What’s up with the Grimsley football team? Today’s headline in the News and Record reads:“18 ineligible in Grimsley football”.
The article by Robert Bell goes on to say the high number of academically ineligible players contributed to the former coach’s(Todd Shuping) resignation.
Was it really a resignation or was the coach fired? Who is at fault for the problems within the Grimsley Whirlie football program? Is it the coach? Is it the teachers at Grimsley? Is it the parents? Or is it the kids who are victims of a lazy society?
This could kill or ruin Grimsley’s upcoming 2007 fall football program. I am not here to spread doom and gloom and the title of this entry is not meant to make the Grimsley program look bad, but in all honesty we have some problems here and maybe we need to talk about them.
You can read the full details in Tuesday’s sports at News & Record.
One point that I failed to mention above is that there will be a mandatory one hour study hall/tutoring session put in place this fall for all football players.
You must go to the study room at 4pm and work there on your homework until time for practice. I received this news from a Grimsley football parent last weekend.
Could it be the principal who hired the coach under a “just win,baby” mandate? Interesting that both are now gone from Grimsley.
I don’t see any problems here. Grimsley will bounce back and I bet you that they win the conference championship this year in football. The Whirlie boys need to get a break. If the coach and the principal are the ones that messed up then why is everybody riding David Moore’s back so hard. Eighteen players and I predict that all of them including David will be eligible for the first game of the season. Coach Saunders is taking care of business. The only real problem Coach Saunders better keep a close eye is PAGE. I just bet you they are the people that turned us in because they sure couldn’t beat us on the field. Coach Shup owned the Page Pirates, he never lost to them. Page got jealous and they turned on us and blew the whistle and turned us in at least that’s the word going around over at the First Baptist Church Gym. Why would another team try to take us out, why not just be ready and beat us on the field? Grimsley will be ready and the Whirlies will once again be your Metro 4-A conference champs. Our men didn’t cheat and they are not stupid. Watch out for the Whirlies and Coach Saunders, you might want to think twice before you mess with us again.
Jane,
How could Page “turn you in”? Eligibility is completed within a school, by the athletic director or designee. These players were not ineligble when they played the games, so no one is accusing the Whirlies of cheating. However, a Fall athlete has to pass five of six classes in the previous Spring semester in order to be eliglble for the Fall. It’s not the first time a group of football players goofed off in the Spring, skipped classes, and ended up hurting their team. You can’t blame this on Page.
I think you have to blame it on the former coach and the former principal that had the win at any cost mentality. It sounds like they were checking their playbooks and not keeping up with their schoolbooks. The Grimsley parents that have or had kids on this team should be outraged. The Grimsley football players were not getting an education. What are the kids going to do when the games are over and they can’t get a job because they don’t have a high school diploma. Do you see any kids quitting school over this or maybe suing the board of education?
The Grimsley students are old enough to take responsibility for their own actions. The players have to learn to handle the classes even if they don’t have somebody standing over them making sure they are doing their work. This falls at the players feet but it will be a tough pill to swallow if it turns out that they can’t play football this fall.
Coach Shuping and the former principal may well have been negligent in some of their duties but the buck stops in the athletes’ backyard because Coach Shuping is gone and the principal is gone but the players still have to show up for school and practice every day. It’s time to buckle down and get to work.
Grimsley has long been a school with a strong tradition. Mayor Keith Holliday is a Grimsley grad. Rick Dees came out of Grimsley. NFL’er Ethan Allbright is from Grimsley. Grimsley has sent students to the highest levels of learning. Several of the current city council members are graduates of Grimsley and I believe one of them is considering a run for mayor or maybe even governor. All I really know is that Bob Jamieson built a very strong foundation for athletics at Greensboro Grimsley Senior High School and those that have come after him have not maintained the excellence. Something is wrong at Grimsely, I can’t put my finger on it and I don’t think it can be easily fixed. The problems are many and to me the future does not look very promising. What is wrong, I can’t tell you, but the kids that are at Grimsley today don’t stack up to what we saw back when my parents and grandparents went to that school. They need to clean house at Grimsley and get rid of those students who don’t want to play by the academic rules. I thought things were bad at the other schools but this really gets my goat.
