A kid swam the 500 all fly in a high school dual meet yesterday. His coach was furious and benched him for the rest of the meet. One of my lane mates this morning, who was the Starter at this meet said that was showboating and demeaning to the other competitors. I disagree. Was that any more demeaning than swimming free and lapping people? Plus, I saw the flyer ask everyone in the heat if it would bother them. Even on the blocks he said "Are you sure you guys are OK with this?"
If the coach cared about points, why would he bench the kid.
Because he didn't care about points. He cared about his own reputation for sportsmanship, or about maintaining discipline among his swimmers.
Maybe the coach made a mistake. On the other hand, maybe the coach didn't know that the kid planned to swim fly. If he did not know, he probably was horrified when he saw the kid do so, because he didn't know that the kid had asked the other swimmers whether or not they would mind. Note that the starter, whose job includes watching the swimmers at the blocks, didn't even register that interaction among the swimmers. Also, the coach probably did know, based on his many years of coaching experience, that others in the audience or in the local coaching community would think, as the starter did, that the kid's choice reflected poorly on the coach (such as thinking that the coach put the kid up to it as a stunt).
Or maybe the kid had told the coach that he wanted to swim fly and the coach had said, for whatever reason, "no."
To follow on to gobears's observation, not only is the swimmer's role way different for a high school team at a high school dual meet than for a Masters team at a Masters invitational, so is the coach's role. An important part of a high school coach's job is to teach sportsmanship, teamwork, and communication. Also, a high school coach is already in an awkward position when s/he knows that the other team is much weaker, because pretty much no matter what the coach does somebody is going to make accusations of having run up the score in an unsportsmanlike manner.
If the coach cared about points, why would he bench the kid.
Because he didn't care about points. He cared about his own reputation for sportsmanship, or about maintaining discipline among his swimmers.
Maybe the coach made a mistake. On the other hand, maybe the coach didn't know that the kid planned to swim fly. If he did not know, he probably was horrified when he saw the kid do so, because he didn't know that the kid had asked the other swimmers whether or not they would mind. Note that the starter, whose job includes watching the swimmers at the blocks, didn't even register that interaction among the swimmers. Also, the coach probably did know, based on his many years of coaching experience, that others in the audience or in the local coaching community would think, as the starter did, that the kid's choice reflected poorly on the coach (such as thinking that the coach put the kid up to it as a stunt).
Or maybe the kid had told the coach that he wanted to swim fly and the coach had said, for whatever reason, "no."
To follow on to gobears's observation, not only is the swimmer's role way different for a high school team at a high school dual meet than for a Masters team at a Masters invitational, so is the coach's role. An important part of a high school coach's job is to teach sportsmanship, teamwork, and communication. Also, a high school coach is already in an awkward position when s/he knows that the other team is much weaker, because pretty much no matter what the coach does somebody is going to make accusations of having run up the score in an unsportsmanlike manner.
