Great column from CougarDave!!

[Amgis]

This is a great column from @Cougardave that certainly applies to Pulaski County but Im sure it applies to a lot of communities across the state! I particularly liked this....

"Maybe instead of constantly criticizing everything our coaches or school system does, we should consider simply supporting them and doing whatever we can to make their jobs easier instead of forcing them to look over their shoulders every five minutes to see who is getting ready to stick a knife in their back?"

https://www.southwesttimes.com/2021/08/sometimes-youve-got-to-call-it-like-you-see-it/

 

[Spartanfan334]

One hell of an article and 100% accurate as well....parents keep your mouth shut and let coaches do their jobs....that they get paid near nothing for by the way

 

[1MoreHokie]

Honestly, he only needed one of those paragraphs. Pulaski is struggling primarily because a lot of formerly strong industries and businesses in SWVA have dried out or packed up and left and as they go so go families. It is without any question easier to field a potentially good football team from a base of 2000 students than from a base of 1000. That goes for Virginia or Texas or Alaska. There's obviously more to it than just having a lot of potential players like a good staff to mold the talent (talent also makes average coaching look good and good coaching look great) but as far as HS football goes the expanded pool of potential players is huge.

Pulaski had a legendary coach and well over 2000 students to pick their team from and they set a program standard that is hard to meet in general, even moreso if you can't maintain both of those elements. Hicks retired, the school shrunk, and some fans have never readjusted expectations despite nearly twenty years of football telling them otherwise.

Just on a personal note, I know that virtually any Salem fan you talk to doesn't like that Pulaski has taken a step or two back because a formerly amazing rivalry has essentially been shelved. When Pulaski put on a little run in 2016 or 2017 and 9-0 Salem hosted 9-0 Pulaski in the last game of the season that was THE game in the entire state that week and 10,000+ people packed Salem Stadium to watch that game. Those kinds of games are never not fun but they've unfortunately grown more rare in a once great rivalry and I think we'd all like to see more of them again.

 

[Spartanfan334]

Honestly, he only needed one of those paragraphs. Pulaski is struggling primarily because a lot of formerly strong industries and businesses in SWVA have dried out or packed up and left and as they go so go families. It is without any question easier to field a potentially good football team from a base of 2000 students than from a base of 1000. That goes for Virginia or Texas or Alaska. There's obviously more to it than just having a lot of potential players like a good staff to mold the talent (talent also makes average coaching look good and good coaching look great) but as far as HS football goes the expanded pool of potential players is huge.

Pulaski had a legendary coach and well over 2000 students to pick their team from and they set a program standard that is hard to meet in general, even moreso if you can't maintain both of those elements. Hicks retired, the school shrunk, and some fans have never readjusted expectations despite nearly twenty years of football telling them otherwise.

Just on a personal note, I know that virtually any Salem fan you talk to doesn't like that Pulaski has taken a step or two back because a formerly amazing rivalry has essentially been shelved. When Pulaski put on a little run in 2016 or 2017 and 9-0 Salem hosted 9-0 Pulaski in the last game of the season that was THE game in the entire state that week and 10,000+ people packed Salem Stadium to watch that game. Those kinds of games are never not fun but they've unfortunately grown more rare in a once great rivalry and I think we'd all like to see more of them again.

Agreed...but the parents are a big problem everywhere...they all think their kid is as good as Brady, mahomes etc and they aren't.

Just shut up parents and let coaches do their job

 

[Fairlawncat]

Honestly, he only needed one of those paragraphs. Pulaski is struggling primarily because a lot of formerly strong industries and businesses in SWVA have dried out or packed up and left and as they go so go families. It is without any question easier to field a potentially good football team from a base of 2000 students than from a base of 1000. That goes for Virginia or Texas or Alaska. There's obviously more to it than just having a lot of potential players like a good staff to mold the talent (talent also makes average coaching look good and good coaching look great) but as far as HS football goes the expanded pool of potential players is huge.

Pulaski had a legendary coach and well over 2000 students to pick their team from and they set a program standard that is hard to meet in general, even moreso if you can't maintain both of those elements. Hicks retired, the school shrunk, and some fans have never readjusted expectations despite nearly twenty years of football telling them otherwise.

Just on a personal note, I know that virtually any Salem fan you talk to doesn't like that Pulaski has taken a step or two back because a formerly amazing rivalry has essentially been shelved. When Pulaski put on a little run in 2016 or 2017 and 9-0 Salem hosted 9-0 Pulaski in the last game of the season that was THE game in the entire state that week and 10,000+ people packed Salem Stadium to watch that game. Those kinds of games are never not fun but they've unfortunately grown more rare in a once great rivalry and I think we'd all like to see more of them again.

I agree with all of this but.......Pulaski in fact, DID make some boneheaded hiring decisions after Hicks and their fans were patient at first, but after the choice was clearly a bad one, the school officials buckled down and basically told the fans to **** up and go to he"*. That didn't set well. What did PC do after that? They finally get rid of the bad choice at coach and make ANOTHER bad choice and did the same thing, rinse and repeat. So, I agree fans, parents, alums can be a problem and have high expectations, but at PC, they have a little right or leadway based on PCs hiring decisions in the past 20 yrs. They got it right with Dixon. They will be back. They will win again

 

[Spartanfan334]

Agree but they have no right to ***** and moan if their little baby isn't getting the PT they think they deserve...which by the way is 48 minutes a game for most parents....cause their kid would be all American if it weren't for the coaches not giving him a shot lol

 

[DinwiddieProud]

Great job David. I don't think it could be stated any clearer, or any more completely.

Sadly, you can remove the word Pulaski, and insert virtually any school name in the Commonwealth and beyond, and it would be equally apropo.

 

[Spartanfan334]

Great job David. I don't think it could be stated any clearer, or any more completely.

Sadly, you can remove the word Pulaski, and insert virtually any school name in the Commonwealth and beyond, and it would be equally apropo.

I know for a fact you can take out pulaski and insert Giles lol