Why isn't Tennessee HS FB better?

#51
#51
Boca Vol said:
As impressive as Maryville's run over the last decade has been, they would get crushed by 100 schools in FL.
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I agree that Maryville wouldn't be dominant the same way they are in TN, but I think this is a little bit of a stretch. The way they are coached and the way the program is run, I think it would be a playoff team in Florida and might have a chance to win the state every once in a while.
 
#52
#52
I think the small size of the high schools in Tennessee hurts the level of competition, this allows athletically gifted kids to dominate without having to work too much on improving their skills.

With the mega high schools they have in large cities like Atlanta and Miami, a kid has to have a lot of natural talent just to make the team.

If he has a competitive spirit, then he has to really work hard in the weight room, and on the field improving his skills to be a starter or especially to be a star. Plus, these big city kids play against other teams full of great athletes every week.

This higher level of competition pushes already gifted natural athletes to work much harder on improving skills, and they become much better than they would have in a less competitive environment of smaller schools.
 
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#53
#53
knucklehead_vol said:
Example please.
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Whitehaven, Melrose, East, Central (Clear's school, historically) are probably the best known on here the have talent but no coach usually

Woodale has an ok coach sometimes (Jovon Robinson's school)

Whitestation and Ridgeway are the best coached teams and have tons of talent (usually). Also, many city schools don't have a kicker (the reason Ridgeway lost in the playoffs by 2 points).
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#54
#54
I talked with a guy who played CFB and was a product of Ohio HSFB. The problem according to him is coaching and the lack of year round practice.

Do that and the quality of players should improve greatly.
 
#55
#55
DocVOLiday said:
Whitehaven, Melrose, East, Central (Clear's school, historically) are probably the best known on here the have talent but no coach usually

Woodale has an ok coach sometimes (Jovon Robinson's school)

Whitestation and Ridgeway are the best coached teams and have tons of talent (usually). Also, many city schools don't have a kicker (the reason Ridgeway lost in the playoffs by 2 points).
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And Memphis East. Or was it Melrose? Whichever team had the Cooper running back that played for Miami.
 
#56
#56
The problem is that many Tennessee high school coaches are still running offenses that were innovative in the 70's like the wishbone.

Run, Run, Run, Punt...
 
#57
#57
SamRebel35 said:
Maryville wasn't worth a crap in football until the late 90's and they didn't become good by giving kids waivers to play. Your story is fantasy.
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I'm not sure where you come from , or think you know, but I played against Maryville in 66&67 and they were great back then.
:cray::no:
 
#58
#58
I think it mostly has to do with numbers. And right, wrong, PC or not, it's undeniable that black kids are proportionally more likely to be D-1 level football players than white ones. So, overall population matters and black population matters. All of the states with 'good HS football' rank very highly in one or both categories. The states with the best HS football rank highly in both. Period. Tennessee is low in one or both categories compared to the states who have better HS football.

What are the three best states for HS football? Arguably, Florida, Texas, California. All have extremely, extremely large populations compared to TN. Alabama is a better comparison to TN than those. Similar overall populations, but much higher black population than TN, and plays football at a higher level. Facts are facts. (Shameless plug though, my high school generally played an AL team once a year and rarely lost. Coaching matters some in specific cases, for sure.)

The coaching/early development aspect is overblown in general, though, imo. Of course it matters, but very little at peewee levels, middle school levels, etc. I played with several guys in high school who played in the NFL and none of them played a down of football before 7th grade. And none had any outstanding junior high coaching, either. What they had was very real talent.

The high school coaching may be more effect than cause - if you are a great coach and serious about it, you're more likely to wind up in the HS football hotspots than in areas that are just not at that sort of level with respect to talent. Great coaching at Alcoa and Maryville doesn't turn many of those kids into D1 stars, either. It gives them a leg-up for sure, but nothing substitutes well for pure talent.
 
#59
#59
ImportedVoL said:
WoW.. cant believe people are trying to pull the race card, that's so ignorant its not even funny.

TN has low population density.. very few schools have the pool of kids to actually put together decent teams.. if your not on a good team that plays other high caliber teams, you are not even going to get looked at because you have never played against that talent level. Which is why anyone in east TN that wants to give their kid a shot at CFB moves to maryville/alcoa area.. at some of the other schools that play these teams you have a slight chance because coaches can look at tape and see what you can do against better players.

It is simple numbers.. if you come from a school with a graduating class of 80-100 kids, you wont be able to put together a very good team.

Not to mention the fact that TN does not pay teachers enough.. so you are not going to be able to get very good coaches for the type of money they pay around here
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Your crazy if you think a lack of African Americans is not the majority of the reason, IT IS THE TRUTH. Blacks are more athletic in general than whites. And not by a little. Memphis puts out the majority of our stud athletes in the state of Tennessee and Memphis is primarily black... that is not a coincidence. It is what it is.
 
