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Seattle schools’ loose transfer policy creates teenage ‘free agents’

By Derek Belt
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Jan. 27, 2008

SEATTLE — A toothless transfer policy for Seattle Public Schools allows some of the city’s best basketball programs to stockpile talent and turns coveted players into teenage free agents.

Aaron Dotson, the most recent high-profile example of a top-flight player jumping from one power program to another, transferred from Garfield High School to nearby Rainier Beach last year.

He was not forced to sit out the calendar year, as is required of any student who transfers schools for athletic purposes. Rainier Beach officials say Dotson did not transfer for athletic reasons and was therefore eligible to play. Garfield officials believe otherwise.

When filling out the paperwork to complete Dotson’s transfer, Garfield principal Ted Howard, after consulting with Bulldogs coach Dan Finkley and others, checked a box indicating he believed Dotson was transferring for athletic reasons.

Howard said it was all he could do to protest what he thought was an obvious attempt by Dotson to switch teams. Continue reading “Seattle schools’ loose transfer policy creates teenage ‘free agents’” →

High school hecklers can be personally foul

By Derek Belt
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
March 5, 2004

SEATTLE — If players play and coaches coach, what is the fans’ responsibility?

Some say their purpose is to show support for their team. Others argue they’re responsible for creating a lively atmosphere. Whatever the case, there’s no denying the importance of fans at the high school level.

But what about the few who take it to extremes: fans who holler obscenities from the security of the stands and complain to coaches about who took the last shot, or even worse, parents who try to proclaim their child’s successes as their own.

Is there any place for behavior like that in high school basketball?

“Absolutely not,” Rainier Beach coach Mike Bethea said.

Continue reading “High school hecklers can be personally foul” →

What’s hampering a once-proud high school athletics program?

Lean years for the Lions

Foley’s athletic teams have fallen on hard times—what’s the cause, and what’s the cure?

By Derek Belt
Mobile Press-Register
Dec. 26, 2004

FOLEY, ALA. — Michael Ebert stood in the visitor’s dugout at Daphne High School late in a 1999 baseball game, watching intently as his Foley team clung to a fragile one-run lead. It was his second year as the Lions’ baseball coach, and one of his first trips to Daphne’s state-of-the-art diamond facility.

“I was standing there looking around and it just kind of hit me,” said Ebert. “I mean, everything is the best you can buy. They’ve got indoor batting cages, a locker room built into their dugout, names on the back of their jerseys, matching bat bags and state championships everywhere.

“Then I look in their dugout, and the head coach had just won a state championship in Georgia on a team that was ranked in the top 10 in the nation. The assistant coach had won two state championships as a head coach, you had Bernie Carbo in there, who was an ex-professional baseball player, you had another guy who was just the head coach at LeFlore, and you had a kid from the University of Mobile who had just graduated and was helping out.

“I said to myself ‘There’s five guys in that dugout that know more about baseball than I do.’ But it was a 5-4 game and we were winning.”

Unfortunately for the Lions, Daphne stormed back to steal a 6-5 victory that helped steamroll Foley’s chances of making the playoffs later that year. Such is the status quo at Foley High School, where the odds have been stacked sky-high against an athletic program that was once a showcase of stability and success in Southwest Alabama. Continue reading “What’s hampering a once-proud high school athletics program?” →

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