HS Coach With Letsrun Ties Fired Over Runners Running With Their Shirts Off

Toolbags.

What kind of mileage were these kids putting in under Davis to see such improvement?

"The reality is, I strongly disagree with what they were trying to enforce, and strongly disagree with the way they went about enforcing it. Am I supposed to be a puppet and bow down to the demands? A lot of people would say yes, but I disagree."

After reading the above quote, it's easy to understand why the administration weren't fans. And let's be honest, if you have issues that need resolving with your boss, you don't email him and wait for a reply, you go see him, man to man.

That being said, as an AD, you still don't berate players and coaches in front of others. It's so classless and proves that the incident pushing a student may not be a one time occurrence.

So, while I think the way the firing was handled was shenanigans, this entire thing is the result of an inexperienced pompous coach meets old school pompous AD. In this case, I expect more class from the AD.

BillCarr wrote:

To clear it up concerning Jessica Barton, the confusion stems from whether a MA Division I title is considered a "title" or it must be a MA All-Division title. If you include both meets, relays and individual, plus the two XC titles, you get 12. If you want to consider getting a 4x800 title at the Division I state level and the All-State level in the same year double counting, fine, but she is still probably the #2 distance female ever from Newton North HS.

Back to the topic, I think Coach Davis should just walk away from this one, and seek other employment. Let the situation be a learning lesson, even if the AD is a jerk. Know when to fold 'em.

Emass titles in the spring are not state titles, unless emass is a State?

Looking back, she is a 3 time (xc, track) individual State Champion, and 1 time State Relay champion, 4, 12 what's the difference, somebody's stretching the truth here, what do you want to believe?

Tom,

Be careful. Future employers, i.e. law firms, will google you. Is this what you want?

Having read all of this, I now find myself aghast at the Scylla and Charybdis situation the Westwood kids have faced to this point: a violently combative and socially retarded A.D. on one side and a deluded narcissistic coach on the other. It's been clear from the beginning that the A.D. is almost a caricature of an unfit employee, but it's become just as clear that a coach who cannot distinguish truth from fiction (I'm convinced he's not lying for the most part, he's confabulating) should not be working with kids. If my coach had gone online and called rival coaches ignorant, I'd be embarrassed to show up to meets, knowing what others knew about our program.

I like the nice juxtaposition of Mr. Davis calling himself a keen lifelong student of the sport while railing on about his own stupid rookie dietary mistakes before his basically-2:27-coulda-been-2:20 marathon in 2:31-something, all while assuring whoever was listening that he really hadn't trained for this "training run." The kids who think Mr. Davis is a great coach remind me of the people who do their first marathon at some shit event in 80-degree heat with 20,000 other joggers after training the run/walk way and crow about how great the marathon and coach were, oblivious to the fact that only their novice frame of reference has led them to say these things.

Joe Garland wrote:From this, largely from Davis himself, it seems that he disagreed with the policy and decided he was going to ignore it.

He's told that members of the girls teams don't like it. Instead of saying, "guys, some of the girls object so let's suck it up and keep the shirts on" he does nothing because, presumably, he doesn't care what the girls think..

Sorry, what? Where are you getting that? He told them they had to wear a shirt or risk being kicked off the team. This thread is already bad enough without you deciding to just make up your own information for the fun of it.

well, it's obviously NOT the real reason he was fired, is it? There was some other underlying reason - there always is.

I guess you missed this quote?

"The reality is, I strongly disagree with what they were trying to enforce, and strongly disagree with the way they went about enforcing it. Am I supposed to be a puppet and bow down to the demands? A lot of people would say yes, but I disagree."

Then he himself threw the girls under the bus on the news. So I guess then he doesn't care what the girls thought.

He got what he wanted anyways...

Where am I getting that? Let's start with the article, which quotes Davis: "A few weeks ago, the school expressed to me that a few girls on the track team were uncomfortable that some of the boys were running shirtless," Davis said. "A week later, (Fogel) confronted another student for having a shirt off after coming back from a run. After that confrontation, I emailed (Fogel), saying we need to discuss the issue."

