John Grindrod: LCC's removal, NWC sending the wrong message

The day after I learned of Lima Central Catholic's decision to leave the Northwest Conference before it would be ousted by the other nine members of the league, I went to see the Adam Sandler movie “Jack and Jill.”

Really, at the Celina theater, given what was showing, that was the best option for a guy who wanted to take his best girl, Jane, to the movies and dinner. While I enjoyed Sandler's work as a “Saturday Night Live” cast member during his 1991-95 run, despite the commercial success of his films, I really haven't embraced his cinematic efforts despite their grosing more than $100 million.

As a matter of fact, I've often wondered why he ever bothers to change the movie titles, because one comedy pretty much is the same as the other when it comes to getting laughs. You know the formula: a series of rapid-fire jokes, many of which are put-downs; at least one scene where the humor revolves around bodily functions and the noise that sometimes ensues; and a liberal dose of physical comedy, especially pratfalls and other acts that would bring physical pain were it not for the magic of filmmaking.

In other words, pretty predictable stuff, and, for me, about as predictable as the schools representing nine communities in the NWC and their desire to remove a member it just asked to join them in 2006. In terms of school size, travel proximity, and the potential for friendly rivalries for the young people who want to compete in ways that don't involve a math or history book, LCC seemed to fit well.

Of course, the reason I say it was predictable and really only a matter of time before school officials of the league decided to uninvite the T-Birds after just six short years is those boys and girls who go to school just off South Cable Road were winning too doggone much!

And, as predictable as Sandler's bathroom humor, that's just how some folks decide to solve this type of problem. I guess it's much easier to cry competitive imbalance and bemoan the school voucher program, which Ohio has had in place before LCC even joined the conference, than to look for ways to raise the level of their games to wrestle some of those championships away from LCC athletes.

In my 32 years in education, which included both teaching and coaching for almost a third of those years, five of them actually in the Northwest Conference at then-member school Perry and also at Allen East, I've seen the haves and the have-nots. The pendulum swings in any athletic organization, and, at times, it seems as if it has a very long arc when it comes to who's good and who's not and for how long.

During my Perry years in the mid-1970s, we Commodores were the have-nots in both of the revenue sports, boys football and basketball. The pre-eminent football school was Ada, especially when those teams trotted out a couple of running backs by the names of Sterling Brown and Steve Decker. In basketball, through to my years at Allen East in the late 1970s, it was so often the Ray Etzler-coached Crestview teams that were the gold standard.

It doesn't seem all that long ago when I was coaching junior high basketball at Perry that my old friend, John Bean, then the boys varsity basketball coach, used to tell the press who came to interview him so they could write preview articles about the team's chances, “We'll win our share.”

For the Commodores of that time, our share usually meant three or four wins. In football, it was one or two.

But, never once do I remember during our struggles ever discussing any way to rally support from the other NWC have-nots of the time to have Ada or Crestview removed because they were better.

To me, what's happened to LCC is reminiscent of a misguided decision some years ago by the officials of the Little League World Series. You may recall Taiwan was the major force when it came to what team would be hugging in the middle of the diamond at Series' end in Williamsport, Pa. As a matter of fact, Taiwan teams won 17 titles between 1969 and 1996.

In 1974 the misguided solution to dealing with their dominance was to ban all foreign teams from competition. That lasted one year until sanity returned and those officials perhaps realized that keeping someone out because they are successful wasn't nearly as good a solution as focusing more on what American teams needed to do to elevate their game.

You see, when you remove a group or a school for being too successful, you create an artificial environment where for the rest, average takes on the illusion of good and good appears to become great. As far as I'm concerned, that's not much of a lesson to teach children growing up in the other nine NWC communities, is it?

So, now, it's left to LCC and its athletic director, Ron Williams, to forage for scheduling table scraps as an independent in another couple of years when the exit plan is complete, which also happens to be a potential scheduling logistical nightmare, or find a new league, which is extremely difficult. Unlike what's going on in college and its current revolving door of league-jumping schools, high school conferences tend to be far more inclusively traditional. While not impossible, Williams certainly has his work cut out for him.

And as for the Paulding principal and NWC President Todd Harmon not agreeing that LCC was forced out because it left before an eventual ouster, I'm reminded of that old Judge Judy line, “Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining.”