WHAT: New Jersey dad sues son’s high school track coach, AD and school district for $40M!!!
WHY: His son was cut from the track team due to excessive unexcused absences. The dad disagreed with the coach on what distances the student-athlete should run and was upset about the loss of potential scholarship opportunities.
LESSONS FOR SPORTS PARENTS: Support, don’t coach. The coach’s role is to set standards for “all” the team to follow and when those standards are broken there are consequences. The coach determines what distances an athlete should run or position an athlete should play based on…..what is best for the team – this decision is not based on what is best for your child. It is not the role of a football-parent to instruct the coach on where to play their son. Parents need to take a step back and understand how counterproductive it is to fight a coach like this – it damages team morale, confuses the student-athlete and divides loyalty, and causes the athlete to lose confidence in his coach.
Suing a high school coach, making a couple thousand in a season stipend, for $40M is probably not the answer or lesson a football parent should deliver to their student-athlete.
