Written by Homer Smith
December 21, 2003

Football coaches in Division 1A get fired. They are paid a lot of money to win, and they expect to get fired if they lose.

Athletic Directors should not be involved. They should have a vested interest in their coaches winning. Those who want to fire can have a vested interest in their coaches losing. That is not fair to players.

My questions are: Should a coach be fired without an established process? Should people be left thinking that big money influences what goes on? Should a coach be separated from his players without those who separate him having to account for their roles? In a democracy, where accountability is supposed to protect democracy, should people have to wonder if the moneyed few operate without accountability?

Our Founding Fathers wanted to prevent top-level people from rising above accountability. No country had ever done that. Today in football, if there are those who are above accountability, it is un-American. What is accountability? Simply a requirement to reveal a role played, a requirement to be open.

Further, to be open is not to entice an ambitious coach into a secret dealing concerning a fellow coach’s job. Everything for professional progress should be offered openly.

When a clandestine top-level dealing is exposed, people wonder if it is the tip of an iceberg. Should they have to wonder? No. Convincing evidence of openness and honesty should be there.

If a rich person tends to want the kind of control that an NFL owner has, he needs to be required to make a statement submitting himself to accountability.

When the only way to be the super power in the world is to have the superior society, every activity must contribute. Football must be an activity where openness and accountability prevail.

Football is for the support of the highest values by which we can live. Without a word from anyone, a football player learns that he cannot boast or belittle or cheat or covet and still win.

Players do their parts. They will bash into one another for 60 minutes without a single move that could be construed as unsportsmanlike. Then, when it is over, they will exchange skin and, often, kneel, hold hands, and pray.

Great players do theirs. Georgia’s 1942 Heisman Trophy winner, Frankie Sinkwich, found himself, early in World War II, in an intraservice game somewhere out west. His team was killing the other team, and at halftime he went over and suited up with that other team.

Top-level individuals must do theirs.

<i><b>This passionate article was written by Homer Smith and appeared recently on his Web Site</i></b>.