Let’s talk Matt Esche from UAB

You're seeing these coaches finally be held accountable for their egregious behavior. They had thought they could get away with it and in fact usually do for many years. They use their authority to gain trust and manipulate impressionable athletes.

steve. the. addict... wrote:

You're seeing these coaches finally be held accountable for their egregious behavior. They had thought they could get away with it and in fact usually do for many years. They use their authority to gain trust and manipulate impressionable athletes.

While I said this, I'll also add that some athletes do in fact have a victim mentality and always blame others for their problems. The athletes need to take at least SOME responsibility for their own problems and also not be complicit if there if abuse occurring.

An internal HR investigation was launched at UAB and through the NCAA. let’s hope he doesn’t job hop to another university without being held accountable.

Because every time something goes up about Matt Esche it’s taken down. This is a serious situation that deserves attention.

Are they going to charge him with human trafficking?

Why are the threads about Esche getting taken down, Letsrun? I posted one earlier this morning that I can't find anymore. Cry "cancel culture" all you want, but clearly the allegations had enough merit that the university found cause to fire him from his job. The running community deserves to know the truth so that he isn't able to continue job-hopping.

Here's the link to the instagram post from alum Marielle Lewis, which has over 10,000 likes and seems to be the driving force behind the petition:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLmmKBLHNT2/

lol nevermind not deleted just didn't show up in search for some reason

I know nothing about this guy, pro or con. still, it has to be challenging to coach in this era.

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

I know nothing about this guy, pro or con. still, it has to be challenging to coach in this era.

That's true for every era when you're ill equipped to be a good coach. Dude coached at Bradley and then UAB, we're not talking the next Mike Smith or Mark Wetmore here.

Ha...Wetmore is married to an athlete he coached while she was in college. Selective judgment.

daveyC wrote:

Ha...Wetmore is married to an athlete he coached while she was in college. Selective judgment.

They didn't marry until she was well out of college. Try again, troll.

Mark Eaton wrote:

They didn't marry until she was well out of college. Try again, troll.

Oh course not! In college the grooming and secret dating process was still in full effect.

Anyway, my point was we're not talking about the loss of some outstanding coach who would be developing champions in any plausible future. He wasn't building the next NAU at UAB.

This is an interesting case because he has athletes at two different schools saying he did bad stuff, but because a lot of the information went on social media, UAB dealt with it before it got too much national attention. and there aren't articles about it (that I've seen) like there have been with some of these cases in the past it'll be harder to look up down the road. So Matt Esche could very well get hired by another institution in the future, just like others have, if UAB doesn't pass this information along. (Or if the AD just doesn't think that any of it is enough that matters.) He resigned under pressure. He didn't get fired.

This case also has to strike fear into a fair number of NCAA coaches who have been less than professional at times (not excusing any of it, just saying it happens...a lot) as it'.s further evidence of the growing voice student athletes have.

Interesting that Marc Burns comes up in both the letter from the Bradley athletes and in this piece

https://www.theprosiest.com/post/abusive-coaching-in-collegiate-athletics

He was the head coach when Esche was the assistant. He only has athletes at one school criticizing his methods. Maybe he learned something and has done better at Mizzou?

The blog post doesn't mention Burns by name, but the letter does. "Both Esche and Burns demonstrated psychological abuse that extended beyond body shaming and fat-phobia." And so on.

Some of you want athletes to be given second and third chances yet you would rather destroy another human's ability to earn a living without the possibility of him changing. I do not have the info to tell whether these are valid complaints. It doesn't look good, however, when students from 2 schools are saying similar things. Sometimes it is difficult to tell the truth when there is so much pride in victimhood. It seems as if you are treated better when you whine and complain and are incorrectly overhyped as some here. That is a mighty low standard for hero.

I imagine these sort of accusations will only increase over the years when people realize it is a path to popularity and a way to get back at someone.

Body composition is a huge part of athletics. Unfortunately, many coaches do not handle it properly. So often neither do nutritionists at schools.

Crazy train continues!

Sure there are some bad people and coaches but all it really takes these days is for one messed up kid to become angry and vigilant then blame their own problems on the coach because they "put their trust in the coach." Coaching is difficult and the results vary for each individual. We have to separate abuse from using the coach as an excuse for the athletes own personal problems.

That's why this case likely strikes fear into the hearts of some coaches. But this was not just one angry runner. It was 14 athletes going to the AD.

14 angry athletes over many years. This thread was started by one of them. Ironically, one of these girls came from UTC, where she was part of the undoing of the coach there. So maybe the leaders of the lynch mob have a few things in common?

Lesson learned, don't bring athletes on your team that dismantled the coach at the previous institution.