Working for Dr. Pepper distributor is not against the rules. Getting paid for teaching baseball is.

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Never seen such a group of holier than thous (yes I am referring to several on this board).

The letter of the law is obviously not clear, hence the need to amend the rule. These kids did not clearly break the rule. Given the lack of clarity and the fact they returned the money which was immaterial to begin withi certainly am sympathetic to those saying the UIL overstepped their bounds here. And did I read it right that the decision was made by the district principals? How many teams are competing for the last playoff spot? The decision was possibly self serving...

When I participated in varsity UIL sports I certainly knew I couldn't get paid by my school to go help out at the junior high. It would have never concerned me to get paid for helping out a little league team. I was paid for umpiring and through doing that I gave tips to catchers, should I have been deemed ineligible?

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Even if you think the wording of the particular law was confusing, if you read the rest of the rule, it's not confusing that the burden is on the student athlete to stay on the right side of the grey area.

Ignorance of the amateurism rules aren't a defense.

As for the Dr Pepper example...the UIL realizes kids need or want to work. And for the most part, they don't care if you get paid more than you deserve, either. They're just making sure you're an amateur a te sport you're playing.

Now, if you were induces to transfer for sports reasons, especially if it involved getting paid to work for Dr. Pepper...or something shady like that...they have other rules you would be in violation of.

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As for the Dr Pepper example...the UIL realizes kids need or want to work. And for the most part, they don't care if you get paid more than you deserve, either. They're just making sure you're an amateur a te sport you're playing.

Now, if you were induces to transfer for sports reasons, especially if it involved getting paid to work for Dr. Pepper...or something shady like that...they have other rules you would be in violation of.

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I certainly wasn't induced to transfer. My initial transfer year was in 6th grade because I didn't want to start over making friends in a new school. And I am sure the Dr. Pepper guy wasn't purposely hiring athletes who had transferred in (it was more who were kids that he knew through his daughters from what I could tell), but I could see where someone could have come in and said he was doing all this stuff to entice us to transfer to this school and play sports and from what you just said we would have had to prove that was not the case, potentially.

Maybe I should be arguing the rules are dumb, but getting paid $1,500 for helping out with a little league team shouldn't impair ones "amateur status". Just like making $1,500 umpiring shouldn't but I probably made roughly that much money per season umpiring. The punishment should fit the crime and in this case I don't think it does, particularly for all the other kids who played on that team who did nothing wrong.

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I certainly wasn't induced to transfer. My initial transfer year was in 6th grade because I didn't want to start over making friends in a new school. And I am sure the Dr. Pepper guy wasn't purposely hiring athletes who had transferred in (it was more who were kids that he knew through his daughters from what I could tell), but I could see where someone could have come in and said he was doing all this stuff to entice us to transfer to this school and play sports and from what you just said we would have had to prove that was not the case, potentially.

Maybe I should be arguing the rules are dumb, but getting paid $1,500 for helping out with a little league team shouldn't impair ones "amateur status". Just like making $1,500 umpiring shouldn't but I probably made roughly that much money per season umpiring. The punishment should fit the crime and in this case I don't think it does, particularly for all the other kids who played on that team who did nothing wrong.

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I'm not accusing you or the Dr. Pepper guy of wrongdoing.

As for what amount makes one not-an-amateur...it is fairly universal that anything above about $0 makes you a professional and no longer an amateur.

The UIL has such a narrow rule on this, that I'm OK with them requiring no compensation whatsoever. Its even sport specific---they could help out the little league softball team and Katy wouldn't have to forfeit any games.


How would you enforce this violation?

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Katy HS is the New England Patriots of high school athletics

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FIFY

Prom Proposal

Well played...

As a youth baseball coach myself, the only place that I could see benefiting from the HS players would be in practices. Using them for hitting and fielding drills and breaking off into smaller groups is a tremendous help. I do not need help during games and the piddly stuff that they claim to have been paid for seems questionable as stated above. I use the catcher's dad to put on his equipment for free.

The next time I cry for Katy getting screwed will be the first time.

Agree. I have coached softball for 12+ seasons, and for most practices, I have the team split into 2 groups for the majority of practice. I'm constantly trying to keep the kids moving and learning vs waiting on their turn/rep. I've been lucky to have one dad that is knowledgeable and can run one group while I do another (and then we switch kids), but that's typically been about it. Having 2 extra hands that are very knowledgeable about the game and about youth drills would be a huge help. I suspect these kids were leaned on for much more at practice than shagging balls.

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Prom Proposal

Well played...

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I disagree.

He just cost his team Wins this season and cost them the playoffs. It wasn't the UIL that paid him or got paid.

If it were any of the other players (not part of the forfeiture)... then a "well played" might be appropriate.

What it shows about him, is exactly what you'd expect.

Sure seems like he learned his lesson. Great parenting all around.

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Never seen such a group of holier than thous

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There is nothing "holier than thou" about seeing the rules being enforced. If you don't like the rules, don't participate. If you do participate, you subject yourself to the rules. In this case, the spirit of the rule was clearly violated as others have pointed out quite clearly.

Are arbiters always fair, just, and 100% correct? No, but exactly what in life is?

Whether it is law enforcement, pro sports or UIL, all threads that point out some punishment for wrongdoing have significant numbers of apologists that seem to just want to let people off for anything. The Saints; Tom Brady; Waco bikers. It is sickening -- as if rules and laws don't matter when the punishment or process offends YOU.

As educated people, everyone on here should be above all this.

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I am sure I spent the bulk of my 50 hours a week doing tasks that were not really necessary...Are we sure he wasn't really gifting me the money as that was clearly more than he needed to pay me. Oh and I should point out at least 3 of the ones of us working there actually were transfers into a larger school district from 3 smaller school districts as we had all moved from in town to in the country and were no longer living in the school district of the larger school we grew up going to as kids. Even more shady I tell you!

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It is up to the UIL district committees, usually made up of the district's school principals, to decide and rule on these things when they're brought up. In many cases, it is more of a political than fact based exercise. In other words, some principals make "rule for my side and I'll protect you next time..." type deals. In still other cases, nothing even gets brought up because no one knows something like what you did even happened.

I did all kinds of crap in HS (school, not athletics related) but was never caught. Had I been caught, I wouldn't have liked it but I certainly wouldn't have complained about it.

Someone else getting off is not a defense, nor should it be. No crime victim would want their assailant to get a pass simply because others got away with the same crime. That's nuts.