Another fine team effort

Now that I get to make some decisions, I won't cover Pop Warner myself. The times when I've had to do it were some of the more unpleasant experiences I've had in the business.
At least around here, Pop Warner has a rule against scouting, so when league officials see somebody taking notes, they get a little suspicious. I once had a hard time convincing some old guy with no teeth that I was covering a game for a paper. I'm sure people lie about that all the time.
The team photos drive me nuts especially when they all come at the end of the season or when the same team sends one every week, expecting it to be published every time.
But it's a tradition and far be it from me to mess with tradition.
The unwillingness of some coaches to supply names and stats is a little aggravating, as are their attempts to try to steer me away from some features on individual players in favor of larger group pieces that end up being kind of lame and unfocused. Looking at it from their point of view, they have to deal with team politics, chemistry, etc. and let's face it, what we write does affect kids. I'd like to think that a coach could convince the kids and the parents that any publicity for any athlete is good for all of them, but that seems to be a tough idea to sell.
I've kind of learned that sometimes I have to go along to get along.

 

Flex, I dealt with this problem earlier.
The mother sending in results wouldn't put scores for some games or not have player names. I didn't run them.
She was peeved. I told her I need scores and I'll run the kids who scored and two extra kids on offense and two on defense. No more, no less.
Problem solved.

 

That's typical for what we do for Little League in the summer, and it works well for the most part. I guess this football thing just hit be by surprise since we rarely hear from our pee-wee football coaches/parents around here. Good advice though.