The past week’s Sports Illustrated cover story was “Homeless Athletes.” I don’t know the authors’ intent for sure and I am pretty sure that they wanted to create attention around a problem to cause something good to happen.

There is nothing new or exceptional about this problem. It has been that way since I began coaching which was a long time ago. (54 yrs. ago for those counting.) It has never been a headline news story until now. Does it have anything to do with the fact that the athlete on the cover will probably be a millionaire pro player in the very near future? What about those that can’t run fast and jump high?

I recruited a young man in Philadelphia back in the day that lived in a shack with a dirt floor. Lucky kid, he had a place to sleep. I was in the one bedroom apartment in San Francisco where this 6’8” 225 lb. player lived with eight other people. Lucky guy. Oh, and the entry way was in an alley lined with, you have it, homeless.

My point is that these kids were always a heartbeat away from sleeping on the street, and “three squares” was a foreign concept. There are a variety of scenarios of the homeless and hungry theme, none of which are good. And, they need to be in school bright and shining come Monday morning.

So they get to school. Have you ever been REALLY hungry? Do you think that hungry person is interested in English, math or science when he or she doesn’t know if there will be a meal or a place to sleep today? The usual outcome is that they are labeled a bad student, incapable of learning and pushed through the system. That is the ROCK.

Some are talented enough as athletes to get into college, given a chance for at an education and a good life. Oops! I forgot that many of them can’t read, and that of course makes it a little tough to do well in college. It’s very tough to get a job you would really want with 6th grade reading ability. That’s the HARD PLACE. Too many end up back in the neighborhood, standing on that same old corner.

If we promise them a dream we need to do two things; hold them to the prescribed standards and make sure we provide them the tools to achieve those standards no matter what it takes. You can’t fight the bear with a willow switch.

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