tonkatruck

The decay of athletics and this school system has been going on for sometime. The Distritct Admin and sometimes the school Admin have made tons of decisions whether intended or unintended that have cut sports off at the knees throughout this district. I get that academics are first but you can do the best you can to have all programs succeed. There is not a feeder system for Nelson County High School. (Nelson gets about 65% of the students that come from OKH and Bloomfield Middle, the other 35% go to Thomas Nelson) OKH & Bloomfield have struggle to even field teams the last few years let alone be competitive on the field. It should not be surprising that those issues have moved up to the high school.

Unfortunately Jim I am not in the cleaning crew but a coach. The school has already decided they can not afford the professional cleaners. We clean after all freshmen games, JV games, and some varsity tourney's because the school will not pay the custodians to do that as they charge an outrageous fee to come in on weekends etc. I know many schools are in the same boat. I would think a school as large as Hoptown would pay someone. However, many small schools and the school I am at is a midsized school and you would be surprised how many teams have to clean the bleachers themselves at least some of the time. If anyone left that mess for me to clean I would be steamed. Again since you do not clean bleachers you have no idea. I think most of us would be steamed if the time to do our daily tasks was doubled by someone's else. Again I doubt those fans realize the issues involved. Again thousands of little papers sticking to every coke spill is not as easy task to clean. I would love to see how not a big deal it would be if someone caused you to have to take 3-4 times longer to do your job with no extra pay.

I have cleaned bleachers many a time after games, tourney's etc. That stuff is a nightmare to clean up. The sticky coke spills causes it not to be just swept up. I doubt the fans realize how hard it is to clean up. So I am sure there thought process is the same as those here no big deal just sweep up but I am telling you this is very difficult to clean up. If anyone has ever run the gym mop you know how it wants to stick to the floor itself sometimes. Imagine all those little papers.

Central Hardin lost a lot of experienced players off last years team. Oldham and Bardstown are two very good teams. I think they are overachieving to get into overtime against those two teams.

Could Jaggers be taking the Nelson job?

Some of Bloomfield Middle (Cox's Creek area and out by the hospital) kids also go to Thomas Nelson which means there is not a feeder school that feeds Nelson County. The talent pool is also pretty thin right now. I know Bloomfield Middle forfeited middle school games last year because of a lack of numbers and I also know OKH was close to doing the same thing. Just a tough spot for sports at both NC and TN.

This has to be Coach Fudge's fault some how doesn't it?

How could this work? If you are an assistant principal I am assuming you have to be at the school until around 4:00. Not sure when the college practices but seems like this would be really hard to do.

The thrill of victory still gives me goose bumps.

I think the coaches know that most if not all of these kids have no chance to ever play varsity. At the local college in my area they have taken several kids who cannot even play on there high school team. I have been told by one coach that the college gives them a number they need to get and if they don't get that many kids they are going to be in trouble. IMO the JV basketball programs are just a way to raise funds, and increase enrollment by giving these students a small discount on tuition in exchange for chasing a dream that the college knows is not going to happen. I think if the college wanted to tell the kid that in the last 10 years we have had 1 or 2 or 0 kids move from JV to varsity and receive more substantial scholarship money I would be OK with it. But IMO for religiously connected schools to use the JV program to raise money and enrollment in this manner knowing there is little or no chance these kids can move up is immoral.

This has bothered me for some time. How all the small colleges in Ky who most are connected to some religious denomination do this JV deal to me is just plain immoral. They give a kid a couple thousand dollars in scholarship money, the kid gives them 10,000 and the kid gets to say they played college ball. Very few if any ever move up to ever play on the varsity and get any real money. The schools know what the score is. They get enrollment and money in exchange for extending a dream that they know is likely not to end well. I think this is a farce that should end at all our small colleges.

I do not know the situation at Greenup County. However, there are coaches who have done tremendous jobs with teams that have only won 7 games or 12 games etc. If a team had 5 win talent and they win 7 or has 9 win talent and wins 12 he has done a great job. Sometimes the schedule plays into the final won loss record. I have seen two similar talented teams and one team won 16 games and one team won 8. So the 16 win team coach is much better? But when you look at the two schedules of the two teams the 8 win team played a very tough schedule and 16 win team played a very weak schedule. Again while I do not know the situation at Greenup, I think it is dangerous to say we only won X number of games so we need a coaching change.

I heard John Wooden reply to the question did he have any regrets. He replied he regretted as a young coach a decision he made because of the ignorance of a parent. He had a player who had not met his lettering requirements. But this player had done so much for his team in other ways he had decided to give this kid a letter. A few days before the banquet this kids parent came in and knowing his kid did not meet the requirements for a letter demanded that Coach Wooden give him a letter. Coach Wooden decided not to give the kid a letter because of the parents action. He said he regretted that decision the rest of his life. So as hard as it can be at times the coach should never hold the ignorance of the parents against the player.

I attend many games every year and have seen Adair play at least once a year for many many years. I always thought Coach Fudge did a great job with the players he had. I think the style of play described above was the style Adair needed to play to compete with the better teams in the 5th region. In twelve years he went to Rupp twice. Year in and Year out I think Etown, John Hardin, North Hardin, Central Hardin, Bardstown will almost always have better athletes than Adair. Marion Co and now Taylor Co are going to have better athletes most years than Adair Co. Although Campbellsville has been down for the last 4 years or so they had great athletes through much of Coach Fudge's tenure. Adair Co has also been know for lots of drama making it a difficult place to coach. I think parents fans a lot of times over estimate the talent there team has, and underestimate the competence of their coach. From what I saw I think Coach Fudge was a very good coach and greatly under appreciated. I think they do have some young players that you could build around but I still do not see them having the talent to beat those top 6-7 teams I listed above.

Seems like the schools that are following the rule are putting themselves at a disadvantage. Your opponents can look to see who are your leading scorers, who your best 3 point shooters are and who to foul and not foul. Schools who don't follow the rule are gaining an advantage by having this information about there opponents while there opponents do not have access to these stats. If KHSAA does not enforce rule then shame on them!!