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The Character Network

March 6, 2015

“You can go other places to try to become a better athlete, but there’s no better place to become a better person than high school sports.”
There’s a hint of hyperbole in that statement, but it’s the sincere sentiments of one with an important dual perspective.
These are the words I heard spoken last month by Robert Rothberg, father of a high school senior who just completed her high school volleyball career. He is also chief executive officer of the NFHS Network that is producing thousands of high school events so family, friends and fans can follow their favorite local athletes, just like his daughter.
Like high school sports, the NFHS Network is for the masses, not merely the elite. Interscholastic athletics provides competition and character building opportunities for students of diverse sizes, shapes and skill levels; and the NFHS Network provides coverage that is just as diverse – from the local subvarsity and varsity level sponsored by schools of all types in all parts of almost all states, to many of the culminating state championship events.
To peek in on the network that focuses on character more than characters, go to MHSAA.tv.

No Rules?

February 6, 2018

We like to say that school sports is “educational athletics,” but this does not mean athletics and academics should be treated exactly the same.

Competitive athletics is not like the composition or algebra classroom. Competitive athletics requires two opponents playing by the same rules that govern who can play and how they can play.

In 1907, William James put in writing a series of lectures he had given in Boston the year before titled “Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking.” Included in the third lecture is this gem:

“. . . the aim of a football team is not merely to get the ball to a certain goal (if that were so, they would simply get up on some dark night and place it there), but to get it there by a fixed machinery of conditions – the game’s rules and the opposing players;”


This to James was a given, cited to help him make a more profound point.

But the point here is profound enough for us. Without rules, and opponents playing by the same rules, there is no validity in moving the ball to the goal. Without rules, there is no value in sinking the putt, making the basket, clearing the bar, crossing the finish line. Without a regulatory scheme adhered to by all competitors, victory is hollow.