Sonny Dykes: Everybody texts at Califonria high school games
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Last: 4 yr ago by Golden One
Monster Thread plz. It's your time.
As true as the day he was hired by Barbour.
calumnus said:okaydo said:
https://apnews.com/e7b5a23b76cb4083a286f563439de8ee
F that dude. Can we schedule SMU?
Sonny's 4 years at Cal coincided with the 4 years during which I saw a lot of high school football games in the Bay Area. I never saw kids or coaches on their phones (except coaches were on phones because phones were the way to communicate with other coaches in the press box, which gets to the resources issue).
Take away the first two paragraphs, and the article is valid, albeit not anything that hasn't been true for a long time. While the most populated areas of California aren't at a disadvantage to the south in terms of weather, the south definitely has the advantage in culture and resources. If anything, the gap may be growing, as youth/high school football moves down in the cultural pecking order.
Take away the first two paragraphs, and the article is valid, albeit not anything that hasn't been true for a long time. While the most populated areas of California aren't at a disadvantage to the south in terms of weather, the south definitely has the advantage in culture and resources. If anything, the gap may be growing, as youth/high school football moves down in the cultural pecking order.
Most of the article is valid, but Sonny isn't.Cal8285 said:
Take away the first two paragraphs, and the article is valid, albeit not anything that hasn't been true for a long time. While the most populated areas of California aren't at a disadvantage to the south in terms of weather, the south definitely has the advantage in culture and resources. If anything, the gap may be growing, as youth/high school football moves down in the cultural pecking order.
SoCal produces elite HS football players as well as anywhere else. The rest of the Pac-12 "footprint", not so much. The contrast is that nearly all of the SEC "footprint" (maybe all except Kentucky and Missouri) produces as much elite HS talent per capita as SoCal.
Agree. But the article is more of a "Puff Piece" than investigative journalism.Cal8285 said:
Sonny's 4 years at Cal coincided with the 4 years during which I saw a lot of high school football games in the Bay Area. I never saw kids or coaches on their phones (except coaches were on phones because phones were the way to communicate with other coaches in the press box, which gets to the resources issue).
Take away the first two paragraphs, and the article is valid, albeit not anything that hasn't been true for a long time. While the most populated areas of California aren't at a disadvantage to the south in terms of weather, the south definitely has the advantage in culture and resources. If anything, the gap may be growing, as youth/high school football moves down in the cultural pecking order.
All it says is that Football means more in the South, they spend more resources on it and they have more time to be involved in the South than further North.
Very little on why Football does not mean more to the youth in California in the areas where the weather is as good or better for football as compared to the South. Nor mention of other alternatives or medical concerns about the adverse effect that football might have on the kids.
Basically it is all written off to kids being more concerned about their cell phones than about football.
I note that the writer took a "cop out" by saying that the number of 4* and 5* players in California might increase later in 2019.
A lot of this is cultural. FB is religion in the South. HS and town social life centers around it. That's simply not the case any longer in most of California with all the hippies, "elites" and atheists.
The mobile phone bit is overstated. Calling it regional is a bit ignorant or just baloney.
While SoCal has population, talent and competition...NorCal isn't chopped liver. Brady, Rodgers and Goff say so.
The mobile phone bit is overstated. Calling it regional is a bit ignorant or just baloney.
While SoCal has population, talent and competition...NorCal isn't chopped liver. Brady, Rodgers and Goff say so.
Typical Sonny Dykes: Whiny, talk-thru-your-ass commentary without a whit of insight
Patience is a virtue, but I’m not into virtue signaling these days.
Sonny, if the kid knows how to play defense I don't give an F if he is playing Words with Friends during practice.
