High Hopes, Dashed Dreams, and Unique Uncertainty Op-Ed

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The following is an op-ed from River Valley Middle/High School Athletic Director and Assistant Principal Ryan Portenga.  The opinions expressed are his, and not necessarily those of WSJM Sports or Mid-West Family…

 

Due to the outbreak of COVID-19 and the subsequent measures taken by both state and federal governments, the business of athletic competition – from prep sports all the way to the Tokyo Olympic Games – has understandably taken a backseat. Gymnasiums are closed, ball fields lie empty, and the exhilarating sound of metal clanging against metal upon the rerack of a plated bar has disappeared from our weight rooms.

Like a runner off of pace or a singer out of tune, the absence of such activity has me out of rhythm. I mean, considering that I was the kid who could read a box score better than I could read assigned literature in elementary school, sports have always been there to lean upon – in good and bad times alike. Now, they are not. Presumably like many others around the world, I feel off-balance.

At some point, ‘normal’ will be restored within our country. Americans will once again be able to dine-in at fast food restaurants and be at ease watching their toddlers chew on multi-colored orbs within the play area’s ball pit. We will go back to allowing our personal space to be invaded by obnoxious strangers within a crowded stadium – so long as they are rooting for our team – and we will (hopefully) once again shake the hands of our neighbors at church, in the grocery store, and in the street. Yet, realistically, this sort of activity is probably years down the road.

In the meantime, even when live sporting events eventually return to our television screens, life is going to be a bit awkward. After all, we are living in limbo, still uncertain of where COVID-19 is taking us and still very much out of rhythm. Unbalanced, like me.
Therefore, as I have wondered about over and over these past few weeks, what is the remedy? What are the baby steps that have the ability to move us forward? Can sports play a role in restoring ‘normal’? If so, how?

Believe it or not, I think that a solution exists – for sporting enthusiasts and beyond – that has the ability to restore our day-to-day equilibrium and replenish at least some of what has been lost. Equally simple and complicated, the plan is fail-proof. Better yet, it leans upon the best of what we are as a country – the most basic and innocent of us all.
Our local youth.

Somewhere within all of the suspended activity are the dreams of countless high school and college senior student-athletes throughout our country whose one last chance at competitive glory lies uncomfortably incomplete. Granted, such frustration pales in comparison with that of those directly and indirectly suffering through the physical and emotional effects of COVID-19, but it is frustration nonetheless.

I mean, in a matter of days, as our country’s academic institutions shut down their campuses, these seniors’ focus went from ‘one last hurrah’ to one big nada. No more late inning comebacks, no more qualifying jumps, and no more back-nine rallies. Nothing. Zilch. Zippo. The thought of all those late nights and long hours shooting jumpers in the driveway with mom or dad – practicing that last-second fadeaway to win the regional championship – actually faded away. With such games suspended or – in many cases – canceled, the chance to perhaps hit such a shot would not happen.

Whenever the cloud of the Coronavirus lifts and our country tries to put ‘normal’ back together, these senior student-athletes – who they are, what they have lost, and what their leadership means to so many – need to be considered. From rural towns to large universities, young people have always been there – rallying together for us.
Now it is time for us to be there for them.

Like it or not, sports – pageantry, competition, and meaningfulness alike – bring us together. Even if, due to COVID-19, such togetherness cannot physically happen, athletics still have the ability to connect us on an emotional level.

For instance, I cannot stand the New York Yankees, did not vote for President George Walker Bush, and struggle staying focused throughout nine consecutive innings of a baseball game. However, my eyes welled up with tears when #43 fired a strike to home plate to open Game 3 of the World Series in front of a roaring crowd at Yankee Stadium – just weeks after terrorists leveled the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

I was not at the game, but I was ‘there’ – wrapped up in the emotions of sadness, anger, perseverance, and pride. While each of us may have a different memory of ‘overcoming’ the September 11 terrorist attacks, Bush’s presidential pitch in front of thousands of New Yorkers – just a few miles north of Ground Zero – was mine.

A simple sporting event meaning so much to so many. Sooner or later, in the midst of this international pandemic, we are going to need something like Bush’s pitch to pick us up. With professional sports taking a hiatus, college sports canceled for the time being, and events like the Olympics postponed, it only makes sense to see prep sports get the nod to take center stage first and foremost.

After all, amateur athletics are the root of sport within our country and, like a flower rising from the warming earth after a long winter, such competition – without care for crowd size, contract clauses, or compensation – has the ability to shift the season of our mindset once again.

