The Future Is ... Football!

This letter to the editor appeared in the Warsaw Times-Union on 11/8/2001. I booked to Florida the next day, logging in for the next week to watch the responses roll in.

Editor, Times-Union:

In a stunning example of brilliance and foresight, the collective minds of administration at the Warsaw Community Schools have come up with a plan to protect our future and the future of our children.

The proposed addition of nearly $10 million in new sports facilities clearly paves a path to limitless local prosperity. We have seen the future, my friends, and it is football.

Without a full complement of sporting opportunities, how will we train the next generation to be competitive in an ever more challenging world market?

Arts and letters are clearly and fundamentally overrated. Those who sit in ivory towers pondering philosophy or geometry are missing the point. Don’t let these eggheads befuddle you.

Only a strong football program, backed by a multi-million-dollar publicly-financed stadium, can guarantee that the local workers of tomorrow will hit the ground running with the skills they need for the job market of the future.

Great jobs in light assembly, photocopier repair or perhaps even working at an establishment offering payday loans await our accomplished athletes. Take hard-earned money away from taxpayers and spend it on books about “physics” or “literature” instead of this essential athletic job training? Common sense tells me that silly ideas like that are simply hogwash.

Those experts out there may say things like “you, the disinterested, taxpaying non-voter are paying big money for this garbage every day, even though it is destructive, stupid, pointless, worthless and supported by only a tiny fraction of the population.”

It may be tempting to ignore them. But instead of ignoring them, I ask you to try to imagine a world without high school football and other important sports. (It may make us shudder to think of it, but I ask you to try anyway.)

Without a big-time, state-ranked football powerhouse, and the expensive, non-self-supporting athletic department it requires, who is around to commit academic fraud to keep a star player in the big game on Friday? In this vacuum, who is here to “muscle up” on those pansies from the Academic Super Bowl Team in the hallway, so everybody knows who’s really in charge of the school?

Without the big game, where do those sad adults, who still care deeply about the fate of the Tigers even though they have no kids left in school, spend an evening acting like an idiot for only $4?

Without hazing, random violence and sexual assault, how will we work the phrase “boys will be boys” into conversation?

No time-wasting pep rallies? No disfiguring injuries? No cheerleaders? What has happened to the natural order of things? Where does this madness end? I feel a little sick.

Chilling, isn’t it? Forgive me this crazy hypothetical example, but understand the point it demonstrates – we must build on our local high school sports foundations to continue the traditions we all hold dear. Traditions like ever-decreasing standardized test scores, the production of a steadily less-skilled workforce and the perpetual decline of elementary school facilities may wither without your support.

Help keep sports strong. Me? You can put me down as a “YES” vote for the big sports stuff and let me know where I can send my check.

Join me, won’t you? Jerry Richardson Warsaw via e-mail