Cancel my subscription to the Resurrection
Send my credentials to the House of Detention
I got some friends inside
Send my credentials to the House of Detention
I got some friends inside
Yeah, the south has the "advantage" in culture if we think it is a good think for larger numbers of young athletes to be playing football. The "advantage" for football is a disadvantage in life, but it does lead to more quality football players in the south.GivemTheAxe said:Agree. But the article is more of a "Puff Piece" than investigative journalism.Cal8285 said:
Sonny's 4 years at Cal coincided with the 4 years during which I saw a lot of high school football games in the Bay Area. I never saw kids or coaches on their phones (except coaches were on phones because phones were the way to communicate with other coaches in the press box, which gets to the resources issue).
Take away the first two paragraphs, and the article is valid, albeit not anything that hasn't been true for a long time. While the most populated areas of California aren't at a disadvantage to the south in terms of weather, the south definitely has the advantage in culture and resources. If anything, the gap may be growing, as youth/high school football moves down in the cultural pecking order.
All it says is that Football means more in the South, they spend more resources on it and they have more time to be involved in the South than further North.
Very little on why Football does not mean more to the youth in California in the areas where the weather is as good or better for football as compared to the South. Nor mention of other alternatives or medical concerns about the adverse effect that football might have on the kids.
Basically it is all written off to kids being more concerned about their cell phones than about football.
I note that the writer took a "cop out" by saying that the number of 4* and 5* players in California might increase later in 2019.
But every California HS football coach I know of would be very unkind to any kid caught on a cell phone during any football activities, whether a game, practice, scrimmage, team meal, awards ceremony, or anything else. And plenty of them would punish the whole team.
I am not sure what is going on, but this article seems like a reach, on something that seems straight forward. It seems to be right and doing its best to have bad examples. At best the composition and flow is bad, I guess.
Leading into this paragraph is a little blurb about Dykes, and his experience recruiting: An article leading with Cal's former coaches time at Cal points out football is regional, and starts leaning towards why Dykes (or Cal) cant compete on the national level, implying that regionally he was at some sort of disadvantage (Why a Dykes California team isnt in the NCG I guess?)... The problem with this flow is that Dykes played a lot of teams from the region he recruited from, and got obliterated. It seems disingenuous to use Dykes to personalize a story about California vs "the South" in terms of football recruits.Quote:
At its foundation, however, college football is still very much a regional sport across the United States. And because regions tend to go about their football differently, as they do with things like food, lifestyle and dialect, there is a simple explanation for why teams from the South have won national championships in 13 out of the last 14 years.
Literally the only time I have ever seen anyone claim the South has more accommodating weather than California. If the claim is South vs northeast, that is ok, the the paragraph leading into this claim is about bluechips from California and how things are changing. Again, at best it is terrible composition.Quote:
Mild weather throughout the year in the South provides more opportunities for kids to be outside playing, and not just football. It's a natural breeding ground for athletes.
The fact that you point to Rodgers as an example is interesting, given he had no offers and was found through happenstance because he was playing with a tight end Tedford liked.Another Bear said:
A lot of this is cultural. FB is religion in the South. HS and town social life centers around it. That's simply not the case any longer in most of California with all the hippies, "elites" and atheists.
The mobile phone bit is overstated. Calling it regional is a bit ignorant or just baloney.
While SoCal has population, talent and competition...NorCal isn't chopped liver. Brady, Rodgers and Goff say so.
It MAY be that the Wests low population density (including LA) is to blame: ie is the sport able to find the best players in the recruiting process when the distance between recruits is so vast. There seems to be an imbalance there.
How is competing at high level collegiate athletics such as football a "disadvantage in life"?Cal8285 said:
Yeah, the south has the "advantage" in culture if we think it is a good think for larger numbers of young athletes to be playing football. The "advantage" for football is a disadvantage in life, but it does lead to more quality football players in the south.
But every California HS football coach I know of would be very unkind to any kid caught on a cell phone during any football activities, whether a game, practice, scrimmage, team meal, awards ceremony, or anything else. And plenty of them would punish the whole team.
This "disadvantage" is getting thousands of kids a paid-for college education. Many of these kids wouldn't think to go to college or wouldn't be able to get into college otherwise. The ROI can be for a lifetime.
