If it works in middle school, maybe it'll work for the Dallas Cowboys

Whatever helps recruiting, Doc!

 

Tough to say, maybe just maybe he thought the kids would enjoy a trick play. The other scenarios are quite plausible as well. He may just be a self important blowhard, just not sure firing him isn't an overreaction.

 

Just to be clear ... wasn't talking about firing him from his main teaching gig. Just the coaching assignment. It's probably some piddling sum, relative to how much work he puts into it. And I might not even do that. But I'd make it damn clear that shananigans such as that will not be tolerated in the future.

 

I agree with those that think this was a dumb thing to do in a middle school game. Maybe the coach's kids did enjoy it. He also made 11 kids on the defensive side of the ball feel dumber that shit, when really it was probably their coach's fault for not teaching them to be watching for those kinds of trick plays. Of course, I can't blame those coaches, who probably spent most of the season teaching the kids to put their pads on right and run the three or four simple running plays most middle school offenses employ.

I'd feel a differently about a hidden ball trick in baseball at that age (11 or 12) or something, I think, but this, at the middle school level which is often one of, if not, the first exposure to playing real football, I felt was a jackass move.

 

Wade Phillips has time to coach the team now.

http://sports.espn.go.com/dallas/nfl/news/story?id=5780262

 

As someone who played football through middle school and high school, my guess is the kids most definitely enjoyed running the trick play. The kids on the defensive side of the football were probably pissed they gave up a touchdown, but I doubt they suffered the emotional scarring some of you seem think they did. Believe it or not, kids don't need to have their feelings protected every second of the day.

And, believe it or not, the play might have actually taught the defensive team something in the process. When the ball moves, you move and you move until the whistle tells you to stop. They might — gasp! — become better football players for it.

 

Maybe, but do you really doubt for a second that this was all about the coach's need for attention?

 

Coach's need for attention? Fire him from coaching? Middle school coaching is about teaching the fundamentals. This play offers a great tool to teach the defense the fundamental that when the ball moves, play begins. The play also drives that fact home to the team that used it successfully. Good for the coach.

 

Reading the title, I thought this was a thread about middle school girls performing lap dances.

 

Indeed.

I laugh my ass off every time I watch that play. Good for the coach who called it, good for the team for executing it. Well done.

If one of my sons were on the defence, first thing I'd ask him after I stop laughing: "Did you learn anything?"

 

Can the other team use it as a learning tool? Absolutely.

Was the coach a tool for doing it? Absolutely.

 

I'm under no illusions that there was any emotional scarring involved. As the father of a middle-school boy (who plays football, but not on either of these teams) I would not be worried about his emotional state in the least. What I can't get past is the thought of this "grown-up" cackling about what he is going to pull off.

I'd also be pretty pissed if my son (playing offense) had to hold his position and take a helluva shot just for the coach to see if the other team was up on its fundamentals.