The responsibility for this mess belongs to Guilford County School Superintendent Terry Grier. Grier cares more about Athletics than does Academics. Academics will always suffer as long as Grier is in charge. Grier is a numbers man. Move the students on whether they are learning or not. Grier doesn’t care about education, he’s into sports. If you are a coach then you will always have some type of job as long as Grier is around.
As Bear Bryant once said—-I have never seen 3,000 people show up on a Friday night to watch kids take a math test—I think Coach Shuping was on the right track—Win,Win,Win.
“They need to clean house at Grimsley and get rid of those student who don’t want to play by the academic rules.”
Coach Shuping, with the principal’s support, built a winning football team with “those students”.
If you want the glory of Friday night, and trips to championship games, you have to find a way to keep “those students” in your school. Coach Shuping knows that, the former principal understood it, but now they’re gone……..
Page used to get all the good football players. Then Grimsley became the city powerhouse. Who will take over the charge now that Grimsley has lost their coach? Dudley may become the city and county’s most consistant team now that Grimsley and Page both are in the rebuilding mode.
Dudley hasn’t been in trouble yet and hopefully they can keep their program clean. Grimsley and Page failed to do that. I have been reading about Grimsley and Page having problems in the past few seasons but Dudley has been safe and sound.
Grimsley and Page have let their fans down, let’s just hope the Dudley Panthers can stay above the radar and win a state championship in football.
Grimsley made it to the big game 2 seasons ago but did they get there with eligible players? I guess we will never know. With good leaders like Robert Lane and Josh Stewart, what happened to the rest of the Whirlies?
The Page program appears to be in good shape now and Grimsley will bounce back. I’m hearing there is much enthusiasm surrounding the new coach Saunders.
Obviously the coach(Todd S) and the former principal(Rob G) are the ones who screwed up. To be honest, I’m not worried about Grimsley. Who will be coaching at Smith this year?
Now I don’t think this is a problem with coaches, administrators or Terry Grier. What I think you have is a school with a traditionally high standard of academics who expected their players to achieve academic success. Obviously at Grimsley there is not a policy of social promotion because if there was then in my mind would there be a way for eighteen players to be ineligible!
What this situation calls for is an investigation accross the board at the performance of scholar athletes in the classroom because I bet at a lot of schools the players are just shuttled thru the system. Especially at the more close nit suburban schools where the success of the sports teams is an important part of the community fabric and where teachers whom fail athletes can find themselves quite unpopular in the community.
As for if this sours the success the Whirlies found on the field, I would say darn tooten! One cannot hear news such as this and not think otherwise.
Paul Lambeth
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People need to realize the Whirlies may eventually get back all 18 players. Just because you are ineligible in July does not make you ineligible in August
This is nothing that doesnt happen at any other school that doesnt make it right but after Grimsley had an outstanding year they were probably looking at them closer than the other schools that didnt have such a good season but like Jeff said ineligible in July does not make you ineligible in August-they will be riding in the summer school buses that Andy likes so much
TODAY ON FIRST AND 1070 SPORTS-DUSTY DUNN SHOW WITH JIM MODLIN COACH TODD SHUPING-X GRIMSLEY COACH-ANNOUNCED THAT HE WOULD BE ACCEPTING A TEACHING AND COACHING POSITION WITH SOUTHWEST GUILFORD AS LINEBACKERS COACH. HE ALSO CONFIRMED THAT THE NUMBER OF FOOTBALL PLAYERS THAT WERE IN SUMMER SCHOOL WAS 4-NOT THE 18 -THAT WAS REPORTED BY ANONYMOUS SOURCES IN THE N & R. WE WISH TODD WELL AND HE WILL BE ON THE SIDELINES AT THE EAST-WEST GAME AS AN ASSISTANT COACH FOR THE WEST BOYS.
