Opinion by Ray Wolf

I remember when the North Section decided to have “central venues” for the baseball playoffs. I remember thinking, “Finally, now if they would just do it for all sports.” Then I started seeing how this all worked. Last season Yreka had to travel to Butte College to play Sutter, which of course is hardly central. The other choice was Shasta College, which would have been much closer to being central.

When the section decided to go to the central venue format for baseball championship games, I figured it was to even things out a bit. You know, make it so both teams had to make an approximately equal drive. Plus, I thought it was a good idea to take away some of the home field advantage that the higher seed has, given how poorly the ranking system is designed (no strength of schedule).

Well, apparently placing the match ups in a central location that is actually central really isn’t much of a priority. Like last season, Yreka again has to make the trip to Butte College to play Sutter. And, Greenville has to drive to Redding to play American Christian, which is also far from a central location. Take a look at the comparison of drive times for the various match ups below. (more…)

Opinion by Ray Wolf

As parents, it’s our job to teach our kids about many different parts of life. Every once in a while, however, it’s our kids that do the teaching, and we are the recipients of their wisdom.

A few years ago, I got one of those lessons from my stepson. He probably doesn’t even know he was the professor that day, but he was.

My kid had been through three different head basketball coaches during his four years of playing high school ball. He had endured three different systems, three vastly different personalities, and most importantly he had endured a whole lot of negative parental involvement.

During his four years, he had to put up with several parents constantly dissing his first two coaches. The parents complained about strategy, substitution patterns, playing time, discipline, and just about anything else imaginable. Some worked hard to get the coaches fired. Whether the parents were right or wrong in their assessment of the coaches, the effect on him and his teammates was definitely negative. Even in his final year with a coach that most of the parents were happy with, there was a parent trying to undermine everything the coach did.

My stepson had come to the point of just wanting high school basketball to end. (more…)

Opinion by Ray Wolf

A few days ago, I posted an editorial questioning the legitimacy of the selection process for All Section teams. The next day I received an email from Kevin Askeland, who politely took exception to the suggestion that the process wasn’t legitimate. He also provided some detailed information on the history and selection process of the All-Section teams.

For those who may not know, Askeland is somewhat of a North Section sports reporting legend. He was certainly one of the people I took note of several years ago, when I first started covering sports. Askeland started a company that later became MaxPreps, a website that just about every coach and player is familiar with. He currently works for MaxPreps and is one of the people who was involved in selecting the first All-Section team, in 1991. His columns regularly appear in the Record Searchlight, as well.

According to Askeland, the first time an All-Section team was selected, “every newspaper in the Northern Section was invited.” And, looking at the list he provided, it appears that just about every newspaper sent a representative. However, slowly but surely there was less and less participation. Now, only sports writers from the Redding Record Searchlight, Enterprise Record and Appeal Democrat, plus Askeland are involved in the actual selection process.

Askeland describe the selection process in this way:

The process starts with me collecting every all-league team in the section. This is our starting point, our pool of athletes. I then contact as many key coaches as I can to determine who the best candidates are. I regularly check with coaches in the outlying areas, such as Yreka, Modoc and Lassen, to get an idea if they have players who should be represented. In volleyball, I try to get opinions of coaches to see who the best players are and who should be considered. I ask coaches from the top football teams in the section to rank their players in order starting with the most deserving player so we make sure to include the top players from those teams.

I then pick a preliminary team based on all-league teams, stats posted on MaxPreps and coaches recommendations. I send this team out to the writers at the Searchlight, Enterprise Record and Appeal Democrat. Writers at those papers give their input and provide additional info on players or possible solutions to get the best players in the right spot. We go through several rounds of this until everyone agrees that we have the best team possible. We don’t always agree on the picks and each writer works hard to pitch the players in their area, but we try to come up with the best team possible without showing bias toward one area of the Northern Section.

Askeland also said that he has consulted with many weeklies over the years. Although he didn’t say it this way, most of the weeklies have just dropped the ball for various reasons.

What was obvious from Askeland’s email is that he cares about getting the right players on the team, and he vouched for the other writers that they are also interested in getting the best of the best from the section.

While I do believe that Askeland makes an effort to get input from outlying areas, it doesn’t address the built in bias that comes from having a limited number of people making the actual selection. Everyone, no matter how well intentioned, has bias. People who see particular players on a regular basis get to see them at their very best, as well as on an average night. When you interview a player and come away with a positive impression, that tends to influence your thinking about that player’s abilities. Sometimes sports writers meet the parents, or maybe have followed the careers of multiple players from a single family. Over time, it is normal to form some level of relationship with that family. The same thing happens with particular coaches and schools over a period of time. It’s inevitable, and even the best, least biased journalist will be influenced to a greater or lesser extent by those relationships. It’s the same for sports writers in Redding, Chico, Yreka, Lassen, or any other area. (more…)

Opinion by Ray Wolf

The Redding Record Searchlight recently posted the “All-Section” teams for football and volleyball at their website, redding.com. I’ve seen these selections before and always sort of questioned how they came up with an all-section team when the people voting on it are attached to a few large media outlets in Redding, Chico and points farther south. The article didn’t say exactly who votes on the selections, but I remember from a previous all-section story, that it was just large newspapers and a television station. That would be fine, except the process isn’t legitimate.

