kdhoffma

October 18th, 2012 at 3:28 PM ^

I'm an officer on a board for a youth sports association, and have some experience with background checks.  Most youth sports governing bodies require background checks on volunteers.  However, they often leave it up to the individual associations/members to let them know that each coach/volunteer is clear.  The governing body will give the associations a list of approved background screeners, but each background screener does things a bit differently.  We used one that just came back "pass" or "fail", but gave us little to no info on why.  So a guy that was ticketed for marijuana possessions in college 6 years ago may come back "fail" without a reason listed.  So we went with another company that would either give us a "pass" or "flag".  For the flagged individual we'd get a detailed report of what came back, so we cold then decide as a BOD what to do.  In the end, it was up to us to decide whether we felt the individual was a risk.  So there's always the opportunity for an individual association/member to lie to the governing body about a background check.

 

My guess though, as an assistant coach, this guy was probably never background checked.

willywill9

October 18th, 2012 at 2:15 PM ^

So, I'm refereering as a volunteer in a youth league... and it sucks.  Everyone hates you, and you're always wrong.  I prefer coaching.... Is it Little League season yet?

Bocheezu

October 18th, 2012 at 4:18 PM ^

I used to be on the chain gang for most games, and one time the linesman on our side joked that each team has four coaches: the head coach, the OC, the DC, and the "holding" coach that bitches about holding on every single play.  And it's true; there's not a whole lot of plays where there wasn't a coach complaining about holding. 

Refereeing is definitely not a job I could do; I can understand these coaches/parents are passionate about the sport, but I find it so disrespectful for them to complain about calls on every single play.  Just shut your mouth and move on to the next play.

FreddieMercuryHayes

October 18th, 2012 at 2:34 PM ^

Besides the whole assulting a person at a little league football game thing, the worst part I think is the fact that the dude runs in and sucker punches the guy when he's not looking and then acts all 'tough' and runs away.  For some reason that really bothers me.  If you have a problem that you feel needs to be settled with physical violence, at least man up and face the person.  I've seen way to much sucker punch pussy shit then someone runs away when the person sucker punched actually faces them.  Grow some balls dude.

SamirCM

October 18th, 2012 at 2:51 PM ^

I was able to discover that the referee that got hit had heard one of the coaches yelling something derogatory and called the team for unsportsmanlike conduct. Based on the behavior of the coaches following that, I tend to believe that they were acting the polar opposite of sportsman-like. 

turtleboy

October 18th, 2012 at 2:53 PM ^

It's funny/disturbing to hear the other coaches defending him. "His fellow coaches stand by his side. The referee was in the wrong. We're fathers first, we take care of our kids first." How does any of that justify having a violent criminal, and cocaine dealer "coaching" your youth football team and sucker punching a ref? 

At least they don't like snitches, amirite? /s

LSAClassOf2000

October 18th, 2012 at 3:37 PM ^

The NBC affiliate in Miami has some other sundry information here, but most notably, one of the players apparently had a relative who was quoted as follows:

"Nobody's perfect, so, what that got to do with football?" Anthony Ramos said. "If he can coach good and he don't mess with the kids like that, everything is fine, no one's perfect."

I am pretty sure Mr. Robinson demonstrated to everyone why he shouldn't be coaching youth football, but if nothing else, he did show everyone how exactly you get an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty called against you, as well as a good way to get charged with assault. I would have to say that, if I found out that one of my kids' coaches had such a past, they would have one furious parent on their hands at the league level.

The question of how people like that get into these positions is a highly relevant one, I think. The sad thing is that the President of the American Youth Football League rang in regarding this incident, saying this to the Sun-Sentinel, "You can go to one city and pass and go to another city and fail. Oftentimes, we are pretty much taking the team's word that they are conducting the checks."

To me, the fact that there is no common system to do the background checks is a little disconcerting.

BeatOSU52

October 18th, 2012 at 3:49 PM ^

I am glad there aren't any videos on the net when I coached youth football.  I once had three personal fouls called on my team on one play, with two out of the three personal fouls coming from myself, the head coach.  One of my linebackers tackled the quarterback late and then spit on him, I then tripped the opposing WR that was running down the sidelines for, what would have been, touchdown, and then after the play was over I told the ref he looked like a penis with that hat on.  It took the refs about 5 minutes after this was over to figure out where the ball should be placed.  Quite an interesting play if coming from a rules perspective.

I definitely was never able to coach again when the ref and I meant behind the dumpster after the game

StephenRKass

October 18th, 2012 at 5:53 PM ^

I've known some youth coaches who have anger problems. I'm not surprised by this at all. People need to learn to walk away, and to keep their hands to themselves.

On a related note, it also was very sad to see that the Pioneer and Huron coaches were suspended two games after the melee following their game last Friday. If I read correctly, one of the Pioneer assistant coaches shoved the Huron coach, and has been fired.

Events like these bring to mind the Woody Hayes incident with punching Baumann in the Gator Bowl and getting himself fired. Interestingly, Hayes never apologized to Baumann afterwards. Hayes justified his own actions by saying he only did it because he was so strongly motivated to win. Outside of Columbus, this one single action completely overshadows anything else he did in his career.

Whether in youth, college, or high school football, violence and abuse by a coach, parent, or player is completely out of bounds. For a coach in particular, and even a parent, the bar is and should be much higher, with zero tolerance. When you're a grown up, you need to act like one.

TampaJake

October 18th, 2012 at 9:15 PM ^

I do High School games in Florida.  We have to have a Sherriff deputy on the sidelines at all times we are on the field.  

My crew and I were assulted after a spring game...a friggin spring game!

What Florida FHSAA has done is at the high school level if a kid gets kicked out of a game he/she looses the next 6 games (of any sport)..so if the season is over and the guy plays basketball he is suspended for 6 basketball games.

But the youth leagues are BY FAR the worst...there is no governing body with authority.  What can they do?  Really.

This month's issue of Referee Magazine has a detaied article about the assult that happened in Sarasota last year, if your interested.

FWIW, I work Umpire and Back Judge.