ROSTER CRUNCH AT AREA MIDDLE SCHOOLS

ROSTER CRUNCH AT AREA MIDDLE SCHOOLS …..It’s time to for some outside the box thinking The time has come for some outside the box thinking on middle school athletics in Mecklenburg County. Too many kids are being excluded from sports participation. As an example, let’s look at an unnamed middle school located in South Charlotte. Over 80 seventh and eight graders attempted to try out for the school’s football team. After three days of running sprints and other drills, the roster was announced and more than half of the kids were sent home. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools do not allow middle school football to start until a week into the school year, leaving many of the kids without a place to play football. By the time the school roster is set Pop Warner football has over four weeks of practice in the books. It’s important to note here that Union County schools have set their football programs up to allow for an August 1st start. With their late start, the CMS schools also run into a situation where the last two games are lucky to make it to halftime before darkness sets in. We will leave this problem for another column, but wouldn’t it be neat to let the middle schools play a couple of games on high school fields under the lights or even as a lead in to the high school junior varsity game on Thursday nights? Why force a 4:45pm start in mid November when the sun sets at 5:30pm? Back to the roster crunch some schools are experiencing. This same school had over 100 kids try out for the basketball team. Over 85% of the kids were sent home after three days of tryouts. Baseball tryouts were held this past week and you guessed it, over 100 kids came to tryouts. With only 15-20 positions available, once again 85% of the kids came up short. That’s a lot of kids to disappoint, especially in the seventh grade class where only a couple are chosen to play with the eighth graders. Ok, so now I presented an obvious problem……. What’s the answer? One of my answers would be why only one team per school? Why not two teams at this overcrowded school? Lack of jerseys? Not an acceptable answer, with kids asked to raise money for everything under the sun at the school, I am sure the kids and their parents would gladly pay $100 - $200 more dollars to help fund the second team. Our area is loaded with what I call “CAN-DO” parents, they would find a way to fund a second team and probably a third or fourth. Would it really hurt anything to have two football teams or a second basketball team when so many kids show an interest in playing? Imagine the excitement when those two teams play one another. Overcrowding is a major issue in this area, but why should we let the overcrowding force so many kids to the sports sideline. Many of these kids work year round to excel in their sport and come up short due to the fact we have stuffed so many kids into the school. I could take a group of kids that came up short at the unnamed school and form a baseball, football or basketball team that would rival any other team in the conference. Please note that I don’t have a child that is caught in this situation, my son is only four years old. I haven’t experienced the trials and tribulations of middle school sports yet, but I have many close friends that keep me informed J It’s important to also note I am not advocating creating a position for every single kid that wants to try out for the team. That’s a different debate, but in situations where overcrowding has led to 120 kids trying out for 15 positions on a basketball team, it’s time for some outside the box thinking. What do you think? We want to hear your opinions and ideas as well. Feel free to drop me a note at Tripp@southcharlottesports.com