Why? Well, if it’s going to be called an all-section team, the process needs to have representatives from all areas of the North Section. For the 2012 football and volleyball all-section teams, that was not the case.

For starters there’s this place called Siskiyou County. It has a daily newspaper, the Siskiyou Daily News; a weekly newspaper, the Mt. Shasta Herald; and a website that covers youth sports, SiskiyouYouth.com. None of those entities were involved in the voting, which means eight high schools had no local representation.

Once I had verified that the newspapers in Siskiyou County had no input, I decided to text the Lassen Times sports editor in Susanville, DJ Estacio. I asked him if he had a vote in either the football or volleyball all-section teams. “Nope, nope.” was his answer. Then he asked if I had a vote. I told him I didn’t and neither did any other Siskiyou County media. I also said that I doubted that anyone in Modoc or Trinity counties had a say either.

“That’s weird. We’re not wanted I guess, lol,” was Estacio’s reply.

Really when you think about it, who would want Estacio’s opinion anyway. I mean he covers Lassen High School, the 12^th largest school in the North Section (out of over 70) and the home of the 2012 Northern Athletic League volleyball co-champion Lady Grizzlies. He also covers Westwood and Herlong high schools. What could he possibly have to offer in the way of insight on players?

I contacted the Modoc Record to see if anyone there had a vote. Again, the answer was “no.” And again, why should they? The Modoc Braves football team hasn’t done much over the past five years—other than win the D-III championship twice, finish 2^nd once, and reach the semi-finals once. This season they were a D-IV semi-finalist. I’m sure the sports editor at the Modoc Record never sees any good football players, and would have nothing to offer.

I asked the Trinity Journal if they had a vote. Nope.

In the Searchlight’s football article, I noticed this sentence, “Now, the 2012 all-Northern Section team is released today, as voted upon by the media and the NSCIF office.”

The NSCIF office? “So, maybe there is some sort of process to this. Maybe there is a way to make this more legitimate,” I thought.

I emailed NSCIF Commissioner Liz Kyle, and asked her to explain the process of selecting the all-section teams. (more…)

A year and a half or so ago, I posted an opinion piece, “What’s the Purpose of High School Sports?” To date, it’s the second most read article ever on SiskiyouYouth.com, and more than one coach has made it mandatory reading for players. Last night, I received an email from a coach suggesting that I repost it every year. So, here it is.

Opinion

A couple of week’s ago I was at a junior varsity softball tournament. A friend, who’s a parent of a couple of players, and I were discussing why we have high school sports. His point was that high school sports exists as a way to prepare for the “real world” after high school.

Through sports, my friend believes that student athletes should learn discipline, commitment, a strong work ethic, and loyalty, as well as how to deal with adversity. He believes they should learn how to get past not liking a teammate or the coach, and perform their best for the good of the team. He believes that through high school sports, athletes should learn the skills they will need to function in the work place, become leaders in the work place, and deal with stress in the work place.

I agree with those points and a whole lot more that we talked about that I’m going cover in the next few paragraphs. But first, I want to let readers know that what follows isn’t about one particular team, player, or coach. It’s based on what I’ve watched unfold over the past several years at high schools around the county, involving many coaches, players, and parents. And, I would love to have an open discussion on the topic. If you are following SiskiyouYouth.com on facebook, you can post comments on this or any other article. If you aren’t currently part of SiskiyouYouth’s facebook page, click here to join and post. Please keep it clean and do not name players, coaches, or parents. If you do, I delete. Oh, and if I make you mad…sorry.

Let’s talk about varsity sports. First, being on the varsity team is a privilege, not a right. It’s a privilege to make the team, and it’s a privilege to represent the school. Really, it’s a privilege to play on any high school team, including junior varsity and freshman.

Second, junior varsity and freshman (if your school has it) are places for development, as are junior high teams. These lower level teams are where players should all see playing time, not just the best players. Varsity is where the best players play. Varsity is where you play to win. Varsity is like going to work. Employers hire the best, most qualified people possible, and then put the best of the best in the key positions. (more…)

As usual, I’m less than happy with how the North Section determines playoff seeds. In Division-V basketball there are two problems.

First, it’s the only division where winning your league gets a team an automatic home game. This often leads to a better team hitting the road—a team that actually earned a home game based on their overall play on the court gets bumped.

It happened in boys basketball this season, when Portola was gifted the 8-seed because they won a league where not one other team had an overall winning record. Portola itself was only .500 overall and ranked 13^th in NSCIF D-V playoff points. The section wound up bumping 8^th ranked, 15-9, Mt. Shasta to the 9-seed and sent them to Portola, where they proceeded to beat Portola. Of course they did! Mt. Shasta plays in arguably the toughest D-V league in the section—note that three of the top-8 teams are from the Shasta Cascade League.

