I live in Tallahassee and I am in the process of watching the machinations of the hiring process for a new collegiate head football coach play out.  It is not a pretty picture to see.  As I watch this process, I realized another part of this which is even more disturbing.

Collegiate head coaches are paid big dollars to recruit players and to win games.  In doing so, head coaches promise players and parents all sort of things.  What they promise most is trust in them (the team) because the team is paramount to good order and success.  Head coaches tell players if they put the team first good things will happen.  This is usually true.  The act of selfishly giving is critical to good society.

But head coaches’ belief in selfishly giving  is limited and lasts only as long until a bigger payoff presents itself.  Head coaches will leave almost every time a bigger reward is promised them regardless and irrespective of all of the promises they made to everyone else.  Worse still, head coaches will use the prospect of leaving a team for another as a reason to get a bonus or a renewed contract for more money.

We have seen countless head coaches leapfrog around, landing in various places across the country -- mostly for more money.  Some coaches are fired and moving around is expected.  However, the head coaches who are not fired often will play a game of chicken/extortion at every opportunity.  These coaches will lobby or pretend to be on someone else’s must hire list as an excuse for a contract renewal for more money.  Just look to all of the coaches who recently singed extensions with increased paychecks.  This is not to say head coaches should be paupers, but mega million dollar pay raises should not be an excuse to sell out.

We are so jaded by now that we think nothing wrong of this behavior and accept it as normal.  Since we do accept this behavior as normal, what we witness are sociopathic people pretending to be coaches.  The truth is head coaches are all about themselves.  If we do not think this if fine, at least we act like we do since we continue to watch regardless of the coach’s behavior.

Is it then any surprise when we see professional players act so destructively selfishly or sociopathically given what they saw and learned firsthand by sociopathic coaches as a player when in collage?  Is it not true that we reap what we sow?  Maybe we should stop the collegiate head coaching madness?