Kids: ‘Throw Them Out There And They’Ll Flat Surprise You’

A recent Sports Illustrated article lamented the decline in popularity of high school football in most states, Washington included.

Several schools have dropped their programs due to lack of participation.

“Football is a game of hard work,” says West Valley High School coach Tim Trout. “It’s more fun to play than practice.”

But there could be an underlying reason other than a perceived reluctance to work hard.

Athletes need to be involved and see a tangible reward for their investment of time and sweat.

“A person is going to learn a lot more if they haven’t given up hope of playing,” says hall of fame college and high school coach Dave Holmes, who coached at University High School in the 1970s and ‘80s.

Like Holmes, I’ve come to believe that you don’t have to sacrifice numbers in order to achieve success. Youngsters today are not content to practice all week merely for the honor of wearing a uniform and standing on the sidelines on Friday night. If they don’t play, they look elsewhere for gratification.

Which is a shame. If any sport is able to afford more possibilities for playing time, it is football.

Freeman coach John Custer concurs. He said he finds spots for all his juniors and seniors and tries to play as many sophomores as possible, if only on special teams.

“You’ve got to trust kids,” he said. “Throw them out there and they’ll flat surprise you. If you have a decent athlete, give him room to grow and see what happens. Don’t put parameters around them.”

Holmes came to that realization while serving as head coach at the University of Hawaii. When he was at North Central previously, he went with his best players both ways.

“Tom Hedemark didn’t start for me as a junior but as a senior was a great player,” he recalled. “He was good enough to start at WSU. In my later years of coaching, the idea that someone couldn’t play like that as a junior was silly.”

Later, at Eastern Washington University he two-platooned, backing defensive players with an offensive counterpart and vice-versa. During a blowout game he moved a starting linebacker to fullback and the player responded that he didn’t know what to do, even though he had practiced at the position.

“I guess that motivated me to realize a kid will learn most in the first three weeks of practice,” said Holmes. “If he loses hope he’ll play, he won’t learn any more.”

It really hit home at the University of Hawaii where a fifth string tackle was forced to play after all other coaching options were exhausted.

“He knew he was going to have to play at the beginning of the week,” said Holmes. “He became a football player in three or four days and learned more about tackle than he had learned in two years.”

So when Holmes arrived at University High, where he completed his career between 1974 and 1984, he brought along his two-platoon system.

“That is what I was comfortable with,” he said. “I fully intended to utilize the better seniors two ways but never was able to choreograph it.”

U-Hi would use 40 to 45 athletes in varsity games. The Titans won nearly two-thirds of the time.

He admits there were strengths and weaknesses. The strength is that juniors play who otherwise wouldn’t get to.

“Your 44th guy was a second teamer and that kept him in the program,” said Holmes.

The result was a consistently good win-loss record.

The weakness was that his teams, while sharing two league championships, were not good enough to win in the state playoffs.

“But I was quite happy with that,” he said. “It wasn’t the dominating thing in my life.”

State championship teams are rare and special. It’s only happened once at West Valley, East Valley and last year at Central Valley.

Keeping football vital for athletes is important. If football coaches want to sell their programs they have to make every effort to involve players and reward loyalty. If not, football participation will continue to decline.