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Ali

July 8, 2016

My wife has never held famous athletes and coaches in very high regard. Much of this has to do with her disdain for misplaced priorities – so much attention and extravagant spending devoted to entertainment and sports when so much of the world’s population is without most basic essentials of life.

Because of my work, my wife occasionally has been in the company of some of the biggest names in American sports; but only one clenched her in rapt attention. It was Muhammad Ali.

We were attending a banquet at which Ali was honored. We sat at adjacent tables, with the back of my wife’s chair almost touching the back of the chair to which Ali was being ushered, slowly because of his disease.

We all stood as Ali entered. My wife’s eyes were on Ali; my eyes were on my wife, for I had never seen her give respect to a sports personality in this manner.

After the banquet, and at times since then, and certainly again after his death June 3, my wife and I have talked about what it is in Ali that she hasn’t seen in other prominent sports figures.

We noted that he brought elegance to a brutal sport, and charm to boastfulness. We cited the twinkle in his eye that outlasted his diseased body.

We recalled the tolerance and dignity he brought to his faith, and how he demonstrated his faith commitment at the most inconvenient time in his career.

We recalled his poetry when he was young and talked too much, and his use of magic to communicate after disease stole his words, as he did that night we were with him.

Years after that banquet, when Ali lit the Olympic flame at the 1996 Olympics, my wife cried. She had tears in her eyes again when that moment was replayed on the day after Ali’s death.

Ali ascended to worldwide fame in a different era – when professional media tended to be enablers more than investigative journalists, and before social media pushed every personal weakness around the planet overnight. It’s possible Ali would not have been as loved if he had emerged in public life today. It’s also possible he would have been even more beloved.

Transfer Rule Rationale

March 6, 2018

It is certain that the Michigan High School Athletic Association transfer rule is imperfect. However, whatever imperfections exist are effectively remedied through a process by which member school administrators may make application to the MHSAA Executive Committee to waive the rule if, in the committee’s opinion, the rule fails to serve any purpose for which it is intended or, in its sole discretion, the Executive Committee determines that application of the rule creates an undue hardship on the student. 

In a typical year, the Executive Committee will receive approximately 290 requests to waive the transfer regulation, approving approximately 60 percent of those requests.

The committee brings to its considerations the following rationale, most recently reviewed and reaffirmed on Aug. 2, 2017:

  1. The rule tends to insure equality of competition in that each school plays students who have been in that school and established their eligibility in that school.

  2. The rule tends to prevent students from "jumping" from one school to another.

  3. The rule prevents the "bumping" of students who have previously gained eligibility in a school system by persons coming from outside the school system.

  4. The rule tends to prevent interscholastic athletic recruiting.

  5. The rule tends to prevent or discourage dominance of one sport at one school with a successful program, i.e., the concentration of excellent baseball players at one school to the detriment of surrounding schools through transfers and to the detriment of the natural school population and ability mix.

  6. The rule tends to create and maintain stability in that age group, i.e., it promotes team stability and teamwork expectation fulfillment.

  7. The rule is designed to discourage parents from "school shopping" for athletic purposes.

  8. The rule is consistent with educational philosophy of going to school for academics first and athletics second.

  9. It eliminates family financial status from becoming a factor on eligibility, thus making a uniform rule for all students across the state of Michigan (i.e., tuition and millage considerations).

  10. It tends to encourage competition between nonpublic and public schools, rather than discourage that competition.

  11. It tends to reduce friction or threat of students changing schools because of problems they may have created or because of their misconduct, etc.