Beyond the Noise
September 13, 2013
It has been said that when the law is not in your favor, then argue the facts; or when the facts are not in your favor, then argue the law; and when neither supports what you want, then just argue.
And this is the time of year when we are reminded that old adage is true.
It is in August and September when the MHSAA staff processes more eligibility questions and the MHSAA Executive Committee considers more requests to waive eligibility rules for individual students than at any other time of year. Often it is the least meritorious cases that create the loudest noise.
It is during these months and the next that the MHSAA deals with the most stressful of forfeitures caused by the participation of ineligible players. When an ineligible student plays in a varsity football game, that forfeiture not only means the loss of that game; that loss could also mean the team loses a spot among the qualifiers in the Football Playoffs.
Difficult eligibility and forfeiture cases sometimes make for good publicity for the individuals involved, but they can create bad precedent for the future of the program if it is only those noisemakers who are listened to and served.
Going to the Mat
October 4, 2016
Somewhere I heard a speaker say: “The most exciting thing in life is to be shot at ... and missed.”
In a real sense, I wouldn’t know; but metaphorically, that’s somewhat how we’ve felt after a federal district court judge tried unsuccessfully to cripple the Michigan High School Athletic Association in the aftermath of a lawsuit over the placement of sports seasons in Michigan.
Plaintiffs wanted the high school sports seasons for boys and girls to coincide and to mirror the seasons the National Collegiate Athletic Association established after our high school seasons were adopted. With the urging of its member schools, the MHSAA battled for nine years to attempt to retain a sports seasons schedule that allowed schools to use their resources (facilities, coaches and officials) in ways that they could demonstrate promoted higher participation rates by both genders.
Plaintiffs did not get all that they sought in the case, and neither did schools; but the judge ordered the MHSAA to pay $7.9 million, much more than the organization’s assets at that time.
But rather than being the death knell for the MHSAA, these events breathed exciting new life into the organization, the positive effects of which continue today.
The judgment – reduced significantly through negotiations, early payment incentives and insurance and paid off in 18 months – set in motion a review of internal operations that reduced expenditures by $600,000 over 12 months, while sponsorship and broadcast revenue grew by a combined $600,000 during those 12 months.
Eight years later, many of the operational savings continue, and non-tournament revenue is now more than double what it was in the first year following the judgment.
While complaints still come to us from students and citizens in local communities regarding the court-ordered changes for sports seasons, and participation has declined significantly in several of the affected sports – especially girls basketball, girls volleyball and boys tennis – the MHSAA office still continues to enjoy many efficiencies, as well as some euphoria, from the shot-at-but-missed experience.
This comes from the knowledge that we went to the mat for what our schools wanted, fought long and hard, paid a high cost, and came out of it with schools’ respect. In the aftermath, the MHSAA staff and Representative Council came together, and came through it stronger.