leatherneck

I absolutely loved this line in the article: One of the best high school teams in Florida found out what Kentucky football was all about on Saturday.

To the bolded: yes. Heck, he put the writer in touch with Jennie.

Nah, we let those very, very few players from Independence that can actually get on the field for Highlands live in big, fancy homes.

I wonder if he even contacted the private schools to see how much they and their booster organizations put into their football programs. Wasn't that the context of the article: how much money is placed into football programs? If so, does it matter whether it's a private school program or public school program? I wouldn't think so. Heck, if I'm a tax payer in FT (and obviously I am), I'm thrilled as Pete to know that a large portion of the funds placed in the program are private donations. Oh well. I'm not as bothered by the article as some are. If I was looking around to see what school I wanted to send my pee wee aged, football playing son to, a factor would be the level of financial support provided to the football program. Whatever shortcomings the article may have, it makes it clear that the folks in FT financially support the football program. And as Martha likes to say, that's a good thing.

Ike is a good man and has supported football in FT for a long, long time.

Oh you are so bad.

B E A utiful! Off topic but similar to your story. Years ago, before I even started dating Henry, she's on a plane flying into or out of CVG. Guy sitting next to her starts talking with her. Explains to her how he is in the construction industry and actually owns a construction company. She asks the name of the company. Guy tells her the name of the company is the company Henry's family owns! Oops. I don't recall if she called him out on it.

I've gone the other way as I've gotten older. I actually get a chuckle out of THAT guy. It causes me to laugh as THAT guy repeats his high school football accomplishments with such detail and clarity. Heck, at my age, I have to look at jbwill's website to remember who we even played my senior year (well, except for who we played in the state game. I remember who we played and the final score but not much more).

And every dollar contributed is accounted for from a Title IX perspective. That I am sure of.

Is his family from this area?

Bingo. Hebel and the inside LBers will have to play big.

I think Morgan helped Duffy out some while Duffy was coaching at Highlands. I know I met Keith on multiple occasions. Nice guy.

That is classic! Do you remember the name of the kid and if so, will you disclose?

The talent on most Florida high school teams is rather impressive. The talent on UC team is even more impressive. A friend of mine from Jax told me that UC gets a lot of lower income students that are very talented football players. For some reason, a lot of them don't start attending UC until their junior or senior years. Florida's very liberal transfer rule makes it easy for them to transfer to UC. Someone mentioned they had 12 seniors transfer this year. Don't be fooled by their low roster numbers (give me 40 exceptional football players and I'll be just fine) or the fact that they weren't rated real high by MaxPreps or any other rating service (my guess is that any rating service had no clue who would be on the team at the time the rating was done). This game is going to be really tough and if Highlands wins by one point, I'll be quite happy. As Clyde mentioned, they return 3 all-staters and I'm not sure if that included any of the transfers. Want to get some feel for the team speed for UC? Watch the highlight video posted above. Pay particular attention to the pulling O linemen and the D linemen. They are fast off the ball.

If I recall properly, Highlands had only attempted two rushing attempts before T went up 14-0. To me anyway, you can't abandon something you hadn't done. I liked what I saw out of Houliston, Schweitzer and Feggins on O; and I liked what I saw out of Bardo, Hope and Cochran on D. Bardo and Houliston both have to be very sore this morning. Birds again got a lot out of the game. Learn and improve. Brooks looked nice running the ball for T; Bonnafon impressed me with his arm; Swabok is a really, really good receiver. Defensively the Rocks have some work to do covering the deep ball but I'm quite certain that will be addressed. 96, 44 and 30 on the Rocks D looked good.

Technically the bye week is already gone. Those that have a bye week have forsaken one of the two permitted scrimmages. Personally I think having a bye week during the season is important to let bodies heal up. But your point about reducing the regular season schedule to 9 may have some merit.

They beat Moeller and only lost to Colerain by 1 point last year. so I'm not sure I agree with your second tier assessment. Is Moeller also in the second tier? Would Colerain be considered a second tier team if it was in the GCL. Who is in the first tier? X by itself?

I'd be fine with that, but you need to remember, there is a balancing act between sports. Extending the season another week in an effort to further improve football would be met with resistance, probably fierce resistance, from the basketball folks. Can't move the start of the season up; it's already too early in my book.

Bingo. Talked to Troy, the football knowledgeable member of the crew, and they plan on broadcasting the game barring technology problems.