GBear4Life said:How is competing at high level collegiate athletics such as football a "disadvantage in life"?Cal8285 said:
Yeah, the south has the "advantage" in culture if we think it is a good think for larger numbers of young athletes to be playing football. The "advantage" for football is a disadvantage in life, but it does lead to more quality football players in the south.
But every California HS football coach I know of would be very unkind to any kid caught on a cell phone during any football activities, whether a game, practice, scrimmage, team meal, awards ceremony, or anything else. And plenty of them would punish the whole team.
This "disadvantage" is getting thousands of kids a paid-for college education. Many of these kids wouldn't think to go to college or wouldn't be able to get into college otherwise. The ROI can be for a lifetime.
1. The recruit must actually get a college education for his/her degree to mean any thing.
2. The ROI is not as great as projected if the head trauma to the player is such that it damages that person's brain.
Those two points are part of it. While a greater number of football players from the south will end up with college scholarships because of the advantage, the number of high school football players who won't get college scholarships is really high. And I've known too many guys who are physically damaged for life from playing high school football (and most of that isn't even head damage), way more than the number I've known who got a scholarship.GivemTheAxe said:GBear4Life said:How is competing at high level collegiate athletics such as football a "disadvantage in life"?Cal8285 said:
Yeah, the south has the "advantage" in culture if we think it is a good think for larger numbers of young athletes to be playing football. The "advantage" for football is a disadvantage in life, but it does lead to more quality football players in the south.
But every California HS football coach I know of would be very unkind to any kid caught on a cell phone during any football activities, whether a game, practice, scrimmage, team meal, awards ceremony, or anything else. And plenty of them would punish the whole team.
This "disadvantage" is getting thousands of kids a paid-for college education. Many of these kids wouldn't think to go to college or wouldn't be able to get into college otherwise. The ROI can be for a lifetime.
1. The recruit must actually get a college education for his/her degree to mean any thing.
2. The ROI is not as great as projected if the head trauma to the player is such that it damages that person's brain.
And a lot of the athletes in the south may well have been able to excel at something else if not for the football culture. The year-round football culture in the south prevents most football players from being multi-sport athletes. While there aren't as many multi-sport football players in California as there used to be, the percentage of football players in California who are multi-sport athletes is a lot higher than the percentage in the south.
But I'm not just talking about the disadvantage in life for the high school football players, but for everybody. The obsession pretty much all of us posters have with Cal sports is arguably unhealthy. The high school football obsession in a lot of places in the south is really unhealthy. I believe it is bad for the players, and bad for the communities. Yes, I believe It is an advantage in life to life live in a place where the culture is such that high school football isn't a much bigger deal than all the other high school sports, as opposed to a place where high school football is the biggest deal in town and the gap to the next biggest deal in town is so big you can't even see to the next biggest deal.
And yes, even though it means that Cal will never be a consistent top 25 football team, I believe it is better for the Cal community and for the vast majority of Cal football players who aren't headed to the NFL, that the campus community will never have an SEC type of obsession with football -- worse for football, better for life.
Well all I can say that your argument is rational but it is like saying people shouldn't like Beyonc as much and should support the local choir singers the same. It is not healthy to be obsessed like that. Doesn't really work that way does it. Football will rule until it doesn't. Even for a place like Cal people come back because of it. I am coming back even though my son is now done playing.
Re Sonny. I am greatful that he gave my son a chance. However, he tried to hold out on scholarships for Walkons who produced. I had a problem with that. Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal. Of course with Wilcox that is no issue.
I don't know about that. Texas is a very large state, and other than Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, and Austin, the population density in Texas is very low. Same for the other Southern states.LunchTime said:
It MAY be that the Wests low population density (including LA) is to blame: ie is the sport able to find the best players in the recruiting process when the distance between recruits is so vast. There seems to be an imbalance there.
