Operation Texas

Sunday, August 16, 2015

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

"There are 364 properties on the market in this county and 11 are under contract" - realtor April 2014.

Prophetic words. I was unable to sell my house and was stuck with a 2K rent in Midland plus a mortgage, home insurance, etc in VT. I loved the coaching experience in Texas but the financial burden was too much to endure. I was fortunate enough to get a teaching position at Hartford Memorial Middle School, so I will be teaching middle school social studies. This will allow me to commute from my house in West Burke and save 25K. From a financial standpoint it was a no-brainer.

In the end it is extremely disappointing that my Texas coaching career was so brief, but on the other hand I'm excited to be back in Vermont surrounded by family and friends. I sincerely hope that the Lee Rebels will have a great season, so too the LI Vikings and the NCU Falcons.

To sum it up, I will be out of the coaching business this fall. This will give me an opportunity to see what normal people do in the fall and be part of the FFCA - LI Chapter. Operation Texas is not over, its on hold...

Sunday, March 29, 2015

WORKING HARD EVERYDAY TO BRING THE BELL BACK HOME

This is the sign that has been hanging on the bulletin board above my desk in the football office since the day I arrived here at Lee. For the longest time, I had no idea what the bell represented that I was working so hard to “bring back home”. Turns out, it’s the trophy for winning the district championship. We compete in what is known as “the Little Southwest Conference”, which got its name because of the ferocity of the competition and the intensity of the rivalries. Abilene High vs Abilene Cooper, Permian vs Lee, and Lee vs Midland High are just a few examples of the battles that take place every year in the Little Southwest Conference. Every team in the district is competitive and there is never an easy win on anyone’s district schedule.

So what have we been doing to “bring the bell back home?” Our offseason began the moment the 2014 season ended – the Lee Rebel coaches and players alike immediately turned their attention to getting back on track and making sure that the 2015 season would not be a repeat of 2014. Its important to remember that here in Texas, football meets every day during the school year for the entire year. This means that when third period begins at 10:30, our kids are in the turf room (indoor practice facility), on the field, or in the weight room lifting, conditioning, competing, doing agility and speed work, or practicing football skills. We lifted four times a week in phases 1 and 2, but now that we are in phase 3, we lift 3 times a week (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday) and practice football skills on Tuesday and Thursday. The beauty of this for me is that as the running backs coach I get nearly 45 minutes two times a week to work on the individual skills of playing the position – ball security, running, pass protection, run blocking, and receiving. It is a wonderful luxury and something I could have only dreamed of having back in Vermont. It also doesn’t hurt that we can get on the field all year round and not have to worry about the weather.

Our work doesn’t stop during the period however. All of our kids are expected to workout twice a day. This means that they will do a winter, and spring sport, or they will workout again “voluntarily” after school. The kids who play basketball and baseball will remain in the football class and workout with the team during school, then they will go to their practices after school. Same for anyone who is doing soccer, track, or powerlifting. The difference is that the basketball and baseball teams have coaches that are dedicated head coaches – meaning that basketball and baseball are the only sports they coach. Soccer, track, and powerlifting are all coached by football coaches doing a second sport (I’m the powerlifting head coach). So our kids have pretty full schedules. Here is an example:

8:00am – arrive at the football office for mandatory team breakfast

10:30am – football workout

4:15pm – workout #2 / second sport practice

6:30pm – head home

As for the coaches, we have been working pretty hard as well. Every Monday morning we have a general staff meeting at 6:45am, and we normally have a personnel meeting at lunch later in the week. In addition, offensive and defensive staff meetings at 6am began in January. Here is my schedule from this past week – which has pretty much been the norm for the last couple of months.

MONDAY	TUESDAY	WEDNESDAY	THURSDAY	FRIDAY
6:45 am – staff meeting 8:30am – class 10:30am – workout 12:30pm – class 3:00pm – powerlifting 4:15pm – workout	6:00am – offensive staff 8:30am – class 10:30am – football practice 12:30pm – class 3:00pm – powerlifting 4:15pm - workout	6:00am – offensive staff 8:30am – class 10:30am – workout 12:30pm – class 3:00pm – powerlifting 4:15pm - workout	6:00am – offensive staff 8:30am – class 10:30am – football practice 12:30pm – class 3:00pm – powerlifting 4:15pm – Junior high track meet timer	8:30am – class 10:30am – football practice 11:30am – staff meeting 12:30pm – class 3:00pm – powerlifting

In addition, during the powerlifting season I would have a meet to attend on Saturday. There is no question that it’s a busy schedule and that the Midland Independent School District gets its money’s worth from its football coaches – at least on the Lee side of town!

It does snow in Texas.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Lee - Permian

Here I was 1 year ago on Friday October 11, 2013. Unbeknownst to me that Friday would end up being "Fun Day" at LI. While being a big supporter of Fun Day I was also concerned that our players would not handle the event responsibly and would ruin their legs playing flag football, frisbee, or one of the many other Fun Day activities offered to them as students at LI. That being the case and with the football team having a game in Woodstock that Friday, I told Mrs. Smith that I would be taking the team to the gym to watch a movie when the Fun Day announcement was made. The movie I chose to show the kids was "Friday Night Lights", the Permian Panthers taking center stage. I could not possibly have imagined that exactly one year later I would be coaching in the Lee - Permian game. Even now it seems ridiculous.

Unfortunately, we lost 45-28. Tremendous credit to Permian as they obviously prepared their kids very well and were able to keep us at bay and win the game after building a 14-0 lead.

As for how it compares to SJA-LI, there is no comparison. My guess is that there were maybe 8,000 in attendance at the game, which makes it number 2 on the list of most attended games I have ever coached in - second only to the Shrine Game in 2004 but well below what I expected for Lee - Permian game. Considering that Caledonia County has a population of approximately 30,000 and the attendance at The Game generally exceeds 3,000, it was a stark comparison. Midland and Ector County (Odessa) have a combined population of over 300,000 people, although they have 4 high schools to divide the kids and fans amongst. Nearly 10 percent of the county's population attend the game EVERY YEAR, and often many more. Here, its just not that way with the Permian game. As a matter of fact, I asked the kids in my class how many of them cared about the Permian game and almost no one raised their hand. You would not have known that we were playing anyone different based on the hallways or the students.

All that having been said, I can say with certainty that Permian has joined the ranks of the HATED enemies....
#1 - Academy
#2 - Academy
#3 - Academy
#4 - Permian
#5 - Patriots

In the end, I am the ultimate JAG this week.

Home of THE Friday Night Lights

Ratliff Stadium, Odessa, TX. Home of the Permian Panthers and the site of the filming of the movie Friday Night Lights. We played them in subvarsity football on Thursday night, meaning that our Maroon (junior team) and Silver (sophomore team) faced their black and white. We won both games easily. Regardless of the outcome, it was neat to see Ratliff in person. On a side note, in 14 years of coaching the lockerroom was the most disgusting I have ever visited by far. It smelled like the Permian opponents had urinated all over the place and no one had ever cleaned it up, pretty awful.

Ratliff is a nice stadium - they did a nice job of designing it symmetrically with the trees in the end zones. It is also set into the ground to a degree and the stands are very close to the bench area.

This is the largest high school jumbotron in Texas and was just built this year.

Monday, October 6, 2014

Pics: Cooper

Trent, TX. If the field looks small, it is. Its a 6 man football field at Trent HS, home of the Gorillas, enrollment 75.. The field is 80 yards long by 40 yards wide. Trent has a population of 314, smaller than my hometown of Wheelock but yet it has its own synthetic football field complete with lights and a sizeable set of permanent bleachers on both sides of the field. Yes it is a different world.

Gorilla Stadium.

Shotwell Stadium, Abilene, TX. Home of the Cooper Cougars and the Abilene Eagles. Shotwell was built in 1959 and was a copy of the Rice University stadium. Its a bit older by Texas standards but it does get loud.

We watched the Cooper band practicing their halftime routine after we arrived and it was pretty awesome. They performed a good portion of the score from the movie "Gladiator" complete with a photographic mural of the Colosseum that stood approximately 15 feet high and was 40 feet long and served as a backdrop for their marching. It was pretty impressive, especially since they had to bring the Colosseum out in three separate sections.

Headed out the tunnel before kickoff. The inflatable helmet tunnel travels with us wherever we go, it makes for a neat experience for the kids.

Pics: El Paso El Dorado

The first "mountain" I'd seen since coming to Texas. This pic was taken somewhere between Midland and El Paso.

The Green Mountains they are not but I was happy to see them anyway.

Van Horn, TX. Population 1,960. Van Horn is 185 miles from Midland so we stopped here at about 2pm for some mental conditioning and a walkthrough. We did the walkthrough on the parking lot with football markings painted on it. I asked one of the other assistants why a parking lot would have a football field painted on it - answer = thats where the marching band practices. Even a school with an enrollment of 265 in grades 5-12 has a marching band.

More Van Horn scenery. I felt like I should have worn my six shooters to this town - it was old school old west.

The terrain got more difficult the closer we got to El Paso.

Speaking of difficult terrain, you can see Ciudad Jaurez, Mexico in the distance on the other side of highway. Home of ISIS evidently and the 37th most dangerous city in the world. It was the murder capital of the world "exceeding the 2nd and 3rd finishers by 25%" from 2007-2009. Awesome! Suffice it to say, we did not cross the river for our postgame meal.