“Raise with Care”
From 8-23-14
When I look back over my 50-year coaching career, I never felt like I had "a job", as I always felt that I was blessed to have the opportunity to teach young people.
I always thought it might be important if each child had stamps on their head that said "raise with care!" I realized that most young people had not yet met with much favor in life, and were enthusiastic and excited about their future! Once they chose to be part of one of our teams, they knew that they had earned their way into an "exclusive club"! They didn't really care how much I knew, until I could prove how much I really cared for them. (Some of the things we would share, and talk about, were usually new to them.)
We realized that athletics was a place where lessons could be learned--lessons which were a "means to an end, and not the end, itself!" We would try to talk about the future, even tho' most of them thought their future was "now". We discussed that what they were spending their time doing now should be important to them now--and to their future! As I look back on the memories of the many teams for which I had the opportunity to be head coach (& share my thoughts, which I believed would be meaningful in their future), I later had many players tell me how some of those stories impacted their adult lives! I only coached in 2 schools away from the area where most of my 50-yr. career was spent. I previously wrote about how Dr. J.Y. Jones influenced us to come to teach & coach at Trinity Christian School in Dublin, Ga. It was there that our girls basketball team, led by our only senior Emilie Wages, brought us our 1,000th varsity career win! This brought on a great celebration in which Dr. Jones & Booster Club president, Diane Wages, brought together people from all parts of our lives! GPTV (& Jim Ginnochio) spent 2 days in Dublin creating a program featuring a poem by former team member, and long-time friend, writer Darrell Huckaby. The 5 years we spent in Dublin were fun years which we shared with a lot of people! The only out-of-state coaching job came about in a strange way! Our son, Brad, was at our Panama City Beach condo in September, and noticed in the paper that Port St. Joe H.S. needed a boys basketball coach. When I called & sent them my resume, they encouraged me to take the job, as they desperately needed a coach! I decided not to teach (after I heard what they paid teachers), & they were really surprised when I took the job for only the low coach's salary! As we went to the school on my 1st trip there, I told my wife, Jan, it was strange not to know anyone at PSJ, and the people didn't know anything about me. When we entered the building, someone yelled, "Coach Bradley!"---& it was Maridel Meyers, who had been one of our students at Newton Co. HS in Covington & I had also taught with her mother there! This was an unusual job, with us traveling 35 miles each way from PCBeach to the school! It was a very successful season, & in the state tournament when we led Benjamin H.S. of N.Palm Beach, by 7 pts. at halftime, I thought we might be on our way to another state championship. Hampered by fouls in the 2nd half, we lost to the future state champions, 45-37. We finished a very interesting & successful year with 3 different championships & a final record of 27-7. Thanks to the persuasion of Becky Rutledge & Darrell Huckaby, & the principal (formerly one of our Newton basketball players, JW Rutledge), I was offered the same basketball position which I had held 30 years earlier!!-- & we eagerly headed North!!