You know this situation from the inside: Don't walk-ons who are able to crack the depth chart usually get offered a schollie around their junior year? Isn't this what happened with your son and Malik (and Laird)? What I'm asking is, wasn't it more timing than anything that got them their deserved schollies from Wilcox, rather than Dykes? Has JW had a walk-on that he rewarded very early on with a scholarship?Goobear said:
Re Sonny. I am greatful that he gave my son a chance. However, he tried to hold out on scholarships for Walkons who produced. I had a problem with that. Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal. Of course with Wilcox that is no issue.
My son is entering his senior year of college, and he has really enjoyed his 4 years of high school football and his 3 years, soon to be 4, of Division III football. But I think it is way better for him that he went to a high school and a college where football didn't rule. We can never know the road not taken, but knowing him like I do, I think he will come out of college better for those 8 years of HS and college football. I'm not sure, however, that he would be able to come out better if he had been at a high school or a college where football ruled.Goobear said:
Well all I can say that your argument is rational but it is like saying people shouldn't like Beyonc as much and should support the local choir singers the same. It is not healthy to be obsessed like that. Doesn't really work that way does it. Football will rule until it doesn't. Even for a place like Cal people come back because of it. I am coming back even though my son is now done playing.
And what I'm saying isn't the same as "Don't like Beyonce as much and support the local choir as much as you support Beyonce." I do think it is better to balanced in life, and not be too obsessed with Beyonce. As a singer in a local choir, however, while I appreciate people who come to our concerts and enjoy them, I don't want anyone to cut back on Beyonce to go to more local concerts they will enjoy less. But I think people overly obsessed with Beyonce would be healthier if they would go out for more hikes or bike rides or spend more time in community service. Or spend more time with their kids or parents. And certainly don't cut back on Beyonce just in order to spend too much time posting on Bear Insider, which I say as someone who certainly spends too much time posting on Bear Insider.
But it is even more important for a community, for the culture, to be balanced than for individuals. In the community, in the culture, it is OK if some people are obsessed with Beyonce, like most of us here are probably too obsessed with Cal football. It would be bad if it felt like the entire community was overly obsessed with Beyonce. Just like it is bad if it feels like the entire community is obsessed with high school football, or if it feels like an entire college campus community is obsessed with its football team (and in some respects, that is worse than being obsessed with Beyonce, because she is an adult wanting a career where some people are obsessed with her, as opposed to being a high school football player who just wants to have fun). Where the community is balanced, then the individuals have more options and are more free to follow their passions.
In the places where football rules, football will rule until it doesn't, but I believe it is healthier, I believe life is better, in the places where football doesn't rule, but exists with a more appropriate role in the community. I think that in most places in California, football doesn't rule and has an appropriate role in the community, and I think that is frequently not true in the south.
LunchTime said:
I am not sure what is going on, but this article seems like a reach, on something that seems straight forward. It seems to be right and doing its best to have bad examples. At best the composition and flow is bad, I guess.Leading into this paragraph is a little blurb about Dykes, and his experience recruiting: An article leading with Cal's former coaches time at Cal points out football is regional, and starts leaning towards why Dykes (or Cal) cant compete on the national level, implying that regionally he was at some sort of disadvantage (Why a Dykes California team isnt in the NCG I guess?)... The problem with this flow is that Dykes played a lot of teams from the region he recruited from, and got obliterated. It seems disingenuous to use Dykes to personalize a story about California vs "the South" in terms of football recruits.Quote:
At its foundation, however, college football is still very much a regional sport across the United States. And because regions tend to go about their football differently, as they do with things like food, lifestyle and dialect, there is a simple explanation for why teams from the South have won national championships in 13 out of the last 14 years.Literally the only time I have ever seen anyone claim the South has more accommodating weather than California. If the claim is South vs northeast, that is ok, the the paragraph leading into this claim is about bluechips from California and how things are changing. Again, at best it is terrible composition.Quote:
Mild weather throughout the year in the South provides more opportunities for kids to be outside playing, and not just football. It's a natural breeding ground for athletes.
