Wisconsin High School Sports | Wisconsin Sports Network | WisSports.net

By Dennis Semrau

Wisports.net

 

All it took was a motion at the WIAA s annual meeting in Stevens Point last month to put the issue of spring baseball vs. summer baseball on the negotiation table once again. But this time, it won t be all talk and a return to the status quo.



You can count on a proposal to be made during the upcoming 2009-10 school year to end the sport s two season approach at the high school level once and for all.



Even Arrowhead coach Tim O Driscoll, one of the most avid supporters of the summer game, knows the writing is on the wall.



"We d been battling it for a number of years now," said O Driscoll, who is beginning his 35^th

season as the Warhawks head coach. "But it looks like the WIAA wants us to have just one season. I think this time it will happen."

 

I have heard all the reasons why the WIAA should have just one baseball season and championship playoff format, which would be held in the spring. I also understand the argument for keeping the summer option open for the 67 schools that still believe baseball should be played during warm summer days and evenings instead of in the spring when it is cold and rainy.

 

However, I firmly believe the issue basically comes down to one main point that was emphasized during the open discussion period at the WIAA annual meeting: High school sports seasons should be held during the school year. That seems like a logical argument to me.

 

Summer time is for vacations, camps and for those graduating seniors, time to prepare for college or the next phase of their lives. Also, the availability of unlimited summer contact for all high school coaches and their student-athletes is -- like it or not – eventually going to happen.

Although the state s athletic administrators rejected an amendment this year that would have added soccer to the list of sports that allow coaches unlimited coaching contact in the summertime (by a 173-130 vote), it was not an indictment of soccer.

 

Rather it was part of a growing sentiment that unlimited summer contact should be available for all sports, which is an issue that summer baseball would have to deal with that it currently does not.

 

I ve often thought that of all the coaches at the high school level, those who had it the toughest during the school year were spring sports coaches. That was not only because they have a relatively short competitive season but that they also have to deal with such "distractions" as spring fever, prom, end-of-the year school trips, senior skip days and yes poor weather, too, to name a few.

 

Yet, try being a coach in the summer, after the school year has ended, and have to maintain the type of control expected of all school coaches. How do you administer the sport and hold the athletes to a required code of conduct standard after they have already graduated?

 

While there will have to be some type of adjustment to the beginning of the spring baseball season – an April 1 start date, perhaps -- I don t go along with this "sprummer" concept of extending the spring season well into the summer.

 

And it s not because I have any sympathy for American Legion baseball programs or any other sports programs hat can t wait for the school year to end either so they can vie for the student-athletes attention.

 

But rather the school year is long enough when you consider that fall sport athletes basically lose the month of August as vacation time due to their preseason practice schedule. After the school year is over, kids should have a chance to be kids, enjoy some time off and focus on summer activities.

 

With the recent expansion of the playoffs to four divisions and an increase in games played from 20 to 26 beginning this season, two main advantages that summer baseball held over spring baseball have been negated. Sure, the weather issue is one that won t go away. But the bottom line is school sports should be held during the school year – that means at the beginning of the school year, too -- and you can bet that the WIAA will do all that it can to make it so.