When adults literally kill the game for kids

It’s been about 20 years since I last coached youth league football and when people ask me why I stopped, the answer is simple: Too many fathers, uncles, older cousins, and “friends of the family” acting like jackasses in the stands and on the sidelines of Pee Wee (age 10-11) football games.

I got to reminiscing about my own coaching days this past weekend when I read that Mike Hickmon (above), a Dallas, Texas area youth coach, was shot and killed by Yaqub Talib—brother of former NFL star Aqib Talib—following a verbal altercation during a 9-under league game.

Rest in peace, Coach Hickmon ❤…

So, I remember one incident late in my last season of coaching when a dad was heckling our coaching staff the whole first half of a game because we weren’t playing his 10-year-old son.

You see, the child’s mother had told us that he had been goofing off in class and wasn’t getting his work done, so our decision as coaches to not start him was done as a form of discipline. While the mother was pleased, and the child understood, the father was pissed and kept heckling—until I finally had enough and while walking towards him, I loudly exclaimed “if you spent more time staying on your son about his school work than standing around talking shit at Pee Wee practices and games, perhaps he wouldn’t be sitting on the bench right now!”

Well, the dad didn’t like what I had to say—I didn’t care—and it took several onlookers and coaches to keep us from fisticuffs right then and there. 

That was 2003…

Now, in 2022, fools are out here shooting volunteer coaches over matters that don’t hardly rise to the level of needing deadly force. 

Sigh…

Here’s hoping that justice is served in this matter for Coach Hickmon and his family—and my prayers are with all of the children and onlookers who will remember seeing a good man shot and killed for nothing until their own last days…

Trump-FBI Fallout 

Last week’s FBI raid at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home means different things to different people, much the same as any court case or controversy; as Americans, we are endowed with First Amendment rights to criticize anyone so long as it doesn’t break any slander or libel laws in the process. Meaning, in this instance, if you believe that the FBI raid was politically motivated, such is your prerogative to hold that viewpoint. Conversely, if you believe that the FBI raid was warranted based upon the search warrant information released so far, such, too, is your prerogative.

But divergent viewpoints on a case or controversy should NEVER lead to death threats against the law enforcing personnel that are doing their duties to investigate crimes. I remind of this very simple point because I find it hypocritical that many of the same conservatives who called former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick a “traitor” (and worse) because he kneeled in protest of police brutality, are the main ones now calling to “Defund the FBI” while threatening to blow up FBI field offices (and attack bureau agents) after the lawfully allowed raid on Trump’s home. 

Again, we are all endowed with the right to agree or disagree with the investigations into all or part of Trump’s legal battles, but those folks who are taking literal aim at the FBI are hypocrites, cowards, and traitors who deserve to be locked up for fomenting anarchy! 

Tempus Fugit (Time Flies)

Nine years ago today, I had the honor of meeting Civil Rights legend Julian Bond, Morehouse College Class of ’71, after he spoke to the “Dream Defenders,” a group of local college students who peacefully occupied Florida’s Capitol Complex for over a month in protest of the Trayvon Martin verdict and the state’s Stand Your Ground law.

As a member of the Morehouse Class of ’94, I waited anxiously for an opportunity to converse with Brother Bond—and was blessed to soak up his wisdom and graciousness for a few minutes. 

Brother Bond passed away exactly two years after we met, on August 15, 2015, but the “ties that bind” one generation of Morehouse Men to the next will remain “true forever…”

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Chuck Hobbs is a freelance journalist who won the 2010 Florida Bar Media Award and has been twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary.