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Consequences
Last night at our meeting we got a little more information which I thought would be of interest. Some of you will remember last year the story which came out of Oklahoma where a QB was ejected from a quarterfinal playoff game. He had clearly kicked (visible on film) an opponent while the opponent was on the ground. By the state association rules he also was required to miss the next game. Which would be the semifinal game. The family (the kids dad was the head coach) got a lawyer and they pressed the issue in court, They presented their weak case and ultimately lost so the kid had to sit out but it resulted in a 3 week delay before the semi final game was played and therefore the finals were played a full month after the date it was originally scheduled. This obviously created a lot of problems for everybody from the teams that were left to play as well as basketball and wrestling coaches.
If I understood it correctly from last night the new thing I learned was that the legal action cost the state association $20,000 to defend the case in court. And that was just for the deductible so the cost of the lawsuit was much greater. As a result the insurance company raised their deductible to $50,000. So if something similar happens now and lawyers do their thing it will cost them a whole lot more to defend a basic fundamental rule that everybody agrees to when they sign up in the first place to belong to the state association.
And all that when the officials got it right. Just thought it was interesting what the consequences of these things are.
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