The second problem is that nowhere in the seeding formula are teams given credit for beating good or great teams. A win against a 1-20 division opponent is the same as a win against a 20-1 division opponent. It is slightly better than the football formula in one sense because you get credit for actually beating an upper division opponent. However, beating a 1-20 upper division opponent is the same as beating a 20-1 upper division opponent. And, no matter how good a lower division opponent is, you get no points. Does anyone doubt that beating D-VI Westwood (24-2) would be a legit win for a D-V team? Think about this, Westwood beat the NSCIF D-V 2-seed, Fall River. Westwood’s only losses were to D-V one-seed Liberty Christian and seven-seed Chester.

Could we maybe reward actually beating good teams? We sure can, and it’s easy. (more…)

Opinion

I’m about to get in hot water with this one. I just know it. Let me start with a question. Do we as parents, educators, and coaches want our young people to have self esteem based on the everyone gets a blue ribbon approach? Or, do we want our young people to grow their self esteem through achievement?

I first started thinking about this during a couple of high school awards banquets a few years ago. During the fall sports awards, a soccer team pretty much had an award for every player. I was astonished. There was offensive MVP, defensive MVP, forward MVP, midfielder MVP, fullback MVP and…goalie MVP (That must have been an incredibly tough selection since there was only one goalie), as well as a host of others like most improved, most inspirational, best reserve player cheerleader, best cookie provider, and best drinks brought to games. Okay, so they didn’t do the cheerleader, cookie or drinks ones, but I’m not kidding, I think every player got an award. My kid was on that team, and received the offensive MVP award. When we got into the truck to go home, he said, “That was stupid.”

No kidding.

More or less the same thing happened at a girls basketball awards dinner that winter. Just about every player got something. As my kid would say, “that was stupid.”

Before writing this, I did a bit of reading on the internet of scholarly articles to see what the research had shown concerning what I call “artificial bolstering of self esteem” and it’s effects on actual achievement. By artificial bolstering, I mean rewarding kids for basically being alive and breathing in an effort to increase their self esteem, something an educator friend of mine calls the “blue ribbon soccer mentality.” Nearly all the research focused on self esteem’s correlation to achievement in school or in the work place.

What I gleaned from the papers I read was that there is a moderate correlation between self esteem and achievement. However, that correlation seems to work in the opposite direction of what the “everyone gets a blue ribbon” people want to believe. Actual achievement helps build self esteem, not the other way around. In other words, engineering self esteem through rewards for nothing more than being alive, does not appear to increase achievement.

What a shock! Who would have thought that people feel good about themselves when they actually accomplish something. I mean, who would have thought that students might think of themselves as being smart when they ace a test, or even pull off a “B.” Or, who would have thought that when a player makes the football team and earns a starting spot through hard work and dedication, he would feel good about himself (or herself, in a few cases of females making football teams). (more…)

Opinion

I’ve been meaning to write this for years. Yes, literally “years.” Finally, I’ve had enough with the North Section CIF system for football playoff ranking. The North Section’s way of determining football playoff teams is seriously flawed. It rewards mediocrity and it often denies good teams a fair shot at making the playoffs or being ranked as high as they should be in playoff points. If you want to skip all the explanation and just get to my proposed formula, click “more” and scroll down.

For a concrete example of a team in this year’s playoffs that greatly benefited from this bogus system, we can look at Gridley (4-6) in Division-II.

What did Gridley, a team with a losing record, do to merit not just being a playoff team, but a 5-seed? Well, they went 0-2 against D-III teams. They were 2-3 against D-II teams. Of course they were 2-1 against D-I schools—D-I schools with a combined 8-22 (.364) record , including that 0-10 powerhouse Las Plumas. They did not beat a single team with a winning record.

On the other hand, there were two 5-5 teams left out, Central Valley and Yreka. Let’s compare.

Central Valley was 1-0 against D-III teams, 3-3 against D-II teams, and 1-2 against D-I teams. CV’s D-I opponents were a combined 17-13 (.567), including 8-2 Enterprise and 8-2 West Valley. While the Falcons didn’t beat a team with a winning record, they did beat Gridley, 32-15, in Gridley…that’s a pretty decisive road win.

So, how about Yreka. Hmm, Yreka was 1-1 against D-III opponents, 4-3 against D-II opponents, and 0-1 against D-I. Yreka’s D-I opponent was 8-2.They beat Central Valley, 21-6, in CV, during the Falcons’ homecoming none the less. Oh, and they had that win over some pretty good team. Now, who was that? Oh ya, number-1 ranked, 9-1 Orland—a team that beat Gridley 42-7! So, the team that handed the top team it’s only defeat, has a better winning percentage than Gridley, both overall and in division, doesn’t make the playoffs?

Can you maybe see why I refer to the North Sections’ playoff ranking formula as “flawed.” (more…)