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I will preface all I’m about to say by stating I have been involved in yute sports from every angle, player, coach, official, and administrator, I always felt like I had a pretty good handle on what we, at least I was trying to accomplish with yute sports. And call me a romantic, but I truly believe athletics are an extension of the classroom. With all that being said everyone is aware of the current state of officiating at all levels. Shortages, bad officials, inexperienced officials working to high of levels, rinse, repeat. Over the weekend while supervising a club softball tournament I read numerous posts on FB complaining about umps… from C level to a HS Varsity HC complaining umpires cost his team a sectional championship in a 7-6 that featured his opponent hitting a grand slam. Most of the posts, complete with pics and vids did show a generous strike zone. But the recurring theme I heard was yes it was like that the every game of the sectional. Everything I saw as an uninterested third party looked consistent to me. WTF else can you ask for? I will assure you when I’m on fire behind the dish I’ll still miss a couple. Which leads me to the point of this paperback. I’m 61 years old and I realize I’m from another time, but in my thinking, we need to adjust to Blue’s zone. That would seem a LOT more logical than bitching about balls and strikes on FB wouldn’t it? Today I got involved in this gem on FB. 11 YO gets punched out on a pitch in the other batters box, it’s a bad call, but it IS the call. My point is my thought process in ALL of this I’m trying to teach my kids A) shit just went wrong, how are you going to react and B) to control what they can control. And don’t waste energy on stuff you can’t. Instead of whining on FB and looking like a TOTAL BEOTCH, what if we taught our kids to make adjustments. If Blue’s got a wide zone, let’s throw our hands at it, foul it off and maybe the next pitch will be something we can do something with. On the other side of it, when you’re sitting over there on that bucket, don’t you keep calling farther and farther out until you figure out Blue’s limit is? What are we trying to accomplish with youth sports today? As an official and administrator, what are we doing? Are we here for the NIL money, college scholarships, have fun, child development, social status ( yes I’m looking at you in particular Westfield), I’m down with whatever just let me know what we’re trying to accomplish

I still don't see the need for a shot clock in Indiana High School Basketball. There is already a counter to "stall ball" in the existing rulebook. It's called the 5-Second Violation. Coaches need to actually teach their players how to play aggressive man-to-man defense in order to force such violations, along with turnovers. Yet it seems more and more coaches are content to play insipid zone defenses and just whine and complain about the other team holding the ball.

To have Paul Condry (also puts on the yearly GRIDIES AWARDS with COLTS) and Tim Phillips in the same sentence, paragraph......... not even remotely close to that stratosphere. History Lesson: Paul Condry is in the Indiana Football HOF. https://greatnews.life/article/the-story-of-paul-condry-the-voice-behind-regional-radio-sports-network/?region=michiana https://rrsn.com/author/paulcondry/ https://ifca-hof.org/inductee/condry-paul/

Unless you’re Chuck Norrris

2 obvious clues it’s not D Tees from Donnie No mention of recruiting and exposure services. No mention of the site being for sale 😎

Good Luck with that.... now that ABS..... is on all the algorithms..... I mean if the the 9U teams and their $150 worth of Gloves, Sleeves, Eye Black, Shades, pads, all while clipping their favorite Song for 12 sec of walk up so they can go 1-4 in the local Summer league, I am SURE the new ABS won't filter into their demeanor when things do not go their way for lil JR in the box or on the bump. How bout that coach who told his player to throw a heater in the opposing dugout from the bump.......

I love winning as much as the next person, but what happened to finding a way to win through actions rather than words and complaints. This is the reason we have little girls and boys going out into the real world instead of young men and women. We have parents, coaches, and leaders holding the hands of student athletes to make sure everything goes perfect for them. One thing I never understood as a child, but now can't appreciate enough from my parents was their ability to allow my siblings and I to fail on our own, and sit back and say you got knocked on your ass what are YOU going to do to figure it out because once you get out in the real world there's no one to sit there and hold your hand through this whole thing we call life. We're crippling our youngsters by not allowing them to fail similar to what you said with the strike zone. It's bigger figure it out.

