Editor’s Note: This column originally appeared in October 9, 2006 edition of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. Gridiron Strategies realizes that there are two sides to every story, but it’s good food for thought during a long off-season.

UNWRITTEN RULES ARE what regulate sports. Break a written rule and the whistle blows alerting everyone to the folly. But break one of the unwritten guidelines and the only regulators are the people in uniform and their bosses.

In high school, however, we’d like to believe the players shouldn’t have to stick a fastball in someone’s back, flagrantly foul someone in the paint or headhunt a receiver going across the middle. The penalties that would lead to these kinds of paybacks should be kept in check by the adults.

Unfortunately, in the day of Internet recruiting services that count every yard and national television companies becoming enthralled with high school football as the final stop before the game becomes tainted (never mind that this kind of attention is what leads to the tainting), those checks and balances are being forgotten.

Attempts To Regain Control
The state of Connecticut saw sportsmanship becoming a second thought with its high school football teams, so this season it implemented a flawed mercy rule. The rule says the coach of any team that beats its opponent by more than 50 points will be suspended for a week, no matter the intent.

There have not been many cases of this kind of blowout on the Wisconsin high school football scene this season. A couple of teams have some 40-0 or 45-0 victories under their belts, and last week Milwaukee Riverside smashed Milwaukee Washington, 56-0. Riverside did not score in the fourth quarter, though, showing at least some sportsmanship and a degree of class.

On Sept. 19, the Oscada (Mich.) school district canceled the rest of its football season after the team's 0-4 start. Oscada was tired of being blown out - the team lost by a combined score of 164-0 in the four losses — and the coach, who supported the decision, said he thought it was unsafe for his team to be on the same field with those other teams.

Shameful Display
On Sept. 29, the polar opposite of even decent sportsmanship was on full display. A football coach in West Virginia made a calculated effort to get his running back a national rushing record — despite having the game well in hand by halftime.

As an athlete at any level, you have to deal with hurt pride and bruised egos after losses. That is expected, but this was extreme.

Matewan RB Paul McCoy was aided by a no-huddle offense with a 35-point lead in the third quarter and by his team not returning punts, instead letting the ball roll back to give McCoy more ground to gain. He finished with 658 yards, a national record, and 10 touchdowns, second-most ever.

The final score: 64-0. The losing players refused to shake hands afterward, according to the Washington Post. Good for them.

Matewan coach, Yogi Kinder, defended his decision by saying he refused to “punish” his kids for having a better team, and also said the game’s results would have been the same if McCoy didn't play.

Is this serious? It isn’t a punishment to not have your name in a record book few have ever seen. While we’re at it, open the dictionary to “integrity,” because this is the same program that a day before McCoy's record-breaking game had to forfeit two games for using an ineligible player.

Critics and columnists have blown the whistle on Matewan and its coaching staff. But in the court of public opinion, the football program as a whole, including its players, is also lumped into that criticism. For an athlete’s entire life, he is told to obey his coach and to respect him as an authority figure. It is too hard as a 17-year-old to say, “Coach, I'll sit this one out because I don’t really want to embarrass anyone.”

Kinder’s decision to unapologetically go for a record reeks. This was a reckless disregard for sportsmanship and speaks to where the integrity of high school football has fallen.

When the regulators, supposedly responsible and protecting, start succumbing to the spotlight and attention, the game of football is in trouble.