Last spring, my next door neighbor was a beautiful 19 year old young woman on the short list for the 2012 Olympic Cycling team. A straight “A” student majoring in Chemistry, she spent the final 2 months of the 2010 academic year finishing Physical Chemistry and Differential Equations by email as she trained and competed with the USA Olympic Cycling Team in Europe.
Today, she is 20 years old---still beautiful but no longer either an Olympic athlete or an A student…her speech and thinking are a little slow, her grades are no longer A’s and her college cycling coach has suspended her from the college team for life. The reason? In a bike race last summer, she fell and sustained her 2nd concussion. She was her college teams top competitor, leading them to 2 consecutive National Championships-but her coach knows that no win is worth risking the life of a young woman over an athletic competition. The 2nd concussion almost killed her and caused irrepairable brain damage-a third is something her coach will not allow to occur on his watch. The coach refuses to allow her to ride..and also insisted that the administration allow her to keep her full athletic scholarship.
This is the coach we all want for our kids.
At the 2011 Fisher Cup, we were treated to a different type of coach.
During a senior mens game between LA Water Polo and the Junior National Team, the Assistant Junior Mens National Team Coach (playing for LA Water Polo) delivered a closed fist, out of the water punch to the back of the head of a 19 year old player…one of the coaches own players on the Junior National Team. The player was taken to the hospital where he was diagnosed with a concussion and was unable to play for the remainder of the weekend.
Concussions are no longer dismissed as “minor” injuries. Most neurologists and sports medicine physicians agree that after 2 concussions, an athlete should not return to competition due to the real threat of permanent brain damage. This young mans water polo career and health have both been compromised… delivered not by accident, in a competition…but intentially and maliciously delivered by the fist of his own coach.
We are not talking about an underwater kick nor are we talking about striking or wrestling. We are talking about an out of the water, intentional, closed fist blow to the head delivered by an older, stronger, more experienced coach to a teenager…whose only crime was wanting to grasp the Olympic dream.
Shortly after the malicious attack on his own player, the coach was back on the bench coaching the Junior National Team, now a group of stunned adolescents trying to reconcile the fact that their coach had just put one of their teammates in the hospital.
The incident was a week ago-a week during which time USA Water Polo has been conspicuously silent, a clear indication that they plan to take no disciplinary action against the coach. A recent post on the Water Polo Planet Message Board summed up one parents opinion quite well;
ODP - Danger In The Water
by BucketMan » Fri May 27, 2011 10:56 am
Parents and Young Players,
When you attend this weekend's ODP Summit/Fundraising Campaign, you should note that
this past weekend's events in San Diego (Fisher Cup) include many coaches, players and administrators
who might punch your kid's heads if their temper flares up and just laugh.
You should be in attendance in case your child gets a concussion, broken nose or possibly stops breathing due to a punch
in the windpipe.
Please go to the Fisher Cup Results and find out who these people are.
Good Luck and see what your children are getting involved in and what they have to look forward to.
When you hand your check in, ask Guy Baker and Chris Ramsey what they did to those individuals
who maliciously injured players, complete disregard of refs. NOTHING.
Fisher Cup Message Board Thread
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=7319
I don’t know this young player or his parents…nor I do know the coach…but as a parent, I have to ask- where do the young mans parents go from here? Do they protect their son (and others) from further assaults by filing criminal charges against the coach? Or do they say nothing…and pray that their son is not on the receiving end of his coaches fist again? On the one hand, filing charges will likely result in a young mans Olympic dreams coming to an end based on the well known vindictiveness of this NGB…on the other hand, silence could easily condone an escalation of this coaches violent outbursts against other adolescents. Or…the worse case scenario, the young concussed player could wind up like the 20 year old ex-cyclist next door to me-forced out of athletics by irreversible brain damage caused by another concussion...maliciously delivered by his own coach.
This athletes parents are in a position into which no parent should EVER be placed by a National Governing Body of the United States Olympic Committee; the choice of whether or not to quash a young mans Olympic Dreams in order to protect him from the physical assault of his own coach.
Why does USA Water Polo demand background checks of coaches and referees when their own coach can publicly and intentionally assault his own player in clear view of hundreds of spectators and not be immedately and publicly sanctioned?
There is no universe in which USA Water Polos lack of action is acceptable.
The Junior National Team players parents and players cannot say anything-they know what will happen if they try to protect their children…But I am willing to stand up for them and am asking every masters player, every parent of every child not in the national team stream, every collegiate club player, varsity player and coach to stand up with me against this NGB’s cycle of intimidation and bullying. We must not accept lip service about the Positive Coaching Alliance. We must not settle for the empty priomises of an unenforced Coaches Code of Conduct.
We must demand to see proof that USA Water Polo has a ZERO TOLERANCE POLICY against coach violence toward players.
EVERY ONE OF US, must stand up in front of USA Water Polo and the USA Water Polo Board of Directors and say THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE. The reign of bullying and intimidation by USAWP must end here.
I urge everyone to email the USA Waterpolo Board of Directors to express your opinion of this issue and let them know that we demand accountability for the protection of our children. Surely, the safety of our children should be the most important mission of all.
USA Water Polo Board of Directors
Mike Graff: Chairman mgraff@usawaterpolo.org
Bill Smith: Secretary bsmith@usawaterpolo.org
Ed Reynolds: ereynolds@uaswaterpolo.org
RoAnn Costin: rcostin@usawaterpolo.org
Richard Esterkin: resterkin@usawaterpolo.org
John Hendrickson: jhendrickson@usawaterpolo.org
Sandy Nitta: snitta@usawaterpolo.org
Bob Sternfels: bsternfels@usawaterpolo.org
