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The Needle

March 2, 2012

Jordan Cobb is one of the MHSAA’s superbly talented staff members; and one of his many duties may intrigue you.

Jordan watches “the needle.” 

The “chartbeat” needle tells us, at any moment, how many visitors we have to MHSAA.com.  It even tells us what page they’re viewing on MHSAA.com, how they got there, and where they’re located in the world.

Not so long ago, Jordan would fret on a Friday night in the fall that our servers did not have the capacity to handle all those looking for game scores.  Through lots of creative programming and work-arounds, and an in-house eight-unit “server farm” that shifts and spreads loads to accommodate peak demands, Jordan now watches the needle more in wonder than with worry.

On most Friday nights during the fall and winter, and for the entire months of November and March, MHSAA.com is among the one percent most visited U.S. websites – on any topic, not just sports.

Even on a quiet weekday afternoon, there will at all times be one to two hundred viewers navigating MHSAA.com.

A decade or two ago, the MHSAA office would not receive two hundred telephone calls per day or two hundred letters per week.  Now, every second of the workday and long into the evening and all weekend long, one hundred to one thousand people or more are making contact with the MHSAA at MHSAA.com.

So MHSAA.com deserves our attention and resources.  It is creating first and lasting impressions.  It is branding us, and doing so far beyond the walls of schools and the borders of our state.

Most importantly, it is demonstrating what we value.  It is conveying messages about who we are, what we do and what we believe.  And providing a stark contrast to who we are not and what we don’t do and don’t believe.

The Whole Body of Work

June 27, 2016

From time to time over the years, criticism has been leveled at the Michigan High School Athletic Association because an MHSAA publication cover lacked a certain number of photos of females or minorities, or a certain balance of large schools or small schools or nonpublic schools ...

My response has always been, “Don’t base your opinion on one cover. Look at the whole body of work. Look at the covers across all sports and an entire year.”

So, when there was recent criticism that our football practice policy wasn’t progressive enough, that it allows (in theory only) too much time for contact drills, my response is: Look at the entire body of work.

The MHSAA was one of the first states in the nation to limit contact in football practice, both preseason and regular season. Some states still do not.

Some of the states which appear to have more restrictive practice policies in the fall also allow football practice in the spring, which actually increases exposure to injury. Michigan does not.

Some states which appear to have more restrictive practice policies in the fall also allow contact at out-of-season football camps, which actually increases exposure to injury. Michigan does not – never has allowed its players to participate in contact drills at football camps, a policy to which some states are returning because of the safety concerns we’ve always had in Michigan.

Some states allow students to participate in five, six or even eight quarters of football games in a single week. In Michigan, students can play in one game only during any five day period, never two, and never part or all of a JV game one day and part or all of a varsity game another day during the same week. That’s been Michigan’s rule for decades, and some states are finally moving in that direction.

  • The MHSAA is the first and only state to provide concussion care gap insurance at its own cost to assure all students have prompt and professional medical attention without the worry of unpaid medical expenses. This is for all students in all levels of all sports, practice and competition, grades 6 through 12.

  • The MHSAA conducts the nation’s largest high school association managed sideline concussion detection pilot program.

  • The MHSAA conducts the nation’s broadest and deepest high school association managed concussion reporting system.

There is still more to the whole body of work – but the point is made. Criticism of the MHSAA for lack of attention to participant safety – in football or any other sport – is wholly unjustified.