The south gets freezing whether in the winter and sweltering, humid whether in the summer. There are a couple weeks of "mild" weather in the spring and fall. Unless we are talking about Miami, the weather is not that much different than the Midwest and East Coast. Over and over when Cal recruits players from the South they rave about the weather. Northern California is football weather nearly all year round.
Also, unlike basketball, football is almost exclusively a highly organized team sport with highly regulated practices. Are they claiming organized football is played year round in the South?
The big advantage the South has is "football culture" which includes social and monetary benefits for playing football.
Cal8285 said:Those two points are part of it. While a greater number of football players from the south will end up with college scholarships because of the advantage, the number of high school football players who won't get college scholarships is really high. And I've known too many guys who are physically damaged for life from playing high school football (and most of that isn't even head damage), way more than the number I've known who got a scholarship.GivemTheAxe said:GBear4Life said:How is competing at high level collegiate athletics such as football a "disadvantage in life"?Cal8285 said:
Yeah, the south has the "advantage" in culture if we think it is a good think for larger numbers of young athletes to be playing football. The "advantage" for football is a disadvantage in life, but it does lead to more quality football players in the south.
But every California HS football coach I know of would be very unkind to any kid caught on a cell phone during any football activities, whether a game, practice, scrimmage, team meal, awards ceremony, or anything else. And plenty of them would punish the whole team.
This "disadvantage" is getting thousands of kids a paid-for college education. Many of these kids wouldn't think to go to college or wouldn't be able to get into college otherwise. The ROI can be for a lifetime.
1. The recruit must actually get a college education for his/her degree to mean any thing.
2. The ROI is not as great as projected if the head trauma to the player is such that it damages that person's brain.
And a lot of the athletes in the south may well have been able to excel at something else if not for the football culture. The year-round football culture in the south prevents most football players from being multi-sport athletes. While there aren't as many multi-sport football players in California as there used to be, the percentage of football players in California who are multi-sport athletes is a lot higher than the percentage in the south.
But I'm not just talking about the disadvantage in life for the high school football players, but for everybody. The obsession pretty much all of us posters have with Cal sports is arguably unhealthy. The high school football obsession in a lot of places in the south is really unhealthy. I believe it is bad for the players, and bad for the communities. Yes, I believe It is an advantage in life to life live in a place where the culture is such that high school football isn't a much bigger deal than all the other high school sports, as opposed to a place where high school football is the biggest deal in town and the gap to the next biggest deal in town is so big you can't even see to the next biggest deal.
And yes, even though it means that Cal will never be a consistent top 25 football team, I believe it is better for the Cal community and for the vast majority of Cal football players who aren't headed to the NFL, that the campus community will never have an SEC type of obsession with football -- worse for football, better for life.
For me college football is "important" but "ALL important".
I came to Cal for the education. Cal football is "the cherry on top of the cake.
I have had many exhilarating moments watching the Bears. Just enough wins to keep me coming back season after season. I most importantly I like the camaraderie of being around Cal fans. IMO a large number of Cal fans are like that.
If College football were "ALL important" for me, I wouldn't be a Cal Fan. I would follow one of those teams that is always in the top 10 or top 25.
Sonny lost to the California trams almost completely and beat the Texas teams while at Cal. The whole premise is stupid. But he is just an excuse maker like Mack Brown and all those other guys from Texas who really are not very good.
LunchTime said:The fact that you point to Rodgers as an example is interesting, given he had no offers and was found through happenstance because he was playing with a tight end Tedford liked.Another Bear said:
A lot of this is cultural. FB is religion in the South. HS and town social life centers around it. That's simply not the case any longer in most of California with all the hippies, "elites" and atheists.
The mobile phone bit is overstated. Calling it regional is a bit ignorant or just baloney.
While SoCal has population, talent and competition...NorCal isn't chopped liver. Brady, Rodgers and Goff say so.