"It's been boring in the Grid" Titan, "hold my beer".... probably

I got dumber by reading these. Saying a guy who has never lost more than 3 games in a season isn't a good coach because he never beat a really good program is just ignorant. The whole "never a Rochester guy" is stupid. One thing I've learned is schools will do what's best for the school corporation, so teachers/coaches need to do the same for themselves. To hold coaches to a different standard because they get a 9k stipend is ridiculous. I've only talked to Coach Shaffer once, seemed like a nice guy. I wish him the best of luck at Plymouth.

Link to article https://hbcunews.com/2026/05/13/the-circle-city-classic-moving-from-hbcu-college-showcase-to-high-school-football-and-flag-games/

I’d say it’s the parents and those looking to profit from the parents that are driving the biggest problems in youth sports today. Another thought: I’d be willing to bet that parent/coach behavior re officiating has only gotten worse as professional and college sports rely more on technology to resolve the grave “injustices” of human error.

The heck did college baseball do to you?

None. The IFD is published by Paul Condry, and has signaled the start of the high school preseason for a long time.

Look at the margin of victory between Valley and Rochester the years prior to him getting there. It was getting really bad. He comes in and every year it shrunk. If you watched the bell game last year you would know that one or two calls the refs made go a different way and that game might have a different outcome. Look at the couple of seasons before he got there. Rochester wasn't even beating those cupcakes you speak of before he got there. There wasn't a push for utilizing the weightroom when he got there. All those things have changed. This is a really dumb take on your part in my opinion. Plymouth wants a guy that can get them back to a winning program. They got the right guy to do that. May not happen as quickly as Rochester, but it will be better than the 3 and 4 win seasons they've grown accustom to. Really crappy thing for a Rochester person to say about a guy who took over a program that went 4-15 in the two seasons before he got there and won 75% of the games they played the next 5 seasons. Easy for someone on the outside of the program who just sees the team on Friday nights to say. Clueless as to all the work he puts in the other 6 days of the week.

Irish Men’s Lacrosse punches their ticket to the Final Four by dominating John’s Hopkins in the 2nd half. Final was 15-9. Irish now hunting their 3rd National Championship in the last 4 yrs. Next up in the semifinals is the winner of Syracuse vs. North Carolina, both of whom Notre Dame beat in the regular season.

I’m with Tundra on this one. Just because a blind squirrel has found a couple nuts over the past few years doesn’t mean they are a better team. Let’s give a new coach a chance with some strong upcoming classes before we make any wild statements. Plus I don’t think Floyd Central would be using AI to make their players look more buff in their pictures if they knew they had an upper hand.

"The university protected it's brand." It was the logo, not the name itself. What Cathedral did was worth fighting for. What Central Catholic is doing is not. Good grief, how did we get here? I was just suggesting some good games.

Last I knew Brian Lewis was an assistant commissioner of the IHSAA, so I think it is an imposter Brian Lewis.

100%. While alot of this is focused on travel ball its at every youth level. Even when its just a Jr High game....like nobody is gonna remember or care who won 7th grade conference in 10 years. I've said it before as I watch more and more youth sports that alot of times I feel some (not all) coach to win rather then coach to develop and prepare for sports at high school level

This will be an interesting topic as it moves forward. I too hate what the travel sport teams are doing too the kids. It's never their fault, the ump (official) screwed us, me our team...... Like IO says, adapt to how the game is being called.

But this is also a part of college baseball......after a walkoff win against that team to the south of us. Just TRY to tell us you don't get goosebumps watching. 🙂

I hate travel sports. And college baseball.

Word! But just for illustration here. It’s my zone, you need to adapt.

The 2017 Dodgers are the only team other than the 2026 Cubs to have posted two 10-game winning streaks and a 10-game losing streak in the same season. "The 2026 Chicago Cubs apparently became just the second team ever to combine two 10-game winning streaks with a 10-game losing streak in the same season. What makes the Cubs even more unusual is that they accomplished all of it before June, whereas the Dodgers' streaks were spread across a much larger portion of the season."

