High School Football At It's Best and Worst

Sports is a big part of our culture so you figure it's probably not that hard to get on TV being an athlete. Try being a high school athlete or even younger and making national news. Sometimes though it's not always a good thing.

Let's start with the good thing though. Everyone loves hearing a good story. Well if you haven't caught the middle school football play heard around the world click here. (You can thank me later for catching you up with the times) This middle school coach not only put himself on the map but did his team and "star" quarterback. This kid will never have a problem getting a date to the middle school dance or the movies.

This play is so far beyond what has really ever been done, it just blows peoples mind. No wonder it made national news. The timing, the practice, the guts to call it are genius. I couldn't imagine even being able to come up with such an amazing play. Hat's off middle school coach Art Rodriguez for not only getting your 15 minutes of fame, but for providing your quarterback Jason Garza the most memorable moment probably of his life.

Now usually you don't hear of the plays that don't work, unless they are pretty bad. Well here is one of those cases. Yes a coach put his team, his "star" player and himself on the map, but not exactly the same affect as the play of the year nomination above.

Alright take a minute and check this video out so you know what I am talking about.

This play was used during a 2 pt conversion try. Clearly it didn't really have much of a chance to work because you can see flags raining before the ball is even put in play. I'm not really sure at what point of the game this is attempted or what the score was at that point. Sorry. Anyways...

The creativity factor is there. It kind of reminded me of the play back in the day of the basketball player getting on his knee's and barking. Remember that? Don't worry if you didn't I have your back. Click here to see what I am talking about.

Now I know the barking play is different and more similar as the first play because it worked and was used at a little more crucial time, but it was attempted to distract the players and I'm pretty sure it does, maybe a little. The referee's though were not fooled.

The player doing all the flips was the place kicker, and probably the only male cheerleader on his high school cheer-leading team. He will surely enjoy his 15 minutes of fame and will probably get into some college as a cheer-leader and maybe even go down in the Guinness Book of Records for most hand flips in an actual football game, not a time-out or halftime show.

To me the most interesting part of this play is what came of it. They were flagged obviously as you can see, but the player was ejected from the game, and so was the coach. I'm not sure why they would get ejected. I think the referee was just jealous a place kicker was more athletic then he will ever be.

The place kicker Cam Haas was ejected for excessive celebration. Is it really celebrating if you are not celebrating anything? As for the coach. It is reported from GoBlueRidge.net that coach Tim Pruitt "was banned because of an additional unsportsmanlike penalty assessed for an inappropriate comment from a Watauga assistant coach." Well I guess that one kind of makes sense.

All in all you have to love the creativity and the purity that high school sports still is. When you hear several reports of college athletes getting paid, and cheating hopefully it stays out of the high school game. In high school and most college's it's nice to see a game played where it's purely on emotion and desire to be the best, not to be the best to get paid the best.

Thanks for checking in. Would love to hear your feedback and comments.