Is it worth it? Odd spring high school football season brings plenty of questions with it
Is it worth it?
Is the effort to squeeze in a spring high school football season worth the costs, the manpower needed to test students and coaches for COVID-19 to ensure a game? What about juggling myriad sports seasons, condensing them into a matter of weeks, all the result of a pandemic that turned a lot of lives upside down?
The easy answer is, of course, yes. It’s worth it.
You cannot put a price on experiences and of good physical and mental health. Sports and engagement provide that and much more. The rewards outweigh the risks. This spring football season is going to be as wildly unpredictable as it figures to be curious and fun.
The season was pushed from the traditional fall months to now because COVID-19 numbers trended down enough to make it possible.
Kickoffs start as soon as Friday for some and March 19 and 20 for just about everyone else. It will be different. There will be no league championship banners to pursue, no postseason tournaments to zero in on. The atmosphere will be hollow with maybe parents and immediate families allowed in, but no marching bands, cheer or dance teams.
It appears most area schools will have a spring season of three to six games. I emailed all the local school districts to get a superintendent or a spokesman — anyone — to answer questions on COVID-19 testing, additional costs and concerns, if their schools are doing some sports.
All but two declined to respond.
Three athletic directors and three football coaches from across the greater Sacramento region wondered in conversations with me about what looms — each concluding with “is it worth it?”
All six were from prominent high school football programs. Not teams. There’s a difference.
Every high school has a football team, but not all have a program — established outfits not undone by constant turnover of coaches, administrators and players. Said one coach of a regularly ranked power, “What we’re doing is just crazy, a rush job. We really shouldn’t be doing this, trying football, but the kids need it, and that’s why we’re doing it.”
While COVID-19 spread is a fear, as one positive test could derail a week or more of progress and games, the chief corner is safety.
It’s the potential for injury that worries some programs with 20 players on a team. Schools have endured stop-and-starts in conditioning since last playing games some 14 months ago.
The “worth it” angle also touches heavily on a matter the public may not understand, or really know about: cost.
As soon as coaches handed out helmets and that player put it on and hit the field even for wind sprints, that helmet is officially used, even if the brand new sticker remains. Each school is required to have football gear reconditioned after a season, like service under the hood of a car.
This can cost between $8,000 to $16,000 per year, per program or team, depending on if the school has all three levels (freshman, junior varsity, varsity). All of the gear used for spring games will have to be redone for the fall season, even if spring games are canceled. Districts generally cover these costs.
Football is generally a revenue maker on any campus. It will not be this spring without fans outside of immediate families. Some schools will charge for tickets, others will not. There will not be food trucks, concession stands, T-shirt sales or raffles, a crusher in revenue and background vibe — but understood, considering the times.
Players speak
Is it worth it?
It sure is for Oak Ridge linebacker Hunter Nabors and his tackling terror partner Ryan Enney. They grew up together. This is their year.
“We’re super grateful to have this opportunity, and we’re mindful of being COVID-safe,” said Enney, a 4.2-GPA student. “We’re going to appreciate all of it.”
You’ll hear the same emphatic yes from guys in the trenches such as Jake Melander at Folsom, fresh off an age-group world championship win in weight lifting, and Bobby Piland Jr. at Rocklin.
Piland is a relentless pile-mover who drags massive tires around his yard for fun. He is in the midst of a tremendous career. Just a junior, the two-way lineman with swelling recruiting interest, including from Ivy League programs, could become The Bee’s first four-time All-Metro player.
At Vista del Lago in Folsom, 10 players are three-year starters for coach Mike Struebing, a science teacher who embraces the chance to clear his brain by supervising football drills. Spring is worth it for Vista’s record-setting running back Ethan Menenez and mighty mite energizer Carson King.
King is a 5-foot-4, 135-pound receiver, impossible to cover or catch in the open field. He represents most of the prep athletes in America, eager to play a final year as college is a long shot. Only 2% of high school students land athletic scholarships. So a spring season is worth it for the other 98%.
One of the fortunate ones is Moses Oladejo, the superb 6-foot-3, 230-pound linebacker of a man at Cosumnes Oaks in Elk Grove. He has signed a letter of intent to play on scholarship at Cal, and he will play with his CO pals this spring because, “these are my brothers. We live for this.”
A spring fling is also worth it for those eager to get recognized by a college, any size, any place. That lot includes running back Ethan Archuleta of Elk Grove, a 4.0 student who cherishes football so much that he places his helmet near his bed so that it’s the first thing he sees when he wakes up.
“We just want a season so bad and will do whatever it takes,” he said.
The spring is also worth extra sacrifice. Quarterback JT Willis of Lincoln said he would go back to distance learning once the spring football season starts to avoid the potential exposure of COVID-19 on campus. He said he would do his part to not doom the rest of the team, because one positive test leads to a domino affect.
The Whitney Wildcats found out, one positive test leading to their opening game against Rocklin to be scrapped. It won’t be the only time a regional team has to pull the plug for a game, leading to a 10-to-14 day quarantine period.
The competition now isn’t just on the field. It’s a collaborative effort to get on the field, and you will find that every coach and team leader is stressing masking and sanitizing. Players from Sacramento County and El Dorado County have told me that they will stick to distance learning or opt into it with their football teammates to be as safe as possible, and that’s just how goofy it has all become.
I cannot blame their approach. I applaud it. Find a way.
Glorified scrimmages and end the blame game
Elk Grove coach John Heffernan wonders about the quality of ball this spring, will some of it feel and look rushed?
He wonders if these will be “glorified scrimmages.”
“That’s the reality of it,” Heffernan said. “No playoffs, no league championship, so what we’re going to do is develop and prepare for the fall and use this as a college spring drill type of thing. Of course, we also want to win those games. There’s a lot to do, and it’s going to be a challenge. I’m already exhausted. No one sees all the behind-the-scenes things it takes to do this.”
More hurdles and obstacles: Where will teams dress? Locker rooms remain closed, as do a lot of regional schools in general for on-campus learning. Weight room sessions are common now on the blacktop outside.
“It’ll be like a Pop Warner youth game — show up in game pants, ready to go,” Heffernan said.
Is it worth it?
Matt Costa says so. He is the coach at Pleasant Grove.
He recalled an 0-10 team he coached a few years ago at Kennedy. He no longer stresses those losses. He celebrates the fact that one of those Kennedy players now works in aerospace and another is a doctor. That’s what high school sports offers — experiences.
What Costa and all of us want is to stop with the finger pointing and blame. The pandemic has made for a continuous firestorm for frustrated parents of prep players, or coaches, or fans, on social media. The themes are that Gov. Gavin Newsom doesn’t like kids, unless they’re his own, or that the governing body CIF hasn’t done enough to help kids get back on the field during the shutdowns and delays, or that coaches and superintendents have sold out on kids, or that teachers are lazy and no longer engaged.
So much of it is wasted noise piled atop misinformation.
“People want to just rail on superintendents and people in charge,” Costa said. “I wouldn’t want to be Chris Hoffman (the Elk Grove Unified School District superintendent), or the governor in charge of 40 million people in this state. It’s hard enough just being a teacher and a football coach.
“I have the utmost respect for administrations trying to make it work. So is it worth it? Absolutely, it’s worth playing. Is it worth the costs and headaches? Yes. We’re in it for the kids, and we know they want and need games and activities.”