My point is that I don’t want the government involved with non-public schools at all. They shouldn’t be.

Agreed and it likely wasn't intentional. IMO, the Bears would be accepting the Hammond offer this morning if they weren't deadset on building in Arlington Heights. At first I thought Indiana was foolish to get involved since they were likely going to be used. In hindsight, it was a win/win for them. In a matter of a few months they were able to put together a deal that Illinois still hasn't been abled to finalize since the Bears bought the property over 3 years ago. Braun and his buddies jumped at the idea of showing businesses in Illinois how easy it is to get deals done in Indiana.

My guess is the legislators called their bluff, even if it was not intentional. I have come to believe Hammond was a bluff on the part of the Bears ownership. My guess is Arlington Heights will end up being the site used.

I thought this was a high school football page? Who do you think will make it to LOS in 2026?

We were inducted on the same night. Have known Paul for almost 20 years. No one in the state has done more to promote high school football than Paul. He and TA were partners in the early days of the Indiana Football Digest. Kindred spirits.

Put private schools in their own league and be done with it!

A private school is a business that offers an exclusive educational experience. It's similar to the difference between free golf lessons at a public course and lessons from the golf pro at a private country club. They are not the same, and the latter should not be funded with taxpayer dollars. Private schools provide a specialized environment for families who value that experience and are willing to pay for it. There is nothing wrong with that. In fact, many private schools have successfully operated this way for hundreds of years by competing in the marketplace and delivering a product that families choose to purchase. If a private school provides a quality experience, its success and survival should depend on the families who voluntarily choose it—not on taxpayers. No taxpayer should be required to subsidize another family's exclusive educational choice.

Good insight. Having been on one of the teams every Friday for nearly 50 years I felt like I was a little more in the know about what it takes to put on a Friday night production. When I retired from Friday nights, our local AD asked if I would come help out for home games. I am tasked with meeting the officials in the parking lot and taking care of them for the evening. Now having seen from the production aspect of this, there is a TON of work that goes into any given Friday night. Thanks for sharing.

Irish lacrosse punch their ticket to Monday’s National Championship game vs. Princeton by outscoring Syracuse 6-0 in the 4th period, to pull away 15-7. Playing for their 3rd Natty in the last 4 seasons. Now the gold standard of college lacrosse programs. They’ve come a long way from this:

I think his coaching days are done. The book is out there on him after the LSU AD’s recent comments. He has the CBS job that fulfills his obligation to LSU and keeps the checks rolling in, and he can play as much golf as he wants.

Point blank, I wouldn't be the man I am today if it wasn't for Ron Shaffer. He taught me more about myself and more about life from the ages of 14-18 than anyone besides my own parents. He was tough on me, held me accountable, and never gave up on me as a player, or as a young man. He was tough on me--and he knew exactly what it would take and how far he could push me to make me the best player possible. He knows his players and he supports them both in the sport of football, but also outside the gridiron. He knew about my professional aspirations and gave me my first ever coaching job assisting him when I was still in high school. We've stayed in touch long into adulthood, and yeah, I do take this shot at Coach Shaffer personally, as I consider him a mentor and friend. Talking scheme and his coaching acumen...his offense led Maconaquah to their best season in a decade in 2004. His offense produced multiple conference and postseason championships at Cass. His offense took Rochester from an 0-10 team in the TRC, which you described as having several cupcakes to a team that was a perennial conference contender and eventual champion. Maybe he never beat Valley--which I can understand from a rivalry perspective how large that game looms--but a few plays and bounces here and there and Rochester probably gets one of those under his tutelage. No moral victories, but he's taken Rochester from a program that "was" good, to a program that "is" good. It's pretty easy to armchair quarterback decisions and playcalls from the stands, but unless you've done it at the level Shaff has, you need to sit this one out. Plymouth is in a similar spot that Rochester was when he took over. Knowing kids that have had the opportunity to play for Shaff, yeah he's tough and he absolutely has high expectations, which is why roster size is a bad metric of his ability. Those kids that are "hangers on" in lesser programs just won't make it on his teams. It's not because he runs them off--it's because the standard is the standard. Kids today don't want or appreciate that level of accountability. We saw it at Maconaquah. After a coaching change following 2004, a new coach came in with a much more "relaxed" and "less accountable" style that allowed more guys to stay on the team that otherwise would have not been a part of the program. Guess what happened to the culture and eventually the W/L record. Maconaquah would have been LUCKY to have him there for a second run in that program...but if you know what's going on inside Maconaquah football right now, then you know exactly why that didn't come to fruition. It's a shame for this generation of Braves, the same way it was a shame that he wasn't given the chance in 2005. If anyone can help Plymouth get back to being competitive, it's him. He knows what he's getting himself into. Rochester should do nothing more than thank him for what he did for the program and for the young men there during his tenure. Rochester is fortunate that Ike is taking over the reins, as he's had the chance to learn from one of the best there is in this area of the state.

