Coaching Parents Up

I'm not happy today. I didn't sleep well last night because I was bothered by a few of our parents. This Blog is for those of you that are in the minority, the ones that feel the need to complain about anything and everthing...

On Saturday afternoon, I had a parent pass on the word that several freshman parents were not happy about this or not happy about that. Yesterday my boss, Coach Martinez, called me to say another freshman parent called him to complain about the Freshman program.

HELLO??? Aren't we 4-0? Aren't we building men for others? Aren't we teaching our players to compete in life? Isn't everybody playing? Aren't we taking kids that have never played football before in their lives and having them play at a high level? Aren't we teaching our players prioritizing core values such a Faith, Family, School and then Football?

We don't abuse our players. We don't use profanity. We don't demean our players. Instead, we value them as people and treat them as men. And that is all they want. Everybody wants to feel that they are valued and an intrugal part of a community. That is what we do.

I am very confident and I am very good at what I do. My job as the Freshman Head Coach is to coach the coaches, coach the players, build men for others and introduce parents to high school athletics. I try to make the experience a positive one for all involved. It is my hope that parents will understand and trust what the coaches are doing or the decisions we make are in the best interest of the team, the program and for the athlete.

As a parent of two former student athletes, I know how you folks feel when you have to rely on the coaches that have your children. But I had to LET GO and trust the coaches and support their decisions. I was lucky to have excellent Head Coaches in Thom Lubic, Page Culver and Larry Rinehart while my sons as they attended Monte Vista HS. I didn't always agree with them or what they did, but I trusted their decision making and how they ran their teams.

As a parent, I made myself available to my sons to voice their concerns, to give them insight from the coach's point of view and to love them up. I supported the Football and Baseball programs at Monte Vista as a parent volunteer and booster club member. That was it. My role defined as a parent.

Parents, I'm taking this opportunity to 'coach you up' on how to be the parent of a student athlete in high school. Listen to your sons. Love them up and support them. That's all I can ask of all my parents. Trust me... I know what I am talking about and we can work together and have a good time doing it.