I truly hope you are right. It would be great for their program and the kids and coaches that have worked really hard.

While I certainly understand TOG's thoughts about Ky football being watered down due to the number of classes (and it is in my opinion) comparing what Ohio does with what Ky does is irrelevant to me. The quality of HS football played in Ohio (across the board) is heads and shoulders above the quality played in Ky. So what is best for them, isn't necessarily best for us. The issue with 6 classes is not whether it watered down the competition (again, it did) but whether having 6 classes will help improve or hurt the quality of HS football in Ky in the future. Those who supported 6 classes (and I was one of those) did so because they believed that it will help improve the quality down the road. Perhaps we will be proven wrong. If so, then I made a mistake. And for those that claim we went to 6 classes because we wanted to remove as many teams as possible from having to play Trinity in the playoffs, I understand why people would think that. Given the tension between the public and privates at the time, it's only logical to think that was a motive. I can honestly say I didn't hear that from other board members. But I can't say for certain that they weren't thinking it. And I'm fine if they were and if that was a motivation or even the primary motivation for 6 classes if going to 6 classes diffused the push to separate the privates. I think that separation would have been a disaster for high school athletics in Ky over the long haul. TOG, you are right in the current structure resulting in watered down state championships, but what would you have called the private school football championship with the many fewer than 30 private schools (16?) competing against one another? How fair would it have been for Brossart to compete against CovCath, X or T for the football championship? If it and the other small private schools had to compete with X and T for a football championships, would those smaller schools even continued a football program? My guess is some of them would have discontinued their programs. That, as Martha would say, would not have been a good thing. There are winners and losers in every decision. Separation would have been good for some schools; but a disaster for others. Going to 6 classes really hasn't hurt any program that I can tell. I acctually think it has helped football programs. It might make for some more blowouts, then again, there were blow outs when there were 4 classes. Not wanting to be a jerk, but we beat CovCath 55 to 0 back in 75 when we had 4 classes. Our closest playoff game was the state championship game when we won by 21 points. I compare that with some of the more recent playoffs. Highlands barely beat JC a couple of years ago when JC's receiver drops a pass in the endzone; Highlands needing a last second TD to beat Bryan Station; a very competitive playoff game with CovCath last year; etc., etc. Yeah Highlands has had some blow out state championship games as of late, but they've had to beat some real quality teams to get there in most years. T survived a very close playoff game with Scott County last year. BG had a really tough time with Cooper in the state game and survived John Hardin the week before on a trick, hook and lateral, play to win the game. NewCath had a tough win over Caldwell County. Central has had very tough state championship wins over Belfry the last two years, one going to overtime. So while I can't disagree that 6 classes has watered it down some, it's not like the same 6 teams are winning it year, after year, with blowouts every step of the way in the playoffs. With a play or two going the other way during the playoff or state championship games, Belfry, Cooper, Caldwell, CovCath and Scott County were state champions last year instead of Central, BG, NCC, Highlands and T (and perhaps Mayfield too but I don't remember their playoff run). The current structure isn't perfect and I understand and appreciate the criticism. Now fire away folks. I realize my thinking is in the minority of fans' opinions (but I believe I'm in the majority of the coaches', administrators' and players' opinions).

I agree. Trolls do make things entertaining at times.

If you are referring to the Mitchell case, those forfeits were later overturned by the KHSAA and the losses were restored. You really, really don't want to get into a discussion about the Mitchell case with me. The lawyer in me causes me to not say: I know the Mitchell case facts better than anyone on this site, so I'll instead I'll say: I know those facts probably better than any one on this site. And for the posters that weren't around when the Mitchell case was discussed ad nauseum on here, when the sanctions were improperly first issued, it was not for cheating or recruiting or anything of the like. At no time did the KHSAA or anyone allege that Highlands had recruited Mitchell or cheated. The improper sanctions were imposed because Highlands had the audacity, the sheer audacity, to follow the directive of a court instead of the KHSAA. Fortunately for the rule of law principle, the General Assembly later gave the Board of Control members a Civics 101 lesson (a ruling of the judiciary trumps the ruling of a state administrative agency) and banned the KHSAA from imposing sanctions on a school for following a court order. Which you would have thought the educators on the Board of Control would have already known but evidently did not. What else do you have? I haven't been posting much on this site, but you've re-energized me.