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Reply to "Time To End Grieving. Reset."

I’m afraid you’ve lost me, Josh.  I’ve enjoyed a lot of your content, but you’ve lost a fan today. Don’t fret. I’m nobody. We’ll both live.

“In my interview with Dr. Parker, there was a common theme that rang loud and clear. In full transparency, the President of Junior College Athletics said, “The benefit [of extended eligibility] is only to the student-athletes that are on our rosters now.” This was the light-bulb moment for me. I can’t blame the guy for feeding his kids before mine. That’s his job. He’s making decisions in the best interest of the community he’s been elected to protect.”

In reading your latest blog, a couple things REALLY resonated with me.  For starters, you misquoted Dr. Parker.  Here is what he actually said about the decision.  â€śThis was completely made to support the student athlete.”

Attached is a response from me on 10/28 to your post about the interview with Dr. Parker. Perhaps it’s was done subconsciously, but your recent recollection of Dr. Parker’s quote aligns better with my post than with what Parker actually said.  With all due respect, if you’re going to quote someone, it’s best practice to actually quote them without taking any liberties or allowing other contributors’ thoughts to augment what was actually said.

Having said all that, I can appreciate your point of focusing on what can be done/solutions. That’s always good advice.

Focusing on solutions is virtuous and practical, but calling a spade, a spade and examining historical failures and short-sighted solutions still has some value.  That is, if better, more holistic decisions are to be made in the future.  No, you can’t blame Parker for feeding his kids before yours. But there are a couple inescapable truths in play here. If Parker has kids to feed right now A) they’ll be out of the house (and should be) VERY soon and B) he’s got more buns already in the oven (like my kid - signed JUCO LOI last week).  Yes, he’s happy to see cells dividing right now in the womb and they’ll be his kids very soon. He just seemingly doesn’t want to take any responsibility for those pregnancies until he has to.  We can keep the kids analogy going all day if you’d like. The buns are in the oven and just like his current kids, they’re going to need a nursery. A room. A bed. Food. See Maslow for the rest.  His current student athletes are both finite and temporary.

Covid has ravaged college athletics. It’s ravaged a lot of things obviously. But I think I can speak for many when I say that the decisions being made could have at least attempted to spread the pain AND wealth across a larger group of student athletes. In other words, everybody gives up a little so the fewest possible suffer.

In terms of simply putting the grief behind us?  Too soon, Josh. Know ALL your audience.  There are lots of uncommitted 2021s, 2022s, etc that will never receive an offer thanks in part to the decisions being made right now. We’re likely a couple weeks away from lots of cuts on campuses and broken hearts flooding the transfer portal again. One way or another, carnage is coming because there will be 3 “freshmen” classes on campus next fall.

You’re free to feel how you want, but I’m not sure everyone saw the same transparency from Dr. Parker that you did. See my attachment below for more detail on that.

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