Here in Michigan, we have great leadership within the ranks of the Michigan High School Athletic Association – led by Executive Director Mark Uyl. From our local coaches and school administration all the way to those who share office time with Uyl, it is an organization that has weathered many storms over the years – consistently, in my opinion, taking proactive (versus reactive) approaches and championing the student-athlete.

It is such leadership – that recently suspended the remaining winter tournaments and all of spring sports (instead of an all-out cancellation) – that has youngsters that I know and work with like Wil Korbel, a senior student-athlete at River Valley High School (located in the southwest corner of the Great Lakes State), thinking optimistically versus the alternative.

See, for over two decades, relative hard times have fallen upon the Mustangs. Not only has their high school enrollment shrunk from 433 (in 1997-98) to 179 (in 2019-20), but Valley’s athletic teams went from dominating the basketball court – with multiple boys and girls state finals appearances in the 1970s and 1980s and winning two state baseball championships in the 1990s – to being roughly absent of state tournament hardware in the same time frame.

Whereas other area families moved away or sent their children to neighboring school districts, many seniors like Korbel – whose father, Bill, played basketball on the 1987 quarterfinalist and 1988 semifinalist teams and mother, Laura, is a longtime teacher within the school district – stuck with River Valley, dreaming of one day hanging championship banners of their own within the legendary Jerry Schaffer Gymnasium rafters.

All having played their respective roles – scholar, teammate, servant, leader, fan – throughout this school year, Valley’s senior class was special. Together, along with their families, the latter half of the 2019-20 school year was to be a special one.

Yet, within 24 hours of playing in the district championship game as a heavy favorite, the COVID-19 pandemic reached Michigan – and sports, like many other constants within our lives, were suspended. The year of the Mustangs – with enough talent to hoist district, regional, and perhaps state hardware in basketball, softball, baseball, and track – is on pause.

For senior student-athletes and school communities throughout our country who – like Korbel and River Valley – finally had a chance to be on top, there is no worse feeling.

With three young girls in our household, our family’s daily routine has always incorporated some sort of reading activity, team-building project, and sporting competition – even if just a heated game of Connect 4. Yes, doing so is ‘love in action’, but it is also an investment. Such endeavors will hopefully bestow upon our Nibbles, Wiggles, and Giggles the tools it takes for them to attack their dreams, whatever they may one day be.

Already, it is impossible to count the number of hours already invested in our three knuckleheads – and our oldest is only five years old! I cannot begin to fathom the time parents have spent working over the years with current high school and college seniors – preparing them for that final exam, that final batter, that final race, that last dance, and that graduation ceremony.

As it stands this moment here in Michigan, there is uncertainty that any of those things – relative staples within one’s senior year of school – will take place.

The dust of COVID-19 will eventually clear. Yet, with so many things already taken away from these young people, what – if anything – can we restore?

Local, regional, and state sports. School and community pride. Restoring America. Reestablishing ‘normal’. Togetherness. These are the things that are on my mind right now.

We need not care if high school graduations take place in July; we need not care if proms take place on a Wednesday night – or virtually; we need not want to nix final examinations and just pass our youngsters on to the next level; and we hopefully are not shrugging our shoulders upon hearing that some state within our union has canceled its track and field state finals.

It all means so much to so many.

Sure, there are other items that probably should be first checked off of our state and federal ‘to-do lists’ – big ticket items such as health care and economics, for example. Shoot, lets nail down a vaccine to combat COVID-19!

But when all of that is figured out – hopefully sooner than later – seniors like Will Korbel deserve to get their shot and communities like River Valley deserve their chance to see the world from atop the competitive mountain.

Even if governors across our country nix the remainder of the school year – yes, you read that right – we need to figure something out before a mental health crisis is added to this COVID-19 mess.

Education is already taking place online. Soon, some of our country’s high school seniors will experience virtual proms, graduations at drive-through movie theaters, and other creative attempts to salvage an incomplete school year.

Why not let athletics take the lead? No crowds are needed and these young people will not care if they are out of shape or underprepared. They just want a chance to finish what they started long ago on the elementary playgrounds and community youth leagues – doing their best to represent their communities and uphold legacies.

America has always leaned upon its youth. Let her do so once more.

In 2001, we needed that presidential ‘first pitch’. Now, it is time to hit a home run.
Even with no one in the stands, everyone will be watching.