The Cost of Winning

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

This four-part documentary examines a Baltimore high school football team that won so many games they were booted from their league — an ejection that also led some to accuse the league of racial bias.

Trailer:

Original air date: 11/9/20

[DanaK]

Esquire followed up one year later and things aren't good with Covid https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a34643923/biff-poggi-the-cost-of-winning-interview/?utm_campaign=socialflowTWESQ&src=socialflowTW&utm_medium=social-media&utm_source=twitter

[ElectricBoogaloo]

On 11/12/2020 at 10:43 AM, DanaK said:

Esquire followed up one year later and things aren't good with Covid

Wow, I found this all incredibly sad. Football wasn't just providing a way for these kids to go to college. It was also providing them with structure and support and a way to not be in their neighborhoods until they could leave for college.

I know the main criticism of Coach Poggi and his recruiting to create a super team is "it's not fair," but that sounds like BS to me. The league that St. Frances got kicked out of was all private Catholic schools in Baltimore. You can't tell me that those schools don't have the money to recruit players. They have alumni and donors who could easily donate enough money (and as someone who went to a private school, I know that all the school really needs to do is waive tuition/fees and call it a scholarship).

Mr. EB's high school was in a league that consisted of public schools in urban cities and one very fancy private school way out in the suburbs that recruited kids from within a one hour radius. To me, that's way more unfair than what Biff was doing because a public school really has no counteroffer to that. But St. Frances and the other private schools in that league had the same opportunity to recruit kids for football.