Freddogg Off The Chain

The best place to recruit high school athletes for a particular sport is during lunches in the cafeteria. Sports like basketball recruit for themselves and the same goes for lacrosse and field hockey.
But track and field and wrestling, sports where reluctant talent hides in plain view, may require a little cajoling and persuasion.
I have never coached girls track so I was spared the awkwardness of suggesting to a young woman that perhaps she would make a good shot putter. I know who the girls are and really some big girls are really strong and coordinated so why not show them the avenue to athletic success and a college scholarship?
The New York Times ran an article on big girl athletes and how heights and weights are always in the program for men but never for women. The story featured a college basketball star at Oklahoma the girl Courtney Paris 6’4” and 240 pounds and making no apologies for it. Her dad Bubba Paris had been a Forty-Niner but ended his career when he couldn’t bust 325 and was cut like a side of beef.
Serena Williams won the Australian Open then reporters scoffed when her weight was listed at 135 pounds because in person “Sererna is A Beast” in the most flattering sense of that word and she is straight out of Compton where the cost of living is going up and the chance of living is going down.
I always tell the story of a beautiful middle distance Homecoming Queen All State Chorus girl who blurted out in class that her track coach was an Oblong headed stupid red necked mother fucker.
“Whoa where is that coming from, ”I asked her.
She said she asked her coach what she had to do to run under 2:20 in the 800 meters and Coach said, ”Drop 20 pounds. Who is he to call me fat?”
“He’s just saying that the less weight anyone carries the faster they run and unfortunately for distance runners it’s true, just look at the Kenyans and Ethiopians.”
Look at football where fat guys are put into non skilled positions and not allowed to touch the ball. In basketball wide bodies can back down a lighter opponent with their big butts and last March during the NCAA men’s tournament Billy Packer wouldn’t stop talking about how Florida had great length which simply means long and tall, lithe and slim runners, at least I hope that’s what it means.
I guess it’s o.k. to be the Queen but not to be Queen sized? Talk about a mixed message. And as Queen sang, ”Fat Bottom Girls They Make The Rocking World Go Round.”

Hovering Like a Helium Blimp

Freddogg