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Dad's Day

April 23, 2012

Today is my father’s 92nd birthday.

Until my wife replaced Dad as my best friend, he doubled as both my best friend and father.

Dad has been inducted into 13 halls of fame nationally, and in Iowa where he was a two-time undefeated state high school wrestling champion, and in Wisconsin where he was a two-time Big Ten wrestling champion for the Badgers before a stellar career as high school and college coach, especially in football and wrestling.  All that before his 29½ year tenure as executive director of the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association.

For two decades Dad chaired the national high school wrestling rules committee, and he traveled nationwide to conduct wrestling rules meetings for coaches and officials in states where local expertise in the sport had not yet developed.  It is not a stretch to call him the father of high school wrestling.  Certainly no person had greater influence than he during the sport’s formative years on the high school level.

And no person had more influence over my formative years.

So it is becoming increasingly painful to observe my father falter, as all people do who live as long as he has. Simple tasks require an increasing amount of assistance; significant talks fill a decreasing amount of our time. It is agonizing to one who has adored him.

When Dad served the WIAA, his sharp mind and strong voice would make him a top choice to address the toughest topics at National Federation meetings.  He received the National Federation’s Award of Merit and is a member of its Hall of Fame.

But perhaps the most meaningful memory I have of Dad’s professional life occurred at his retirement event in late 1985 when the person representing the state’s coaches said this:  “John.  We may not have agreed with your every decision, but we never once questioned your motives.”  There can be no higher praise.

More Than A Myth

September 5, 2014

Without a sure sense of what the outcome should be, we are engaging school administrators and others in a year-long discussion of possible revisions in out-of-season coaching rules.

We know that we would like the outcome to be simpler rules that are easier to understand and enforce; and that we would like to permit coaches to spend more time with student-athletes out of season; and that we want none of this to make coaches feel like they must coach one sport year-round to be successful or make student-athletes feel like they must play a single sport year-round just to make the team.

If there is a policy that can accomplish the good that we hope for and avoid the bad that we fear, we haven’t yet found it or developed it.

There is a temptation to characterize the multi-sport athlete as an anachronism or myth of modern school sports. However, the multi-sport athlete remains the backbone of interscholastic athletic programs in Class C and D schools.

And the multi-sport athlete still appears to be the ideal athlete, regardless of school size. It is an instructive reminder, I think, that the Lansing State Journal named a three-sport star from Ithaca as its high school male athlete of the year for 2013-14, and it was a four-sport athlete from Eaton Rapids who was named the high school female athlete of the year.

Following my presentation to coaches, student-athletes and parents at Jonesville High School last month, a student approached me to offer thanks for our sponsoring bowling. Jonesville won the MHSAA’s 2014 Division 4 Boys Bowling championship; and the young man who thanked me participates in football, bowling and baseball for his school, representing in my mind the kind of student we should strive the hardest to serve as we develop, revisit and revise policies and programs.