Another competitive balance proposal is front of high school principals in Ohio and the deadline to cast their respective votes is next Thursday, May 15.
Without getting into the specifics of the proposal, which includes a lot of legal jargon, it would basically have the potential to force a particular school up a division in a certain sport based on the number of student athletes that live outside of a school district, or did not attend one of the that school’s feeder schools since the seventh grade.
This is an attempt by the OHSAA to curtail some of the recruiting that has been taking place in some districts, mostly in or around the state’s larger cities for some time.
If you have read this space with any consistency you know that is something that this reporter has been calling on the state to do for some time. In fact, it is long overdue.
I think this is a better proposal than the one that failed by just a few votes last time. One of the key differences is it no longer penalizes a district for having athletes from outside the county in which the school is located.
For example, locally Mansfield St. Peter’s traditionally has students from catholic elementary schools in both Ashland and Crawford Counties in addition to Richland County. Under last year’s proposal they would have been penalized for something that has been happening for many years and is not even specific to athletics. Those of a Catholic faith do not have a high school option in Ashland or Crawford Counties.
However, the new proposal still addresses the movement of players for the purpose of athletics from one school to another after their seventh grade year and I think that is something the state needs to curtail. Let me cite the example of teammates O.J. Mayo and Bill Jones, who helped lead Cincinnati North College Hill to three state titles in 2005 – 2007. These were kids who where from West Virginia that went to Kentucky to play in the eighth grade because they were allowed to play on the varsity at that grade level and then transferred to North College Hill.
There will be those districts in favor of the new rules, some against them, and some that really don’t have an opinion. Last year, not all of the districts who had the option to vote did so for whatever reason.
So, a big key, like in political races, is to get out the vote. You can bet that many districts that are either for or against the new competitive balance proposal will be calling principals in the districts that didn’t vote last time and try to get them to vote in their favor.
I have one more thing today. I’m not against high school principals, even those that may have disciplined me in the past, but I don’t think those are really the people that should be casting the votes. Rob Peterson, the Madison High School Principal, was an athlete and a coach and has the knowledge and background to vote intelligently, but not all principals fall into that category.
If principals who are unfamiliar with sports don’t seek input from others, they will be voting blindly. Not a good idea. Why not have the athletic director, the person that oversees athletics, be the one to vote? It just makes good sense to have them involved.
After years of toil and sweat behind radio station microphones, longtime broadcaster, Jeff Swank joined the new generation of sports followers on the web.
Swank launched his internet radio station with nothing more than some wire, a box with some knobs and switches, and an itch to do much more than just scratch the surface of everything sports.
Richland Source is proud to introduce Jeff as a writer focused on high school sports. He will contribute a weekly column and analysis of a featured game of the week from one of our area high schools.
In addition to his work at Richland Source, Jeff provides complete high school sports coverage for over 70 Ohio schools at his web site, http://www.swankonsports.net76.net/.
