK78]

One should not compare professional sports to scholastic sports.

 

Still, in American professional sports, there is an old saying, "What goes around comes around." If a very good team beats up on a very bad team and runs up the score, the beaten team will remember it. Given that the performance of various teams tends to be cyclical over time, so that good teams often become less good and bad teams often improve, there may come a time when the roles are reversed.

[MrAce]

 

This isn't pro sports and these aren't adults. Ease off.

 

Then why would you and others see the score of an amateur athletic event, performed by kids, a humiliation? This is why I said it is laughable, and I still think it is. It becomes humiliation only when it is believed to be one by majority. To me it is just a score, allowed by the rules of the game. Seems to me people are complaining about something that they created in their mind, lol.

 

Instead of teaching to kids that there is nothing to be humiliated by losing badly, and that they would be respected as long as they tried their best, you all are trying to teach them that other team should have shown mercy to them. Instead of giving examples to kids about so many famous sport events where a boxer or a team lost so badly, gained nothing but respect for their effort to do their best even when losing badly, instead you are creating stupid terminology such as "running up the score" As others said I do not even have a translation for this to my native language.

 

Bottom line is, in US, the role of coaches and teams in amateur sports are exaggerated, which everyone seems to be ok with. Fine. Which leads to auto exaggerated reactions to the big loss as in our case. What I am saying is "you made your bed, you have to sleep in it, don't cry"

[mycroft]

My guess (and it's only a guess, coming from NCAA football, in fact) is that there are "traditional games" that get played every year, and simply have to be part of the schedule. Unfortunately, after 60, 70 years, close rivalries can become - less close.

 

If it wasn't forced for some reason, I can't understand why anyone setting schedules would agree to play a game with such disparity. For the top tier team, it would be a total waste of time; for the 9th tier team, a foregone conclusion. So why not set up a moderately competitive game instead?

 

I guess the other answer would be the coach going in saying "Look, most of the time, we're going to be playing reasonable matches for your ability. But you need to know what a 'real team' looks like, so we're playing these guys as our third game. This is just for experience; we'll be watching the game next week in practices and you'll see what they're doing, having felt it on the court. This should really improve your game - but it will feel humiliating at the time. Just try to roll with it and know in the end it will be worth it." Maybe even, "you know, you don't play the full-court press well, or against it well, and that's really because nobody we normally play against does it regularly or well. We're going to learn, and here's how we're going to learn..." In these cases, 210-12 or 156-20, does it matter? But if they stop doing what we set up the game to learn to play against, don't we lose something?

[billw55]

If it wasn't forced for some reason, I can't understand why anyone setting schedules would agree to play a game with such disparity. For the top tier team, it would be a total waste of time; for the 9th tier team, a foregone conclusion. So why not set up a moderately competitive game instead?

There might be a financial motive as I mentioned.

[Bbradley62]

The two high schools are less than 10 miles apart, so someone probably thought that it was a convenient game to schedule. The teams did not play each other in any of the previous 3 years, so it's not a tradition. (I stopped looking after getting that far.)

[onoway]

There is a difference between people who are trying to make their mark in the world and those who are out just for fun and exercise, and whoever put the two together ought to be slapped silly. It would NOT be fun for anyone, not even the kibs, to put a casual lower intermediate player in a JEC match and few casual intermediates would have the (insert appropriate word here) to want to do it, aside from wanting the notoriety value.

 

We have a standing policy now not to show the barometer in team matches as some of the early ones were so lopsided you could SEE the desire to just go away and maybe even give up bridge growing with each passing hand. That is maybe 15% the case when they don't know how badly they are getting stomped, AND it doesn't seem to have nearly the same long term negative effect as watching the score get worse and worse..like having a root canal without anaesthetic...you know there is an end to the pain but you just want it to be over.

 

These are KIDS and unless both teams are intending to try to get into professional sports, in which case a reality check might be in order, whoever organized this match is irresponsible. This is a sports event comparable to bullying and should never have taken place. IMO the idea of teaching kids that winning fairly is not enough, you should humiliate your opps if you can, is the antithesis of the sort of attitude the world needs these days.

 

IF the coaches had no say in the event other than to refuse to play or not, then they ought to have met and arranged some sort of alternative..perhaps matching players and having each player from the strong team coach a weaker player in technique - some sort of mentoring thing, maybe,...something so it could be a productive and fun thing for both without compromising the strong team. There are surely other ways to handle it. Even after the first quarter, when it must have been obvious what a sham it was. Shame on the organizers and on the coaches.

[onoway]

Then why would you and others see the score of an amateur athletic event, performed by kids, a humiliation? This is why I said it is laughable, and I still think it is. It becomes humiliation only when it is believed to be one by majority. To me it is just a score, allowed by the rules of the game. Seems to me people are complaining about something that they created in their mind, lol.