Mr. Modlin, when it comes out (and you know it will come out) that there are more than four Grimsley students in summer school, you will have learned a valuable lesson: Listen to what someone tells you, then verify.
JEFF, YOU WEREN’T THERE. I WASN’T THERE. THE NEWS AND RECORD DAMNED SURE WASN’T THERE. GIVEN THE CHOICES, I CHOOSE TO BELEIVE TODD OVER THE ABOVE MENTIONED. SURE THE TRUTH WILL COME OUT, BUT WHY NOT AT LEAST LET THE PERSON THAT WAS ACTUALLY THERE GIVE HIS SIDE OF THE STORY. EVERY NOW AND THEN THE PEOPLE INVOLVED IN SOMETHING HAVE A LITTLE MORE INSIGHT INTO PEOPLE ON THE OUTSIDE. WERE YOU THERE? MOST LAWYERS LIKE TO ASK A QUESTION WHEN THEY KNOW THE ANSWER-OF COURSE YOU WERE NOT. NEITHER WAS I, BUT ANONYMOUS SOURCES CARRY ZERO WEIGHT WITH ME. AS A BROADCASTER, I ASKED THE RIGHT QUESTION. GOT AN ANSWER FROM THE PERSON THAT WAS THERE. THAT’S WHAT I AM SUPPOSED TO DO. WE REPORT YOU DECIDE OR EVEN BETTER GIVE SOME FACTS THAT YOU HAVE TO SUPPORT YOUR POSITION OR A QUOTE FROM SOMEONE OTHER THAN ANONYMOUS SOURCES. THEN WE’LL COMPARE NOTES. AS USUAL, THE TRUTH IS SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN. I KNOW SOUTHWEST GUILFORD SURE IS GLAD HE’S A COACH THERE.
Best of luck to Coach Shuping!
Grimsley has the coach they wanted – and their former coach has a new job. For all you reporters out there, who’s going to coach Andrews?
AS FAR AS COACHING AT ANDREWS-I HAVEN’T HEARD ANYTHING OF SUBSTANCE AS TO WHO WILL TAKE OVER. FROM VARIOUS COACHES IN THE COUNTY HAVE TOLD ME THAT GETTING COACHES TO COME HERE FROM OTHER AREAS IS DIIFICULT-1.DUE TO THE LACK OF FLEXILBILITY IN PAY I.E.$$$$$ 2. ALSO, THE HOOPS ONE HAS TO JUMP THRU-ATTENDANCE WORK FOR EXAMPLE, MAKES IT DIFFICULT TO DRAW COACHES FROM OUTSIDE THE DISTRICT. STAY TUNED, HOPEFULLY, A GOOD CANDIDATE WILL BE HIRED.
Jim. asking a question doesn’t make you a reporter. It makes you curious. You lobbed a softball question out there, Coach Shuping hit it for extra bases and didn’t try to track down whether it was true or not. I didn’t hear your show. But based on your post, Coach Shupping said there are 4 players who are taking summer school. These anonymous sources you railed against said there are 18. Today’s News & Record quotes the former Grimsley principal as saying there are 4 kids who will not play this year and 17 who are in summer school trying to get their eligibility back. Sounds like the paper was closer to the truth than Coach Shuping was. If the principal was correct, than Coach Shuping was a) not telling you the whole truth or b) really is clueless about his players. I don’t like anonymous sources either. They have their agendas, just as Coach Shuping does. But I think (hope) the NR is smart enough to know that. I’m sure the paper checked it out before running their story, which now appears to be true. If it sounds like I’m criticizing you, I apologize. That’s not my intent. But no mattter where you are “reporting”, be it on the radio or in this blog, you have a responsibility to go after the truth. Giving someone an open mike without verifying whhat they said is true falls short of that. Class dismissed.
The N&R reports that Coach Shuping was reassigned. This lends some credence to the word out of the First Baptist Gym that Coach Saunders was ready to take the Andrews job and Grimsley’s administration made a move to keep him. They found Coach Shuping a job and Andrews is left searching.