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Photo of the year

The photo of Peter Metcalf of the Maine hockey team waving Shawn Walsh’s jersey in the air (BDN, March 25) gets my vote for photo of the year.

Nothing beats a good news story, and front page coverage, yet. Keep up the good work BDN!

Alberta Farthing Owens

Baileyville

Thorne off-target

Gary Thorne’s rambling rant (BDN, March 28) cannot be ignored. Inaccuracies, conjecture and “hip-shooting” abound.

How is it that “non-teaching coaches” (Thorne’s term) are more likely to commit sexual offenses against their players? The Bucksport coach referred to is a certified teacher. It is fair to assume that this individual’s education and certification requirements included the “ethics training that is absolutely essential of a teacher’s preparation.” So, what went wrong?

Professional educators are not less likely to be sexual predators. Numerous cases of teachers’ troubles in this area are known to most of us. Other professions that have experience in this area include priests, Boy Scout leaders, U.S. Presidents, parents and sportscasters, to name a few. It’s not the profession. It’s not the training, or lack thereof. The problem is much deeper than the lack of ethics training for the non-educators among us.

Perhaps the paper and ink consumed for Thorne’s column would have been better used if the topic was more about the national trend to hire coaches not trained as educators. Why are fewer teachers coaching? Could it be low pay, long hours, heightened expectations and underappreciation? Could it be the growing demands on everyone’s time? Maybe it’s too much to ask teachers to coach in addition to the demands of teaching all day. Perhaps “non-teaching coaches” might have more energy and interest to spend every afternoon, evening and weekend with their players since they are not also in school with students all day? The only answer is that there is not one answer in today’s world.

School systems must have the flexibility to fulfill their professional needs from a wide range of options. I know of many excellent teachers who coach. I also know of many excellent “non-teaching coaches.” There are many advantages and drawbacks to both. It is unfair and dangerous to postulate that continuing to hire “non-teaching coaches” will “open wider the door to such very ugly scenes as are now unfolding in Bucksport.”

So, instead of fear-mongering, let us have a thoughtful, rational debate of the core issue. Also, let’s hear more about the many contributions by coaches “teaching and non-teaching” to the well-being and development of their student-athletes.

Jack Gordon, head coach

Bucksport High girls soccer

Close the open tourney

The Maine Principals’ Association has recently started making its annual tournament an open tournament. All teams, despite the record they held during the season, are granted a seeding in the tournament. The only catch is that a very low-seeded team will have to play, at the most, two playoff games. Then they go to Bangor.

Most people think when they see this that it’s a great idea because everyone gets in the tourney, but it should instead be about the best teams going head to head. All the weakest links should be voted off the island before the well-earned trip to Bangor.

During my freshman and sophomore years, our team earned the number one slot for the regular season so they could just go to Bangor and did not have to play in a playoff game. Now the regular season is for nothing. It is for the teams to get practice in before a playoff game.

The biggest problem with the playoff games are the scores. When a low-seeded team plays a higher- seeded team, the lower team usually gets embarrassed by a ruthless beating.

I have nothing against lower-seeded teams, and I believe that everyone deserves an equal opportunity. I also believe that the equal opportunity comes in the regular season.

Dustin Heath

Sherman Mills

Nokomis girls stood tall

I would like to congratulate our Nokomis Lady Warriors for being runner-up in the Eastern Maine Class A tourney as well as for a successful season. Even though they didn’t win the final, their display of sportsmanship was a class act.

Early on in the season, these girls faced a tragedy that no one at such a young age should have to face, the death of their wonderful friend and teammate Mandi Foss. Promising to always remember and play their “all for Mandi,” the team did just that by finishing in first place in the Heal Points, despite the fact that key players had injuries throughout the season.

They entertained many Nokomis fans right to the very end, and we the fans couldn’t be more proud of them.

Betty MacKenzie

Newport

Recalling Mace Brown

The story (BDN, March 27)) memorializing the death of major league pitcher Mace Brown at age 92, brought back a pleasant memory. I was 15 years of age when Babe Ruth hit his last three hom runs on May 25, 1935. I clearly (I think) remember listening to that game broadcast by a Boston radio station. It may have been a telegraphic recreation of the game.

No doubt Mace was there on the Pittsburgh bench or in the bullpen, but the pitcher that day, if memory doesn’t fail me, was Burleigh Grimes. He was, I believe, the last of the legal “spitballers” grandfathered under the rules. Quite obviously, his offerings were no mystery to the “Babe”. As Stengel used to say “You can look it up.”

Carle G. Gray

Sullivan