re: LHSAA votes - how will it go?

So what purpose does it serve the Select schools to stay in the LHSAA?

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good

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Well I guess we know who likes participation trophies.

Even if my team loses, I’d prefer losing badly against the best than win against weak competition

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So what purpose does it serve the Select schools to stay in the LHSAA?

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Having enough opponents to fill out a schedule. Especially for rural private schools who don't want to have to drive hours away for district games.

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For the life of me I can’t understand why people think the split is unfair.

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Let me guess.. you think only private schools recruit ? and that all school systems have the same attendance rules ?

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No, he likes a level playing field. For the life of me I can’t understand why people think the split is unfair.

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I’m not sure fit unfair is the right word. I just think it is harmful to athletics and athletes as a whole. If your only goal is to have the best chance of winning a state championship and getting a trophy, then I guess it is fair. But if the higher goal is to develop strong athletes, then the split does not give the majority of schools appropriate competition to do that.

In a state the size of Louisiana, being one of 12 state champions in football it’s just not as much of an honor as it used to be. And in some select divisions, where there are only 10 or 11 schools going to the playoffs, all it takes is one win to make it to the semi-finals.

Being in the playoffs used to be an honor and something that you worked for. I remember when in baseball, making it to Sulphur was the goal that every team had. Now 48 teams go to Sulphur. It’s absurd.

Just curious as to what people think about this. If Bonine legitimately wants the split to end, and public schools are still saying that recruiting is the biggest issue, would it not benefit Bonine to spend the next year doing everything he can to crack down on any and every recruiting violation? I know that takes a lot of time and effort, and it’s often easier said than done, but it seems like that would be a start with respect to appeasing public schools?

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I’m not sure fit unfair is the right word. I just think it is harmful to athletics and athletes as a whole. If your only goal is to have the best chance of winning a state championship and getting a trophy, then I guess it is fair. But if the higher goal is to develop strong athletes, then the split does not give the majority of schools appropriate competition to do that.

In a state the size of Louisiana, being one of 12 state champions in football it’s just not as much of an honor as it used to be. And in some select divisions, where there are only 10 or 11 schools going to the playoffs, all it takes is one win to make it to the semi-finals.

Being in the playoffs used to be an honor and something that you worked for. I remember when in baseball, making it to Sulphur was the goal that every team had. Now 48 teams go to Sulphur. It’s absurd.

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there was an argument to be made that 5 classes was still too much (in football anyway)

let alone 9

or 12

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If Bonine legitimately wants the split to end, and public schools are still saying that recruiting is the biggest issue, would it not benefit Bonine to spend the next year doing everything he can to crack down on any and every recruiting violation? I know that takes a lot of time and effort, and it’s often easier said than done, but it seems like that would be a start with respect to appeasing public schools?

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I think it's more than that. It seems like there is not only a huge mistrust, but also, a lot of the public principals flat-out HATE the privates. I don't know if it's a liberal vs conservative, or poor vs rich, or what it is. Maybe all of the above.

The problem is, there aren't bagmen in high schools. You don't have Nike and Adidas funneling money to kids. It's a lot more down-low.

It's the things like diversity scholarships that always seem to go to athletes. Gatorade funds (expenses are recorded on the ledger as buying gatorade, but really it's going to cover tuition loan payments). Rich families "just doing the Lord's work and helping" poor families afford private school tuition, "to help these kids out of bad situations" yet again, all that generosity only seems to apply if the kid runs a 4.45 40 time.

Any real solution isn't going to come by tightening the screws on the select schools. It's only going to come by relaxing the rules for everyone. Quit being stupid and admit that recruiting happens EVERYWHERE. So, just try to regulate it. Remove all attendance zones. Only let X number of kids get athletic scholarships, and really define what that is. Start classifying teams by ability and success, not by student body size.

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You think it’s unfair?

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It’s unfair to the kids, that they are not being prepared to compete against the best. Instead they are being forced to play playoff games vs teams with losing records all because the principals who vote have an ”Everyone deserves a trophy mentality”

5 classes IS too much, for publics in LA
4 divisions IS too much, for privates in LA

The actual fix is to drop from 5 public classifications to 4 & from 4 divisions to 2.

That forces everyone to make a choice regarding how they want to progress or regress their school size + focus on or off of athletics.