I don't believe I blamed the refs. Never said anything about them missing a call. Simply stated that if a play was called differently it could have been a different outcome because it was a controversial call where both sideline judges called it differently. It didn't go in our favor and we moved on. Ask other head coaches of 2A programs around this area if their rosters are shrinking or growing. If you're a Rochester guy, ask Brant Beck if he would rather have played for someone else, ask Jabez Yarber who came from Caston what he thinks of Coach Shaffer, ask the Swango's, ask Alex Demming. If players didn't play for him or quit, they probably weren't wanting to be a football player in the first place. I can tell you that was absolutely his plan to retire to spend more time with family. He also felt like it was time to step aside for someone to take over long term and it was the right time for that. Plymouth reached out to him because he is a winner and wanted him. If you want to know more about the Mac job feel free to PM me. I'm more than happy to explain it there. The biggest joke here is you bashing a guy who took a program at one of it's lowest points in program history arguably and turning them back into a winner. Since you are so concerned about Rochester and the program, I'd love to hear what you have done in the last 5 years to help the program grow and succeed?

Is there a more unlikable coach than Kiffin? I think not…

I like the "do's and do not's"....but it still has to be enforced. Guess it boils down to the level of confidence one has for enforcement. What we do know is that some will certainly test the system.

The Statehouse really needs to go fly a kite.

Northrop sucks. 23, you are basing this off one year. They need to put together 5 years of good play to even be mentioned

I know I’m ranting into the void - but earlier this week I heard questioning ‘Why don’t they move all non conference games to week 1 and be done with it?’ It won’t work with an odd number. Not sure how people can’t figure that out. Thanks for coming to my TedTalk

proximity wise it's totally understandable though... some areas, well basically anything outside of "more than an hour from Indy" are in a scheduling crunch... Bloomington South even saw the ramifications of that... Thankfully for FC--- no longer playing JC and Vincennes moving out of the SIAC-- has offered some flexibility. All three of these adds are still pretty hefty drives. 105 miles to Whiteland, 106 miles to GS, and 111 miles to Ev Memorial.

I believe TCC is a school originally founded by the Brothers of Holy Cross, who founded ND. In Indiana, both Indpls. Cathedral and Evansville Reitz Memorial were also BHC schools at one time. We have recently "re-affiliated" despite not having any Brothers of HC on faculty. Not sure if Cathedral is still affiliated or not...

"Fighting Irish"? Does the University of Notre Dame know about this blatant trademark violation? Or does Toledo Central Catholic has some kind of special dispensation?

Only 364 light days away from a light year.

Great Mayor Johnson: Why don't you just sell the land/property to the Chicago Bears, the ultra rich, then? I will hang up and listen.......

yes, at least that is what the Suits at NCAA thought would happen.... Johnny get the money to wave at the car wash...... THEN AGENTS swooped in........ Good Night Sally

It seems particularly appropriate, in light of current events, to remember what happens when a government turns on its own people. Never forget. Images

More state titles after they joined, but having watched Snider for 50 years, better teams before they joined in my opinion