There was a nice little editorial in the L.A. Times this morning about Bob Weinberg, Principal of the Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies. Seems the varsity baseball team of SOCES decided to no-show the last 2 games of the season, seeing as how they were 7-0 at that point, and had already clinched a City Section playoff berth. A number of the students decided that they would rather go to parties than play the last two “meaningless” games. CES had to forfeit the games. After consulting with the coach, Principal Weinberg forfeited the school’s playoff berth.
“Kids need to know that they have to give 110%,” Principal Weinberg said, “whether it’s a team, business, or family. You can’t go 80% and say, ‘Ok, I’m going to coast now and not even bother to show up.’”
It hit the sports page when pissed parents/students complained about the forfeit. Sports reporters always look into the causes of forfeits, especially City Sectionals and such.
Those players who forced the team to no-show* showed great disrespect to people who love the game of baseball and athletic competition in general (whether someone competes to win or just to have fun). I can imagine that the students who didn’t make the team would be pretty pissed.
On that thought, it would have been nice to see the school suspend the team and draft new players to finish off the season and/or compete in the playoffs. Unfortunately, I’m sure there are league rules which would have made that idea impossible.
I’d like to assume that at least some of the players on the team wanted to play, but if they showed up with too few players, the games would still have been forfeit. And, what with peer pressure the way it is, especially on sports teams, those players could easily have become targets of abuse by the spoil-sports.