Dallas Cowboys fan. Retired Teacher. Wrestling Coach at Pendleton Heights H.S. IN rep for NWCA. Sterilaser rep of IN,OH & IL. Keenly aware that life isn’t fair.
We're not stopping with the Bears. We're heading to Cincinnati tomorrow to see how the Batesville Bengals sounds to them. We are Indiana. We are a football state. We are unstoppable.
@JABsMusic When I was coaching sixth grade GBB, my team had some good guards and a late lead, so I wanted them to move the ball and run clock.
Kids did what they were coached to do. Dad on the starts yelling at his daughter for passing an "open shot." I couldn't get a sub in fast enough.
Said it before: It is our sacred obligation to live lives worthy of the sacrifice they made for us. Rest easy, members of The Greatest Generation who never got to enjoy the world they saved.
90% of the soldiers on the first boats to hit the beach didn't live to see the end of the day. Look at those faces. Some of them never made it to 18.
Never forget that they paid the ultimate price for our freedom. We live our lives the way we do because of them.
Season comes to an end with a 9-2 loss in first game Semi-State. Just wasn’t in the cards and the big first two innings by North Vigo, PH couldn’t recover from. @PHHSAthletics
Very sad news. I'm too young to have seen "Gentleman Ned" race, but with Bob Jenkins & Benny Parsons, he made up one of the best and most fun booths in motorsports history. I'd occasionally see him in the IMS media center, balancing his media roles with being a proud dad. RIP.
Every American should know the names of Wade McClusky, Jr, Jimmy Thach, Richard “Dick”Best, Dusty Kleiss, John Waldron and Torpedo Squadron 8. We live as a free people because of the unbelievable heroics of service members like these men.
84 years ago today, a pilot running out of fuel made a decision that won the Pacific War. Most Americans have never heard his name.
June 4, 1942. Six months after Pearl Harbor, Japan's navy is undefeated. Four of the carriers that burned Pearl, Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Hiryu, are steaming toward Midway to finish off the US Pacific Fleet.
At 7:52 AM, Wade McClusky launches from USS Enterprise leading 32 Dauntless dive bombers. Here's the detail nobody mentions: McClusky is a fighter pilot. He'd been given the air group weeks earlier and had barely flown a dive bomber in combat. Now he's leading every SBD the Enterprise has at the most important target in the Pacific.
9:20 AM. He arrives at the intercept point where the Japanese fleet is supposed to be.
Empty ocean. Nothing for miles.
The Japanese had turned. Nobody knew where. And now McClusky owns the worst math problem in naval aviation: his fuel is bleeding away, and every minute he keeps searching, he condemns more of his own pilots to ditch in open water where nobody will find them.
Doctrine is clear. Turn back.
McClusky keeps going. He works a search pattern, squeezing miles out of dying fuel tanks.
9:55 AM. Far below, a single Japanese destroyer is cutting a white scar across the ocean at flank speed. It's the Arashi, racing to rejoin the fleet after depth-charging the American submarine Nautilus. Think about that. A failed sub attack is about to give away the entire Japanese navy.
McClusky reads the wake like an arrow and follows it.
10:02 AM. The horizon fills with the entire Japanese strike force. Four carriers, their decks crammed with planes being refueled and rearmed. Fuel lines snaking everywhere. Bombs stacked in the open.
And here's the miracle: the sky above them is empty. Minutes earlier, American torpedo squadrons had attacked at sea level and been annihilated. Torpedo 8 lost all 15 planes. One survivor, Ensign George Gay, watched what came next while hiding under his seat cushion in the water. Those doomed pilots dragged every Japanese fighter down to the waves. The door upstairs was wide open.
10:22 AM. McClusky pushes over from 14,500 feet. Both squadrons follow him down onto Kaga. It's actually a mistake, doctrine said split the targets, but Lt. Dick Best catches it mid-dive, pulls out with two wingmen, and goes after Akagi alone. His single bomb pierces the flight deck into the packed hangar. It's enough.
By 10:28, Kaga, Akagi, and Soryu, the third hit simultaneously by Yorktown's bombers, are floating infernos. Six minutes. Three carriers that attacked Pearl Harbor, gone. Hiryu follows them to the bottom that evening.
The cost of McClusky's gamble was real. Many Enterprise bombers never made it home, some shot down, others swallowed by the sea when their tanks ran dry. McClusky himself was jumped by two Zeros on the way out, took five bullets through his shoulder, and still flew his shot-up Dauntless back to the Enterprise.
Admiral Nimitz said McClusky's decision "decided the fate of our carrier task force and our forces at Midway." Japan never won another major battle.
One borrowed pilot. One destroyer's wake. One choice to keep flying when every gauge said go home.
The day after. Had to bring out the Sectional trophy and take a look around at this beautiful sight Legends Field. It’s here we’re all the work is done, the blood, sweat, and tears.
A PARENT’S JOURNEY THROUGH YOUTH SPORTS:
Age 5: “He’s got a cannon.”
Age 6: “He’s the fastest kid out there. Coach said so.”
Age 7: “Rec ball isn’t challenging him anymore.”
Age 8: “We tried out for select. Obviously made it.”
Age 9: “$2,800 for the season. Plus uniforms. Plus tournaments. Plus hotels.”
Age 10: “Cooperstown is basically a family vacation, right?”
Age 11: “He needs a hitting guy. And a pitching guy. And probably a mental performance coach.”
Age 12: “I’m not a crazy sports parent. The OTHER parents are crazy.”
Age 13: “We changed schools. For academics. (And also baseball.)”
Age 14: “Showcases are a requirement at this age.”
Age 15: “Ya his ranking just ticked up. We’re cooking.”
Age 16: “He just needs to get seen by the right school.”
Age 17: “The D1 schools want him to walk on. He’ll earn a spot by sophomore year.”
Age 18: “Okay, D2 is actually really competitive.”
Age 19: “He’s redshirting. Strategic.”
Age 20: “He’s focusing on school now.”
Age 21: “You know what? He’s so much happier.”
Roughly 7% of high schoolers play in college.
About 1.5% of those get drafted.
Less than half of draftees ever play one day in the big leagues.
The odds of our kids going pro are somewhere between “struck by lightning” and “find a $100 in old shorts.”
I love youth sports (all my kids play a bunch of them) just keep a good perspective my friends. ✌️
Wrestling is a combat sport. Emotions and tension are going to run high at times.
In my NCAA bronze medal match, my opponent SHOVED MY HEAD into the mat after the match. I can promise you my immediate thought was, “heck no - hit the guy.” In that moment, you don’t want to let another man disrespect you and you never want to submit to an opponent.
A couple important things though:
1.) The referee was right there doing his job and keeping both athletes safe.
2.) Wrestling is a martial art. One of the things experience teaches you is how to recognize and control emotion quicker in intense moments. Never perfect but you get better over time. I was able to collect myself.
Hopefully this becomes a valuable learning experience for everyone involved.
✔️You should never shove an opponent’s head after a win.
✔️You should never allow emotions to escalate into a punch.
✔️Referees must stay right in the middle of the action to protect both athletes in case tensions rise.
I’m confident everyone can learn from it.
1 in every 1,000 people in the United States will be in Indianapolis at the track today for the Indianapolis 500, as they have been for over 100 years.
There is nothing else like it in the world.