Delay of Game and Blocking by LHS

[XLFD]

On Thursday, February 1, 2018, Ludington High School's girls basketball coach resigned, a fact that was noted without any other comment on the City of Ludington Daily News (COLDNews) and the WMOM Sports FB page. 

No explanation was given that day by the school or by Matt Millspaugh, the coach, nor has it since until this evening 15 days later where the COLDNews reports on a letter from Superintendent Jason Kennedy (pictured above):

Ludington Area Schools responds with apology following resignation of Ludington girls basketball coach

Ludington Area Schools is responding after girls basketball coach Matt Millspaugh resigned Feb. 1.
The Ludington Daily News had asked for a response on that day and Superintendent Jason Kennedy responded that he was looking into the situation and would reply as soon as possible.

Kennedy did reply with the following letter on Friday, Feb. 16:

"Ludington Area Schools received the resignation of Head Varsity Girls’ Basketball Coach, Matt Millspaugh (“Coach”), on February 1, 2018. This resignation took immediate effect. The District has had no knowledge of any allegations of inappropriate activities by the Coach; however, it is important to recognize that during the course of personnel management in an organization, discourse and disagreement may occur.

"In no way, was it the intention of the District to cause hard feelings toward the Coach, our student-athletes and their families, our community, or our school. If this has been the case, please accept this apology on behalf of myself and Ludington Area Schools.

"We care deeply about the success of our students and staff. Moving forward, please know that the District is committed to providing the absolute highest quality educational experiences for its students and student-athletes, and that we will continue to review and reflect upon our practices, procedures, and policies to ensure that we continue to do so."

Respectfully,

Jason J. Kennedy
Superintendent

In the era of the me-too movement in the state where MSU's Larry Nasser (above) groped female athletes for over 20 years, it seems patently irresponsible of Ludington superintendent to wait fifteen days until answering a simple question about why did Millspaugh resign.  Even more irresponsible is the vague and mostly meaningless letter written by the superintendent.  

If there has been no allegations of inappropriate activity by the former coach, why wasn't this immediately acknowledged by Kennedy?  For fifteen days, people in the community may have suspected the worse about Matt Millspaugh coaching high school girls, but in a late Friday afternoon release, they finally decide to absolve him of this burden.  This is grossly unfair to Millspaugh.

Instead of offering anything specific regarding the cause of the resignation, Superintendent Kennedy tells us 'discourse and disagreement' can occur during the course of personnel management.  Even when you understand that this educated school superintendent meant 'discord' (i.e. quarreling) rather than 'discourse' (i.e. conversation), you realize it reveals nothing as its a general observation.

The next paragraph isn't comprehensible; he apologizes at the end of the paragraph for some unclear transgression after saying the district had no intention of creating hard feelings.  For what, Superintendent Kennedy, your inability to address the still-obscure issue immediately and with proper leadership?  

The last paragraph of his letter is surprisingly more devoid of content than the previous paragraphs.  One is left with the impression that a coach resigned 15 days previously and the school just doesn't want to tell the public why, just tell us how great they are doing their job and how lucky you are to have your kid in such a school district.  

Where they can't even give a simple answer to the public 15 days later about why their girl's basketball coach resigned, and create more questions with some letter dotted with flowery generalizations that effectively explain nothing.  

[John Doe Jr]

Wow. 

[Willy]

Kennedy's letter makes no sense. He should explain clearly why the coach left. The parents and team deserve that much. If I were a coach or assistant of any kind dealing with females I would get out of the profession immediately. All it takes is a rumor or misstatement or false accusation of impropriety to ruin a coach's career. I would not be anywhere alone with a female student. This "me to" business has gotten way out of hand. Just touching a female's shoulder or arm can get a man in trouble.

[stump]

Some times in life there comes a day you say to yourself, I don't need to take this shit. I did over 20 years ago.I had a good paying job in upper management with 30  years seniority .I just said enough is enough, I quit!!!!      Even back then there was women who made charges about  men making unwanted comments about how tight their pants were or even if they smelled good today.   I would never work with teenage girls nowadays as a false statement by one could ruin your life forever.  It has happened and even if proved false the headlines of that is on page 6. And of coarse nothing is done to the girl that made the false statements. 

[Willy]

Has anyone noticed that during all the uproar over the MSU. Dr Nassar scandal the press and others have tried to drag couches Izzo and Dantonio into the fray just because some of their players have had women accuse them of wrong doing but not a word has been uttered about the Gymnastics coaches, who happen to be women. The gymnastics program is where this all started. Talk about hypocritical. The "me to" movement is another anti men ploy orchestrated by the left just like the "war on women" B.S. Both of these are typical divisive tactics to drive a social wedge between people.

[XLFD]

A year ago, MSU lady gymnastics coach Kathie Klages 'retired' amid her tepid reaction to the then-growing Nassar scandal, she was replaced by Mike Rowe who has not had similar problems.  According to a report by the Detroit Free Press, court documents allege Klages told a Spartans gymnast to remain quiet about inappropriate behavior by Nassar.  Last month, the long standing athletic director for MSU Mark Hollis stepped down to assist with the healing, he claims not to have been aware of the problem until they became public in September 2016. 

Dantonio or Izzo were likely in the same boat, and they seem like coaches that have and would take bad behavior by their players seriously.  The same people who claimed that Linda Tripp (the woman who exposed Bill Clinton's Nassar-style perversions on Monica Lewinski) is a "backstabbing grouch who betrayed the trust of a friend.".  The 'feminists' of the '90s who enabled Bill Clinton to use his power to take advantage of women and humiliated his female victims created monsters like Larry Nassar and made it harder for other victims to come forth.  

[Willy]

Thanks for that information X. I hope Klages has a good attorney because she is going to get her gym shorts sued off of her at the least and may end up in jail.

[shinblind]

To me this whole episode sounds like "the old", we want you to play certain players because of who their parents are, even if the players are not good and are a hindrance to helping the team win.

That used to be standard operating procedure  in Ludington.

Maybe it is again.

Taken in that context, Superintendent Jason Kennedy chickenshit response almost makes some sense.  

[Barney Reinberg]

The most political job in mason county is the head coach of the LHS girls basketball team. There is even more scrutiny placed on the coach when two of the players have school administrators as a parent.

[XLFD]

Those connections may have had a big part in the resignation, and could definitely explain why the reason remains covertly couched in language and riddles.  I have sent a FOIA request to the school to hopefully get some insight into the move, I'm expecting them to keep blocking me out of the paint. 

[Destiny]

You have it exactly right. Parents get upset that their child isn’t playing and they complain to the coach or school but when your child isn’t playing as much as they would like and the parent is part of the school system what happens? The coach gets booted not the first time it’s happened. Pretty sad when you have a wonderful coach caring about the kids and taking them far in the district as he did other schools and you get rid of them because you can’t separate parenting from a job. Way to mess up a coach’s career and make people question his character you should be ashamed of yourselfs way to be a role model to the kids. Not the superintendents fault he’s just cleaning up some of the employees stupity!

[XLFD]

Destiny, thanks for joining the Ludington Torch and having as your first post a very prescient synopsis of what seems to have happened and who is and who is not to be blamed.  I have received a FOIA response from the superintendent over the incident and the written records in possession of LASD leading up to it.  

I will post that response later without overanalyzing it myself now or later, as I am sometimes prone to do.  I think those who know anything about the situation will learn a little bit more than what Superintendent Kennedy put in his press release; I agree that he had to try to clean up an awkward situation.  The records more than speak for themselves is all I will say at this point.