#60
#60
pl3 said:
Because TN is one of the fattest, laziest states and kids see their parents being lazy and they are lazy and they don't like to sweat and compete because they see their fat ass parents not doing either one, either?
A little exaggerated, but I see a lot of big kids walking around and they aren't doingsquat. If you were big or fast when I was in HS, you played football. If you were either and you didn't, you were basically ostracized. PC wasn't around in '87.
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You know what states are even fatter? Louisiana and Mississippi. Pretty sure they crank out the talent.
 
#61
#61
Ohio HS Football is the same run, run, run, punt **** that you guys have in Tennessee. It's like a sin to pass that ball.
 
#62
#62
TN has some quality coaches but they are few and far between.
To me it's coaching and practice restrictions by the TSSAA.
 
#63
#63
A) the middle school coaching sucks as a whole. middle school/junior high should be about teaching fundamentals, getting kids accustomed to weight training and teaching them the schemes they will run in HS.

B) the high school coaching sucks as a whole.
 
#65
#65
1. We are whiter than other Southern states
2. There is not a proper investment into amateur athletics.
3. This whole issue is overhyped. TN puts out several prospects each year, and we are no worse than middle of the pack. The fact that UT has refused to recruit capable instate players over the years has hurt the state's reputation.
 
#66
#66
winchestervol63 said:
I think it mostly has to do with numbers. And right, wrong, PC or not, it's undeniable that black kids are proportionally more likely to be D-1 level football players than white ones. So, overall population matters and black population matters. All of the states with 'good HS football' rank very highly in one or both categories. The states with the best HS football rank highly in both. Period. Tennessee is low in one or both categories compared to the states who have better HS football.

What are the three best states for HS football? Arguably, Florida, Texas, California. All have extremely, extremely large populations compared to TN. Alabama is a better comparison to TN than those. Similar overall populations, but much higher black population than TN, and plays football at a higher level. Facts are facts. (Shameless plug though, my high school generally played an AL team once a year and rarely lost. Coaching matters some in specific cases, for sure.)

The coaching/early development aspect is overblown in general, though, imo. Of course it matters, but very little at peewee levels, middle school levels, etc. I played with several guys in high school who played in the NFL and none of them played a down of football before 7th grade. And none had any outstanding junior high coaching, either. What they had was very real talent.

The high school coaching may be more effect than cause - if you are a great coach and serious about it, you're more likely to wind up in the HS football hotspots than in areas that are just not at that sort of level with respect to talent. Great coaching at Alcoa and Maryville doesn't turn many of those kids into D1 stars, either. It gives them a leg-up for sure, but nothing substitutes well for pure talent.
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I can't comment on football specifically but my son (8) just finished his 3rd year of travel baseball and I can tell you for a fact that the kids he plays with/against are far and away better than kids in normal rec leagues. It ain't even close! I watched a few rec league games this year and parents were tickled pink if little Timmy caught a pop fly at 8yrs old! My son was catching them reliably by age 6. Travelball kids are looking to turn double plays and can recite to you the correct play given various situations. Their IQ is so much higher and it carries over toward middleschool.

My son got to play a few games with a friend's rec team as they were short a player and we actually had parents on the team who thought he was some kind of savant. For the record he's never been the best player on his travel team (mabey 3rd or 4th). Opposing team parents even complained that he was too old or that we must have resorted to beatings and endless hours of training to get his skill level where its at. The truth is that too many parents treat sports like a babysitter. They don't treat it like oldschool piano lessons where they remind the kid he needs to practice if he wants to play. I can't tell you how many parents showed up to practice, jumped on their cellphones, ipads, and tuned out our activities for the duration of practice. That's why we quit rec leagues.

If more kids in FL, AL, MS, LA, GA, etc are playing the equivalent of AAU or travel football year round, I don't see how TN rec league-type kids would have a shot by FR year of highschool. Couple that with 1970-80's coaching schemes, it's no surprise that TN doesn't put out better prospects.

Sure black demographics are a factor but tOSU gets more than its fair share of elite white D-1 players. It hasn't kept them from going to a BCS bowl every year.

If Dooley really wanted to ingratiate himself to TN highschool coaches (mabey even in conjunction with J.Franklin, R.Stockstill, & L.Porter) he could call for a summit of all state HS coaches. It could be broken into 3 subconferences of west, middle, and east TN. Have the HS coaches air all their greivances and recommendations for improving the talent in the state. Take that list to TSSAA and influential alumni in the state legislature if need be and push for changes.
 
#68
#68
Most Texas high schools have crazy facilities, better than most colleges. They also make more money so they can pay better coaches. As someone else said Maryville would get crushed by most teams in the main hs football states.
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#71
#71
Voldemonium said:
I can't comment on football specifically but my son (8) just finished his 3rd year of travel baseball and I can tell you for a fact that the kids he plays with/against are far and away better than kids in normal rec leagues. It ain't even close! I watched a few rec league games this year and parents were tickled pink if little Timmy caught a pop fly at 8yrs old! My son was catching them reliably by age 6. Travelball kids are looking to turn double plays and can recite to you the correct play given various situations. Their IQ is so much higher and it carries over toward middleschool.....

