Why I’m Here ~ Wrapping up the OVFL season

As most of you know I’ve been with the Etobicoke Eagles in some capacity or another since 2003.

We’ve won COMFL, house league and OVFL titles in that time, at various age levels.

This year, we did a LOT better than I expected, honestly.

Then, we ran into a buzzsaw named the Cumberland Panthers in the Rogers Centre last weekend in the Conference finals, and they chewed us up and spit us out. Full credit to them, a great team with a great gameplan, good luck to them in the OVFL finals.

But more importantly than all that, our Eagles kids proved to me that they had grown up this year, and those returning veterans that I (and other people) had some concerns about, showed that if you believe in each other, you can accomplish great things on the football field, and you can carry those lessons forward in your entire life, off the field.

Taking a step back from my ‘football GM’ role, from the point of view of a teacher, and a coach, there were some stories in the 2010 Eagles that might go untold, but that will probably prove to be more important to the young men involved than all the OVFL championships combined.

The power of this sport is its power to unite a group of people, from different backgrounds, under one goal or vision. That is the power of ALL team sports.

We read and see a LOT of negativity about the OVFL, OFC, SCOFL, OMFL, COMFL, whatever alphabet soup league is on the front burner in any given time period.

People say “The League does ‘this that and the other’ to keep teams/people down, or to elevate others for their own interests.”.

People blame coaches, governors, managers, owners and even other players/parents for the adversity faced by their own teams.

Heck, I’ve been there, and I understand. In 2006, when we won an OVFL championship, I was suspended from the OVFL twice before the season was 3 weeks old (I was reinstated without ever actually serving suspensions). We were fined, we were falsely accused, we ‘stuck it to the man’, and we ‘raged against the machine’.

Did all that help our team to win a championship? It’s entirely possible.

But part of the beauty of our ‘club ball’ world here in Ontario – League executives change, team ‘people’ change, players and the ‘players’ involved go in cycles. We control, to a large extent, who is involved with ‘our’ leagues, through annual meetings, elections, etc.

If you dislike it, you can effect a change. It may not seem like it at times, but there does exist democracy in the ‘small world’ of this sport.

You may want to call ‘BS’ because my Eagles seem like one of the ‘haves’ in the League right now. But if you have been around for the past five years, you KNOW where we started from, and you darn sure KNOW we have worked hard to get where we are at.

I’m sure ‘making it personal’ is high on the list of motivating factors for teams – I know it was for our guys – but I think that that eventually rings hollow, and is a sign of a lack of foresight and long-term vision – because eventually you’re at the top and the other teams are ‘aiming’ for you.

For me, all of that is not why you should be involved in this game at this level.

And aside from a preamble, it is beside the point of this post.

For me, the ENTIRE reason why we do this is summer up in a short (yeah right, I know) story about our loss last weekend.

We got beat, plain and simple, first and foremost.
OCP is a very good team and I am happy for them, and wish them luck. I think on their ‘home field’ in Ottawa, they will be hard to beat in the championship. That should be a heck of a game.

We had 3 OVFL JV players who had been practicing with the Varsity squad all weak as ‘scout teamers’ come to the game to help out. They ran water, did a 50/50 draw, and basically helped me with whatever I needed. Their day sucked, basically. They’d been tackling dummies all week, it was CRAZY hot, we were behind for basically the whole game, and they did the ‘grunt work’, they had no reason to really care when it was all said and done.

But one of them really stood out to me, and renewed my faith in why ALL of us adults are involved, or why we SHOULD be involved, in all of this ‘child’s play’.

We had our post game love-in after the loss. Thanking ‘graduating’ veterans, hugging it out, etc. Tears flowed, handshakes were exchanged, etc etc etc

Two of these JVs are sitting just outside the locker room, texting, eating snacks, asking for Bills game tickets – doing what I’d probably have been doing – teenager stuff that you do when you’re not personally involved.

But this one kid – this kid is standing beside our head coach in the post game, and absolutely HANGING on every word he says. He is fully engaged in everything the team is doing. It isn’t even ‘his’ team, and here he is clapping, cheering – straight BUYING IN to everything.

– Now, having taught high school, I can tell you when a teenager is ‘engaged’ in what is happening. It’s generally the opposite of when they are sitting in my English class –

This kid is absolutely INTO everything.

The Varsity team does ‘one last breakdown’, and the other two JVs are getting donuts and juices, and this kid is in the MIDDLE of about 10,000lbs of dirty, sweaty Varsity team players, breaking it down with the rest of them.

You tell me if this kid cares what the ‘league executive’ has been doing all year, or if he even really cares about which league the team plays in.

I’d bet every dollar I have that this type of kid would treat an OVFL, OMFL, OFC, CJFL, CFL or NFL experience the same.

I’ll bet every dollar I have that this kid is back playing Eagles football next year, and that he is in the CIS in a few years.

In every locker room, on every team, in every league, this kid exists. This kid has bought in to the Eagles ‘way’, just like he’s bought into the ‘Essex Ravens way’, or the ‘Sudbury Gladiators’ way or the ‘Burlington Stampeders’, ‘Toronto Argonauts’, ‘Detroit Lions’ or ‘NY JETS’ way.

This kid is why we are here, and this kid makes all the other ‘stuff’ you’ve put up with manageable, every season.

Win or lose, whether you’re a ‘have’ or a ‘have not’ – understand that this type of kid is what you’re here for, and why you need to keep doing what you’re doing, to ensure that this kid has a chance to play this great game, somewhere, every year.

Good luck to OCP and the Essex Ravens in the OVFL championship.