So we know that he was told that "a few girls on the track team were uncomfortable." A week later, he says, one of his runners did not have his shirt on. So from these two facts, from Davis's mouth, I infer that he either did not tell them to keep their shirts on or that he did tell them and they ignored him. Given that it happened, again according to Davis, twice more creates the inference, at least to me, that he did not tell them to keep their shirts on. He admits it. Instead of telling them that he says that they might be kicked off the team if they did and he only does that after the second incident, so he presumably did not do it before then (or he would have said so in this article).

Presumably you think I "made up" the following, which you quote (the other part of the quotation being what he said), "Instead of saying, 'guys, some of the girls object so let's suck it up and keep the shirts on' he does nothing because, presumably, he doesn't care what the girls think." Fair enough. I "made that up." It is, however, something that I inferred from the other facts. If he did not tell them -- he's the coach and, from my experience, what the coach says is the law -- it must be that he doesn't care about what "some of the girls" think.

As I say, the alternative is that he told his runners that they had to keep their shirts on and they ignored him not once, not twice, but three times. But, again, this doesn't work because he admits he only told them they might be thrown off the team if they took their shirts off after the second incident. Had it been otherwise wouldn't he have said in the article that he had said something to his team before then?

But then you must factor into Davis's more recent statement,

which suggests that he ignored the policy (beyond tellng the kids that they might be thrown off the team) since he says disagreed with the policy and refused to be a "puppet and bow down to the demands."

People can read the article, draw their own conclusions. To me, though, it added information that was not on this thread earlier.

The way he looks as this story goes on has a classic tom davis trajectory, looks good at first then the more you see (or the more he talks) the worse it gets. Least he's consistent.

Newport Richie wrote:

I like the nice juxtaposition of Mr. Davis calling himself a keen lifelong student of the sport while railing on about his own stupid rookie dietary mistakes before his basically-2:27-coulda-been-2:20 marathon in 2:31-something, all while assuring whoever was listening that he really hadn't trained for this "training run."

this is what he was up to 8 weeks before the 2:31 aka "2:27" at Cape Cod:

"In the men's division it was 23-year-old Peabody resident Tom Davis who ran away with the crown, finishing with a time of 15:50.

Davis also felt good in the heat, especially considering the fact that he ran 20 miles in a workout earlier in the day.

"It was a tough race course, much tougher than I thought," Davis said. "I ran 20 miles earlier today so my plan was to give it all that I had left.

"It felt good crossing the finish line," Davis said. "But I have ran about 120 miles this week so I'm tired."

I'd say he was training for something last fall, if not a marathon then who knows what. Hard to figure why else you'd be doing a 20 miler/5k road race double on a Thursday at the end of the summer.

The quote from the Westwood patch article shows that he hasn't found a lawyer yet. If he had the lawyer most certainly would have put a muzzle on him. He could get a nice chunk of change from Westwood if he plays his cards right but that kind of blabbing does him no favors.

Wonder what mom and dad think of all this...

Tommy Boy isn't exactly "making excellent happen."

do they let you cover the course in the olympic trials?

Tom did the right thing by standing up for his kids. If you can't see that, then you simply don't understand the entire situation, or you have a serious personal problem with Tom that you should address with him personally.

I think the girls team should show support and run shirtless!

snarkfest wrote:

Wonder what mom and dad think of all this...

http://www.newbalance.com/company/leadership/jim-davis/http://www.newbalance.com/company/leadership/anne-davis/

Tommy Boy isn't exactly "making excellent happen."

What is with all these letsrun cats born into privilege and walking around with a chip on their shoulder?

Like the brojos, and as the saying goes, they're "born on third base and think they hit a triple."

While I dont agree with how things were handled, TD is showing himself to be a clown, like we knew he was. Neither the AD or the coach represent the school well IMO.

No one comes out looking good in this one, probably good for the kids in the long run.