Fight Night

Mouth had a bad temper. He was one of the first players that I ever threw out of practice. During an intrasquad scrimmage he felt like a teammate was being dirty, which I didn't see, so he took a swing at him while play was going on. I wasn't surprised at what Mouth did. He came to me with the reputation of being a loud mouth who liked to fight.

Ordinarily, tempers flaring has never been an issue for me. I think it's a good thing when teammates are physical in practice, or even square off to fight. Practice tends to be monotonous at times, so I welcome signs of intensity that some would deem counterproductive on occasion. In that case I ejected Mouth from practice because his attitude was awful for consecutive days, and he had voiced some personal issues with me about this teammate previously. I didn't like the premeditated nature of his aggression.

For a while after that spat, Mouth did a great job of controlling his temper. Coming into the season I knew he was a wild card given his past. In addition to being arrested as a teen for fighting, he had been in and out of foster homes. His home life was a mess, and continued to be when he played for me. He and his mom never got along, and (like so many other guys I've coached) his father was barely in the picture. Although he never verbalized it, I felt like Mouth's anger stemmed from having a very turbulent childhood.

Mouth had other issues here as well. He was also a very lazy student who picked up many poor habits from being enrolled at the local alternative high school for a couple of years. As Mouth put it, he never had any real school work there. Although Mouth placed into College level English here, he struggled mightily at first because he wouldn't do any homework. After he failed to heed my warning about getting work done, I suspended him for five games. Ultimately, he ended the first semester with a 2.13 GPA. While modest, that was a far cry from what he was doing in high school.

Mouth actually thanked me for straightening him out with that suspension. After the first semester ended, he continued to do well academically. He had two "Bs" and an "A" during the second semester mid-term break. At one point that semester, I was even stopped in the hallway by a faculty member who wanted to tell me that Mouth had earned an "A" on an oral presentation about Marcus Garvey. He was on track to transfer after the semester if he kept up his grades.

I was really happy with his progress. Things were going well until I received a text from Mouth asking me to call him asap.


Me: Hey man. What's up?
Mouth: I gotta drop out of school.
Me: What? Why?
Mouth: I got jumped by four dudes from school off campus.
Me: Hold up! What? You okay?
Mouth: Yeh. I'm aiight. It sucks to get jumped, but it's whatever at this point. I just ain't tryin to get locked up for retaliating
Me: Damn. I'm sorry this happened. Before you drop out, let me talk to the Dean about this situation.
Mouth: I ain't tryna be no snitch. I don't want no names being dropped.
Me: Okay. Fine. Why do you have to drop out, though? Can't you just go to class then head home? That's fifteen transferable credits you'd be burning.
Mouth: Nah. I'm in class with one of the dudes who kicked me in the face.