It MAY be that the Wests low population density (including LA) is to blame: ie is the sport able to find the best players in the recruiting process when the distance between recruits is so vast. There seems to be an imbalance there.
Actually, the West is very dense (including LA):
https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/2010_census/cb12-50.html
"The nation's most densely populated urbanized area is Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, Calif., with nearly 7,000 people per square mile. The San Francisco-Oakland, Calif., area is the second most densely populated at 6,266 people per square mile, followed by San Jose, Calif. (5,820 people per square mile) and Delano, Calif. (5,483 people per square mile). The New York-Newark, N.J., area is fifth, with an overall density of 5,319 people per square mile. (See sortable lists.)
Of the 10 most densely populated urbanized areas, nine are in the West, with seven of those in California."
Not the case when you are a starter every game and there is room. In Addison's case he was the only starter in the Pac-12 with no scholarship for an entire season. You should get a scholarship in that case. At least after 6 games or at the end of the season. Dykes did nothing. I cannot go into details but it happened to other guys who played a ton and had to go begging for it.Big C said:You know this situation from the inside: Don't walk-ons who are able to crack the depth chart usually get offered a schollie around their junior year? Isn't this what happened with your son and Malik (and Laird)? What I'm asking is, wasn't it more timing than anything that got them their deserved schollies from Wilcox, rather than Dykes? Has JW had a walk-on that he rewarded very early on with a scholarship?Goobear said:
RRe Sonny. I am greatful that he gave my son a chance. However, he tried to hold out on scholarships for Walkons who produced. I had a problem with that. Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal. Of course with Wilcox that is no issue.
What in The Funnies is up with this obsession with Sonny F'ing Dykes? Okaydo, time to move on.
Here is a HS coach who is out of his feeble mind if he thinks ANY D-1 coach is going to be blackmailed into "taking care of his guys." Here's a new concept for idiot coach Rollo: How about if he actually gets "his guys" to attend class & graduate from HS without being totally illiterate?Goobear said:
Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him [Dykes] to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal.
I appreciate the info, Goobear. As a point of comparison, has Wilcox had contributing walk-ons that he DID award timely scholarships to? Or -- as he is only in his 3rd year here -- that he is about to?Goobear said:Not the case when you are a starter every game and there is room. In Addison's case he was the only starter in the Pac-12 with no scholarship for an entire season. You should get a scholarship in that case. At least after 6 games or at the end of the season. Dykes did nothing. I cannot go into details but it happened to other guys who played a ton and had to go begging for it.Big C said:You know this situation from the inside: Don't walk-ons who are able to crack the depth chart usually get offered a schollie around their junior year? Isn't this what happened with your son and Malik (and Laird)? What I'm asking is, wasn't it more timing than anything that got them their deserved schollies from Wilcox, rather than Dykes? Has JW had a walk-on that he rewarded very early on with a scholarship?Goobear said:
RRe Sonny. I am greatful that he gave my son a chance. However, he tried to hold out on scholarships for Walkons who produced. I had a problem with that. Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal. Of course with Wilcox that is no issue.
Hmmm, well all the kids who came to Cal from Mater Dei to Cal graduated from Cal so there is that.....Bear19 said:Here is a HS coach who is out of his feeble mind if he thinks ANY D-1 coach is going to be blackmailed into "taking care of his guys." Here's a new concept for idiot coach Rollo: How about if he actually gets "his guys" to attend class & graduate from HS without being totally illiterate?Goobear said:
ICoach Rollo at MaterDei told him [Dykes] to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal.
