You can take the boy out of sports ... but not sports out of the boy ...

Growing up in Tuttle carries with it the expectation to play sports. Late summer and fall Saturday nights find many parents watching their young boys playing football under the lights at Bill Hinkle Field. Each aspires to play for the Tuttle Tigers. Beginning Friday nights in September the stadium is full of eager young boys longing for the day when they may take the field as they watch the Varsity Tigers take the field.

Football is not the only sport in Tuttle. Boys baseball and wrestling get good billing with basketball not far behind. Girls softball enjoys a great deal of success and there are always hopes for a solid girls basketball team.

Lyle played for the Tigers. He enjoyed attending the games. We took in most home games this past season sitting on the 50 yard line. Craig, and sometimes Kimberly joined us. When Lyle had to be at the "Station" he would call to get the score. We enjoyed watching the Tigers win the Class 3A State Championship this past December. On the way home we talked about Zack Mincy's running that night - it was special to get to see.

This week when the news about Kelvin Sampson taking the job at Indiana came out I was reminded of a number of conversations over the past few months. Lyle would talk with a sense of frustration as we followed the Sooners Men's Basketball team. I remember Lyle saying he should have turned the game off as the Sooners would drop a game we thought they sh0ould have won. It would be eespecially intense if they were winning until he turned on the game only to watch them lose. The Sooners were his "team."

Many parents relive their sports careers through their children. Lyle did not seem to do so. Nathan's decision to quit playing football and focus on basketball and his choice to play golf rather than baseball only meant Lyle would alter what sport he watched his son play. We often talked about the undue pressure placed on young people to succeed at sports. Many a parent believes their child a sure future "Hall of Fame" candidate if they were just given the chance. Today we would do well to encourage our children in their pursuits rather than push them to pursue what we want/did. Sports offers a great number of life learning experiences. Long after downs are played and innings finished these lessons linger.

We coud adapt an old saying which is true on a number of levels - You can take the boy (or man) out of sports but you cannot take sports out of the boy (man).