....push for changes.
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I don't discount the effect that you're speaking of with respect to baseball in particular. I don't happen to think that it applies as well to football, though, and also don't think it'd be a great idea for the younger kids to be playing football year-round, etc.

I guess that I just don't think that the early years influence football development nearly as much. I personally know guys who played in the NFL and never wore a football helmet til 7th grade and who never played anywhere other than at school. But, I don't think I've ever heard of a great baseball player who didn't play from as old as he could hold a bat, either. I've also coached a lot of T-ball and peewee football and just think the kids are learning and developing a lot more baseball at those ages than football. And there's no doubt, for instance, that the all-star level kids (more similar to travel team level) are a world apart from the average t-baller.

Regardless, I don't deny that year-round playing would improve some players in football. But I also know that the guys I know who were great never played like that and would've still been dominant if all of the lesser-talented guys playing around them had years of extra practice. Just wouldn't have mattered. May be that football relies a bit more on raw athletic ability (speed, strength, power) and that baseball skills are more fine and able to be developed over time (fine motor skills, pitching details, etc.). You might learn to hit better after 1000 swings, but if a guy can run a 4.4, you won't ever practice enough to catch him if you're a 4.7 guy to start with.

But I agree completely with you regarding baseball and the effect of early development. I think the skills and development are just vastly different between football/baseball.

As for OSU, I never said that white guys can't compete or be great at D-1 levels. If they're good enough to be recruited to a school like OSU, they are great players, period and race doesn't matter. TN has great D-1 players, white and black. Just not in the numbers as the more populous states.

But the observation about a kids race versus potential D1 football ability just matters when applied to overall populations. There are many, many more black kids at the D-1 football level than white kids, but there are very many more white kids to start with. So, it seems apparent to me that if you have similar overall populations (TN vs AL), but disparate white/black ratios, that the number of D-1 level football players is likely to be different too.

Oddly enough, I would also disagree completely that this observation applies to baseball. It simply does not. And TN is a much better baseball state than football, I think.
 
#74
#74
It's all about the emphasis put on high school football in our state. Like I have seen some other posters say, there isn't any team in the state that could remotely compete with a South Lake Carroll, St. Thomas Aquinas, Miami Northwestern, etc. Reason why? Parents don't sink money into high school football in our state like they do elsewhere. Also, Maryville is a dominant program because of a system that is perfected through years of training from pee wee all the way to high school ball, not because of elite athletic ability. Tennessee does have some talented players, but there is not a vast majority of players that are good. Similar to our football team the past few years, our top guys are pretty good, but the second tier and on is pathetic where other states second and third tier are still very good football players, and they are pushing the top tier to be even better. Sure Tennessee has some good talent, but compared to other SEC states, we are only comparible to Arkansas and Kentucky. Every one else has us beat by a lot.
 
#75
#75
A lot of parents do not support their kids. I have coached middle and high school ball. Atleast in high school ball you have 20 or so parents out of 70 kids that do everything; fundraising, showing support at games and practice, ect. The middle school kids in rural areas are lucky if they have 2 or 3 parents helping out, and most times they are the coaches wives. I have coached midget ball with 14 kids, and had to worry game to game if I was going to have 11 for the field that night. Parents don't install a sense of committment in some of the kids over the summer work outs either. There have been a lot of high school teams I have been associated with that have a hard time getting all the kids all the time to the weight room. In some places only a third of the kids show up for weight training. There are several local area schools that get D1 and other weight lifting companines to come and work on the student's S&C. These are starting to pop up more and more, but mostly in wealthier areas. Though many parents don't show up to help the team, they are there to complain on game days: especially if their kid didn't get to play.

All this junk that high school teams don't run up to date offenses is a bunch of crap. Many East Tn teams have switched to a spread offense. There are some that still run the veer and I formations because they are basic football formations. Lots of pro sets coming up as well. I have seen a heck of a lot more passing the ball from ten years ago. I have also noticed some east TN teams running the 3-5 D, and that is about as revolutionary a D to date. Running a prowler is very innovative if you ask me, full of stunts, hard to scout, and easy to adjust for the D.

If teams are running older offenses and 5-3 D's, well there is probably a good reason for it. When watching hs film there is usually one maybe two rarley three studs on a team. Some teams only have a player that isn't a burner, but is a hoss up the gut. To insult a lot these coaches is really ignorant. HS and MS coaches get paid very little for what is a second full time job. I haven't been a head coach, but I have seen how much that goes into it. To be honest, you can never have enough help. Sure, there maybe some here or there that may not know a lot about football (I'm still learning a lot myself); however, you'll find it few and far between. More and more east TN coaches have college experience as players and they know more about the game than most weekend bloggers.

So ultimatley, I would argue that a lot of the issue with local talent is between physical ability and the support of the family and community. Like a previous poster stated about texas football, they have funding and support of the community. From my experience, that can make all the difference in the world.
 
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