I am out of the loop but trust that Wilcox has a fair system.Big C said:I appreciate the info, Goobear. As a point of comparison, has Wilcox had contributing walk-ons that he DID award timely scholarships to? Or -- as he is only in his 3rd year here -- that he is about to?Goobear said:Not the case when you are a starter every game and there is room. In Addison's case he was the only starter in the Pac-12 with no scholarship for an entire season. You should get a scholarship in that case. At least after 6 games or at the end of the season. Dykes did nothing. I cannot go into details but it happened to other guys who played a ton and had to go begging for it.Big C said:You know this situation from the inside: Don't walk-ons who are able to crack the depth chart usually get offered a schollie around their junior year? Isn't this what happened with your son and Malik (and Laird)? What I'm asking is, wasn't it more timing than anything that got them their deserved schollies from Wilcox, rather than Dykes? Has JW had a walk-on that he rewarded very early on with a scholarship?Goobear said:
RRe Sonny. I am greatful that he gave my son a chance. However, he tried to hold out on scholarships for Walkons who produced. I had a problem with that. Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal. Of course with Wilcox that is no issue.
If you want access to MD talent, probably a good idea to listen to Rollie (what we called him back in the day) given his success. He's produced a bunch of talent like Leinert and Barkely and other NFL'ers, and they went to USC, his alma mater. So it he has some pull in directing kids. In any case, his guys did their job, got their degrees from Cal.Bear19 said:Here is a HS coach who is out of his feeble mind if he thinks ANY D-1 coach is going to be blackmailed into "taking care of his guys." Here's a new concept for idiot coach Rollo: How about if he actually gets "his guys" to attend class & graduate from HS without being totally illiterate?Goobear said:
Coach Rollo at MaterDei told him [Dykes] to take care of his (Rollo) guys or he would recommend no one to go to Cal.
what kind of HS athlete picks a college based on their HS coach's recommendation????
"Coach, I really like Cal."
Don't go to Cal, I don't like them.
"Okay coach. L.A. schools it is!"
"Coach, I really like Cal."
Don't go to Cal, I don't like them.
"Okay coach. L.A. schools it is!"
The assertion was "an advantage in football is a disadvantage in life", for which I have read no good argument for in this thread.Cal8285 said:
My son is entering his senior year of college, and he has really enjoyed his 4 years of high school football and his 3 years, soon to be 4, of Division III football. But I think it is way better for him that he went to a high school and a college where football didn't rule. We can never know the road not taken, but knowing him like I do, I think he will come out of college better for those 8 years of HS and college football. I'm not sure, however, that he would be able to come out better if he had been at a high school or a college where football ruled.
And what I'm saying isn't the same as "Don't like Beyonce as much and support the local choir as much as you support Beyonce." I do think it is better to balanced in life, and not be too obsessed with Beyonce. As a singer in a local choir, however, while I appreciate people who come to our concerts and enjoy them, I don't want anyone to cut back on Beyonce to go to more local concerts they will enjoy less. But I think people overly obsessed with Beyonce would be healthier if they would go out for more hikes or bike rides or spend more time in community service. Or spend more time with their kids or parents. And certainly don't cut back on Beyonce just in order to spend too much time posting on Bear Insider, which I say as someone who certainly spends too much time posting on Bear Insider.
But it is even more important for a community, for the culture, to be balanced than for individuals. In the community, in the culture, it is OK if some people are obsessed with Beyonce, like most of us here are probably too obsessed with Cal football. It would be bad if it felt like the entire community was overly obsessed with Beyonce. Just like it is bad if it feels like the entire community is obsessed with high school football, or if it feels like an entire college campus community is obsessed with its football team (and in some respects, that is worse than being obsessed with Beyonce, because she is an adult wanting a career where some people are obsessed with her, as opposed to being a high school football player who just wants to have fun). Where the community is balanced, then the individuals have more options and are more free to follow their passions.
In the places where football rules, football will rule until it doesn't, but I believe it is healthier, I believe life is better, in the places where football doesn't rule, but exists with a more appropriate role in the community. I think that in most places in California, football doesn't rule and has an appropriate role in the community, and I think that is frequently not true in the south.
I think dedication to an activity (sports) and supported culturally by the community and region is a positive thing, particularly compared to the alternative (a community that isn't passionate about anything, with time left idle). Team sports help build all sorts of life skills. Not all of them will take advantage of those aspects but that's not really an argument in support of the original assertion.
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