i not sure if you are going to return back to this post to view comments as many don’t and move on but; thanks for your comments. appreciate your frankness and stance. not all will agree with one another and if you are ok, then that’s fine. sorry to hear your boy was pulled up but hardly played. always wonder why those coaches who do that, do so as it deprives one of PT. not going to get into a heavy discussion on philosophy but at the end of the day; one wants all to be Firm but Fair. Coach Kane would definitely agree to that. Good luck to your boys next season and other Castle football alumni who have their sons playing on the team. I’ll just keep walking around the track.

@Castle Track Walker Not sure who I’m talking to, however, if what I say after this offends you, my apologies. I put my name out there because it’s my opinion and I’d freely tell it to you if we were to sit down and have a conversation about it.

First off, my son and nephew’s playing time has nothing to do with the way I feel whatsoever. My son got pulled up to the varsity team as a Freshman for depth purposes. During the course of that season, he hardly smelled the field as there were seniors in front of him that were frankly better. When he questioned whether he should have played on the JV level, I told him to contribute however he can and if he wanted to get more playing time, put in the work to get better. I know what it’s like to go to a game and wait for the 3-4 plays he may get in and any playing time he receives now is a product of the sacrifices and suffering he’s gone through to get there. Same for Kila. I could go on and on about his training during the offseason.

That being said…Did I agree with all of the coaching decisions this staff made? That’s a big negative. There were many play calls and personnel shifts where I openly questioned them to people around me. Did I ever confront the coaches at the team bus or complain to the AD? Not once.

Speaking of complaints, let’s look at those you listed.
1-“Players missing practice but start in games” Valid complaint if there was a policy laid out to parents but ultimately a coaches decision. Neither you or I know if any of these so-called absences was excused so let’s not pretend we do.
2-“Coaches use of profanity on the field” Football is a rough sport and kids these days are a lot more defiant and distracted. I’ve been sworn at many a time by both my Castle and college coaches and deserved it every single time (except maybe once). Have you ever listened to Coach Rod York talk to his team? Unless it’s BYU, I can assure you that it happens more often than not.
3-“Staff wearing St. Louis attire instead of Castle attire at practices” This one is kinda ridiculous to me. They could each wear their own alma mater’s gear and the only thing that should matter is whether or not they’re coaching up the kids.
4-“Coaches always late to practice” Unless we’re being coached by Nick Rolovich or someone else that gets paid to strictly be a football coach, it’s gonna happen. That’s why the majority of us watch from the stands and not the sidelines (at least that’s my reason). Our jobs simply won’t allow us to be there for the start of practice.
5-“Pop Warner mentality of No Cut philosophy” Ummm, isn’t that a good thing? For some of the people grumbling about playing time and what not, their kids might be the ones getting cut. And Pop Warner limits the number of players they can have. I guarantee you can’t find a Pop Warner roster with 50 players.

You closed with speaking about what kind of program I want my kid to be associated with and mentioned “right life values”. I personally believe those values should start with us at home. If we teach them well enough and “ingrain” it into them, no coach who sees them for 3 hours a day should be able to overcome that. I want my kid to be associated with a program that teaches the values of hard work and facing adversity head on. We had a lot of that in every game we played this year and, as evidenced in this last game, the boys never gave up but I feel that some parents may have.

Again, I didn’t mean to write a novel, but felt this had to be said in the hopes of improving things for next year. We have a lot of talent coming back and I’m looking forward to it. I have no idea who you are but you obviously know who I am. Please feel free to come up and introduce yourself and we can have a friendly conversation. If we still disagree then so be it, but I’m sure we’ll still support the team like always.

STAT! PRONTO!