Kerekes column: Sports, trips prove a tough balancing act

Published 10:58 pm Saturday, April 15, 2017

Drew Kerekes

If an athlete wanted to take a pre-planned trip with his or her family on spring break, would potentially missing a baseball or softball game during that time earn them a trip to the coach’s doghouse?

Would it be fair for a coach to make him or her earn their way back into the starting lineup?

This type of hypothetical is probably far too general to elicit a serious discussion. Are the games being missed key district games that determine playoff seeding? Is the player in question a key starter for the team? Were the dates of the games known plenty of time in advance, before the trip was planned?

It’s probably much easier for a coach to demand their players always show up for games in theory than it is in practice. Things come up, and a coach’s job is to determine whether or not the consequences should be “by the book,” or if nuance should be used.

In the case of longtime West Lauderdale baseball coach Jerry Boatner, the idea of a player missing a game due to trips hasn’t been an issue in at least the last several years. The players know what to expect, Boatner said, so missing a game during spring break hasn’t been something that’s come up recently.

“What we’ve tried to do in the last three years is give them half the time off (during the week of spring break) and play at the end of the week,” Boatner said. “I’ve never had a kid miss a game for going somewhere on spring break since I’ve been coaching, or if I have, I don’t remember.”

If the issue ever did come up, Boatner said his approach would depend on the player.

“I wouldn’t mind someone who doesn’t play a lot going somewhere if they come talk to me, but we expect our best players to be there — we demand it,” Boatner said. 

Times have changed, according to Southeast Lauderdale softball coach Chris Harper. During his time in high school, when he played baseball, Harper said they would play every single day of spring break. Now, however, his approach is similar to Boatner’s: Harper gives his players most of spring break off before they play in Clarkdale’s spring fling, and the Lady Tigers’ games are usually only on Saturdays.

“Kids are different now,” Harper said. “I find it a lot easier to give them a break. We’ll play a few games the weekend before we go back to school (following spring break), and go from there. Sometimes it helps us, and sometimes it takes us out of a rhythm, so I can’t really say either way whether it’s an advantage or disadvantage.”

Harper said a player missing a game due to a trip has come up before, but it’s never been a major issue as long as reasonable communication happened.

“I’ve had a senior before who had a trip planned with her family, and it was planned before I did the schedule,” Harper said. “Typically, I frown on kids missing, but when we have communication and they let me know stuff ahead of time — which this kid did — I generally try to work things out.”

The plan going forward, Harper said, is to give his players a yearlong schedule, where they know the date of each game for both slow- and fast-pitch softball so they can plan accordingly.

In the case of football, there typically isn’t a major holiday that affects the sport’s schedule outside of Thanksgiving, and teams typically only play during the Thanksgiving holidays if they’ve gotten deep into the postseason — which no player would want to miss. Summer workouts, however, could potentially be affected by family trips.

Lamar School football coach Mac Barnes said he’s grateful to coach a sport where potential conflicts don’t typically crop up during the season.

“Football is the easiest one, because when our season starts in late July, there are no major holidays,” Barnes said. “We try to communicate our summer schedule, but when practice starts, we say to set up all of your things so it won’t conflict.

“When you have basketball with Christmas break and baseball with spring break, it’s not an easy thing to deal with. You want your kids to be well-rounded and have family time, but when you have games, you want them to be there.”

Most coaches will determine a minimum number of days the players are required to attend for summer strength and conditioning. If a player is going to be away for an entire summer, the onus falls on that player to work out and stay in shape. In Barnes’ case, Lamar hosts both morning and afternoon workouts in the summer so his players can be flexible with their schedules. For Barnes, attending summer workouts isn’t just a way for players to show discipline — they physically need the workouts in order to be in shape come fall camp.

“The more they miss, the harder it is to play,” Barnes said. “That’s just the reality of it.”

There’s no easy answer if a player wants to miss a game due to a family trip or other extra-curricular activity. Communication is critical in such situations, and the more coaches schedule games ahead of time, they better off they’ll be in helping avoid such circumstances. Ultimately, a case-by-case approach is probably best.

Drew Kerekes is the sports editor at The Meridian Star. He can be reached at dkerekes@themeridianstar.com.