If you are competing and your opps can casually disregard your best efforts as virtually meaningless no matter how hard you try, it is going to be experienced by most people as humiliating, nobody likes to be made to feel inept, incompetent,powerless, insignificant. If a person CHOOSES to put themselves in such a situation as a learning experience, that's a totally different situation, these kids play when and who they are told to.

Instead of teaching to kids that there is nothing to be humiliated by losing badly, and that they would be respected as long as they tried their best, you all are trying to teach them that other team should have shown mercy to them. Instead of giving examples to kids about so many famous sport events where a boxer or a team lost so badly, gained nothing but respect for their effort to do their best even when losing badly, instead you are creating stupid terminology such as "running up the score" As others said I do not even have a translation for this to my native language.

Telling a child not to feel humiliated in this situation is the same as telling a child that they should not be upset about being beat up or bullied - denying reality. There have to be other options and it is irresponsible of the coaches not to look for them, a total lack of respect for the players of either team to have this match go forward as a real competition instead of the farce it obviously was.For sure, it's a good thing to tell the kids that you respect them for doing their best, but it's a rare person, especially a child, to whom that is other than very cold comfort.

Bottom line is, in US, the role of coaches and teams in amateur sports are exaggerated, which everyone seems to be ok with. Fine. Which leads to auto exaggerated reactions to the big loss as in our case. What I am saying is "you made your bed, you have to sleep in it, don't cry"

The point is, the KIDS did NOT make the bed, the irresponsible adults in their lives did, and then made the kids lie in it.

 

Edited January 22, 2015 by diana_eva
fixed quotes

[mycroft]

If I enter the Spingold, one of three things is going to happen:

 

1) I get matched in a head-to-head with a single-digit seed and get stomped (check, got the scoresheet)

2) I get matched in a 4-way, play against a 30-odd seed, hopefully survive the repechage against the other cannonfodder, and get matched on the second day with a single-digit seed and get stomped (hasn't happened yet)

3) I get matched in a 4-way, play the 30-odd seed, and don't survive the repechage. (sort of check; the last year they did 4-qualify-1s, we slipped up and lost to the 69th seed, a match we should have won, and didn't get a repechage against the 125th).

 

Only one of those outcomes is bad - *if I voluntarily enter the Spingold*.

 

I know the mercy rule is important for a certain stage of play - I can see 12-year-olds not wanting to play a game with no meaning, even if it's their last game in the Little League championships ever - and they're good enough to get there. I know that I at 25 had no qualms about being chopped up for beans at the bridge table and paying (a bit) for the privilege. So, when does that cut over? These are highschool competitive girls - 16, 17, 18 years old...

 

My feeling is, if the cannonfodder team players *know* they're fodder, and are playing the game, anyway, for whatever reason is valid to them, I don't care what the score is, or what the parents or the school thinks. However, if the players know they're fodder, and they have no idea why they're playing this game and would rather stay home and not get humiliated in public, but are forced by the coach or the school or the parents, then I have a problem.

 

I would also have a problem with pullback if it were obvious; "oh, they're just playing with us now. She had the shot, but instead is just playing keepaway to humiliate me more." Sure, rest the first-stringers, give the junior players their limelight, try new stuff; but to the handicaps you're applying, play 100%; don't Washington Generals me, please. I may not be all players, however.

[Trinidad]

The problem simply lies in the fact that someone thinks that the score is more important than the game.

 

I agree that it would have been better not to have had this game, because nobody really benefits a lot from it, but once the game is in play, just play it and have fun. The score has nothing to do with that.

 

Whoever taught these kids (and coaches) that the enjoyment of the game depends on the score is the real culprit. A 2 game suspension is not enough punishment for that crime.

 

Rik

[gwnn]

Surely, we can all find something in there to determine what was wrong with what happened during the game in question.

OK I give up, I looked at the list five times now and I still don't know which point you mean. Are you talking about "To eliminate all possibilities which tend to destroy the best values of the game." that's the only one that I could see someone seeing apply here but I don't think it does. Or not treating it like life and death? That sounds like more about things like injuring an opponent or cheating in various ways to prosper. Playing your normal game of basketball is protecting the best values of the game. What if the team had agreed to play a little game and tried not to score any more points, throwing the ball out ostentatiously whenever they get to the other team's plank, and easily preventing the opposition from scoring? Would that not be much better described as destroying the values of the game?

[barmar]

Whoever taught these kids (and coaches) that the enjoyment of the game depends on the score is the real culprit. A 2 game suspension is not enough punishment for that crime.

I don't think it's just the score. It's how the score was achieved.

[mycroft]

Unless you mean "backing off in the second half", I think that's the problem. "How the score was achieved" also boils down to "who agreed to schedule this game in the first place?"

 

If you mean the top-tier's game strategy, that *is* the same as "Playing EHAA in the weakest game in the city". Which I'm lucky, my partner and I can switch, so we don't do that. But the Polish pair that comes in and gets the side-eye for playing Polish Club in the 199er game has a real problem - it's the way they play, not "a pressure strategy to humiliate, instead of just beat, the weak opponents".