Junior Year Box Set

“That was on my to-do list,” Coach Hope said. “It reminds me, though, that a couple of the players were homeschooled. Johan Bauer’s a junior, and Derek Hofmann’s a sophomore. Roc and Milo are both freshmen, so they should be fine. I’ll have Ms. Jaroslav look into the NCAA guidelines to see what needs to be done in that situation.”

Coach Zoon wrote it down; I knew who Coach Hope expected to delegate that task to.

“Did Coach Mason give you a breakdown of what he told us?” I asked.

“Yeah, he was pretty funny. He said he expected that you’d remember it all, but you were a kid,” Coach Hope said.

I didn’t react, which made Coach Zoon grin. He knew the ‘kid’ remark would irritate me.

“I thought we would do the same thing we did last year,” Coach Hope continued. “I’ll have the trainers put together individualized programs for both nutritional and weight-and-conditioning programs. There was a lot of improvement over last year.”

“I agree, but we need to tweak it,” I said.

“What do you mean?” Coach Zoon said.

“The best example I can give you is that Jim isn’t nearly big enough to play at Alabama. He needs to put on forty to fifty pounds of muscle without losing any flexibility or speed. He was lucky that Bo knew him, and recommended that Alabama look at him. Based on Jim’s weight, they probably wouldn’t have recruited him otherwise. There are a lot of high school left tackles who are three-hundred-pounders already. I believe we played against several of them.

“I want to see Jim succeed. If we contact Alabama, I’m sure they’ll help us with a plan to get him ready. They’re one of a handful of college programs that have the best offensive lines each year. What we learn from that could be used with the rest of our offensive line. Can you imagine what we could do if next year’s offensive line packed on even twenty pounds of muscle?” I asked.

“Yes. We got everyone into great shape, but no one blew up in terms of size.”

I kept my mouth shut because last year’s ass-hats had done just that. The only problem was they did it the illegal way.

“What else?” Coach Zoon asked.

“I suggest there are specific skills that need to be worked on. Overall team speed is never a bad thing. Can you imagine if Ty were faster? He might be able to catch me,” I said with a grin. “Being able to jump would help the receivers. Right now, we rely on Wolf’s height. Imagine if he were able to jump just a few inches higher. We’d never have to worry about someone getting high enough to stop him in the back of the end zone.”

“I see where you’re going with all this. Let me work with the trainers and the rest of the coaches. I’ll call Coaches Harrington and Mason and get their input. We should have everything we need equipment-wise with the new Field House and weight room. It’s just a matter of putting together a training program. We’ll sit down with each player after the season and get them on individualized programs while you go play in LA,” Coach Hope said.

“I’m sure all I’ll be doing is sipping cocktails poolside while I’m away. If you want, I can send you some pictures,” I teased.

“Get out of here. I might have to make an example of you and your smart mouth, and make you pull from the punishment jar,” Coach Hope said.

“By the way, I changed all the punishments to going out on a date with Cassidy,” Coach Zoon added.

I started to say something but thought better of it; I might actually want to attend practice tonight. Then I stopped as something struck me. I turned around, and both coaches wore curious looks as to what I might have to say.

“You already had all this figured out, didn’t you?” I asked.

Both coaches smiled, and Coach Zoon nodded.

“David, something you have to learn is to listen to your men. You want their buy-in. But you did add to what I’d already planned,” Coach Hope said. “You reminded me to look into the homeschooled players’ transcripts. I was focused on football, not eligibility. You also brought up an excellent point about bulking up. I agree, a call to Alabama is a good start. We want to do it right so that we add the weight the right way.

“I also like that you’re proactive. I planned to attack this at the start of the year. You’re right in pointing out that a lot of development can happen in a month. I’ll make sure I get everyone together after the season and have a brainstorming session like the one we did when we set all this up. I might even throw you under the bus once or twice and tell them something is your idea if they don’t come up with it themselves. That way it’ll come from a fellow teammate, instead of the coaches.”

I thought about what he’d just said, and could see where he was right. Teens didn’t like to be told to do anything. If they all worked together to come up with the ideas, we should be more successful.

“That’s fine, Coach. If they get out of line, tell them I said Cassidy’d make sure they get with the program.”