Chapter 10: The Aftermath

"Turn from the fear of the storms that might be." ~Kyp Malone



Upon sending my notice in to HR, I contacted a handful of MHC skaters to thank them for the experiences we had shared over the past couple of years or so. Although I wasn't remotely okay with what the team and its leadership, past and present, had done, I was still okay with individuals on the team at this point. I absolutely cut ties with the most obvious offenders here and I don't regret that for a moment. I considered what I had seen to be their true colors; how they would respond if times were difficult for them if they had someone around to blame. But we're talking a small number of folks at that time. But unfortunately, this would change.

Something I had seen over my years in this sport is that when a person leaves a league or the sport entirely, they are generally completely forgotten about. I've often been as guilty of this as anyone else; so, believe me when I say there's no self-righteousness there. Most people you meet are just acquaintances as it is and then there are people that must be tolerated because we're all in the same cult...whoops...I mean league. So when I left, I knew I wasn't going to hear from the majority of people within the Denver Roller Dolls. I was okay with that and wouldn't begrudge most of those skaters for that. It is what it is.

But the following months would see supposed friends flat out avoid having anything to do with me. There's a part of me that can understand that I suppose, even though it's not my way. A good friend of mine referred to my old team as a "cult" and I think that's a pretty relevant turn of phrase in this case. If you have someone like me that just got done dirty and is able to freely express themselves, it's going to be difficult to listen to when you have to be a team player and drink the kool-aid. It's also going to be difficult to claim me as a friend once the witch hunt is done and the persecutors are talking shit about me. And I know they did. ;) It was still difficult to watch people I would've done most anything for turn their backs because I couldn't be okay with what that team and its leadership had done. But, so be it. It's better to know where it's at than not. I'm rarely a victim, but on this occasion I was and it was clearly easier to blame the victim than to deal with the real core problems of that team. If I look back at this past weekend, I have to really hand it to MHC; they absolutely identified their biggest obstacle to further success when they adios-ed me. 2011 ended so much differently than 2010. Yeah...

Truth be told, the bulk of this blog was written months ago and reflects a time when I was trying to resolve those nasty months of my life with MHC. And rather than make it all vanilla and PC (which isn't my style), I thought it better to really let people see what it was like and how hard it was to deal with the shit that happened. So I kept the spirit of those words intact. Contrary to the lone commenter's words, I don't think they all suck nor do I hate them all. That is a gross over-simplification of the past nine chapters. I still have people I consider friends on that team and I thank them for being great friends to me this past year. The easy thing to do was to turn their back on me like most did and swallow the words about me that the true douches wanted them to swallow. But they didn't do that and I have much respect and loyalty to that small few that ignored the brainwash. I also still respect some skaters on that team as talented skaters because I believe they are.

Here are some of my big takeaways from my final days as coach of that team. One, things are never as good as they seem when you're winning and they're never as bad as they seem when they're losing. The losses maybe weren't the direct reason for my persecution, but the losses were absolutely the catalyst for everything that would follow. If we beat BAD, I doubt that any of this would've been done to me. I don't necessarily believe that's what should have happened because winning had buried a lot of things on that team, but that is likely what would've happened regardless. Derby is full of many skaters that have never really played on teams and often, they respond to adversity very poorly and selfishly. This is a hard hard reality of derby and it takes a lot of time and energy to try to help many skaters understand what team sports are all about. How to be a good teammate rarely comes naturally; no, these are things that can be learned if people actually pay attention to things like chemistry and the team dynamic.

Two, empowerment in the context of derby often comes at the expense of someone else. I was told a few weeks after I lost the vote that some skaters on the team didn't vote for me because they didn't like the direction the team was headed in if I was in charge. That's pretty hilarious. When did that team or that league get so open-minded to let a non-skater run things? The answer is easy. It starts with "N" and ends with "ever fucking ever". No, this is a league that will give more rights to a skater that's been with the league two months than a non-skater that's been around for years. No, I never had any real power. All I had was the respect I had earned and a strong will combined with a mouth willing to speak my mind. To suggest that as a reason for not voting for me is just silly. This was more about a new captain making it all about this pseudo-power. She wanted to run things and knew that I wouldn't just step aside for her to be the douche I already knew she was. So she empowered herself by taking away my voice. Just as the former captains had done to skaters on the team and former MHC skaters in the league. The former captains empowered themselves by bullying former boards of directors into being left alone to do whatever they wanted and former treasurers into getting what they wanted for a budget. The 2011 leadership empowered themselves by playing stupid games and making talented skaters feel like shit. This allowed them to play favorites and ignore some really blatant conflicts of interest while the people being screwed over by these practices felt like they couldn't speak up about it. The team empowered themselves by shitting on coaches with that travesty of an SOP they created. There's a long list of this; so, I'll stop here. I don't for a second believe that this is at all exclusive to my former team or my former league either. This is the real ugliness that runs beneath the surface in derby. It's mostly a clique-based machine where those on top empower themselves by shitting on others within their own team or their own league. I'm no expert, but I don't believe that's the real principle behind the concept of empowerment. But that's how derby tends to translate it. It's not a hard rule because I have seen exceptions as well, but I know where my money would go if it was betting time.

Third, for the love of fuck, be up front rather than set up secret meetings that exclude portions of your team. If not for all of these ugly events, there's no way to know how things would've ended up. I may have walked away on my own. I may have happily dedicated myself to working with the league skaters and B team with no hard feelings. I may have been voted out on the up and up. All are reasonable and thoughtful endings to my story. But as soon as a group of people commits to executing such disrespectful actions, there aren't many positive results or interpretations to come from it. People can say I wasn't scapegoated or the fall guy. I would then point out that there was only one single person out of 22 people removed from the team. Guess who that is?

Last is probably the single biggest lesson I can take away from all this. That is that it's not okay to avoid drama or witch hunts. There are going to be situations where people will try to do things against others that will require action and strength of character to ensure that person is treated appropriately. Passivity, apathy, and submissiveness are usually not the right answers to that sort of question. These are all easily manipulated traits. In fact, the people committed to using bully tactics, cowardice, or douchebaggery are counting on others not wanting to get involved or to take a stand for what's ethical and moral. When the majority chooses (consciously or subconsciously) to avoid conflict, then a small few will end up making the decision or affecting the decision to get what they want. And the actions of that small few will then paint everyone with the same brush.

It's also that much harder when the small few are your leaders as well. On a team in a sport like derby, most skaters equate resistance or standing up for themselves or others as reasons you'll get cut from the team. Rock the boat and you'll be drowned. The worst part is that the only thing between that perception and the truth is the trust people have in their leaders. If someone is in an environment with less than ideal leaders, they can be cut or benched for all sorts of made up reasons. "You didn't look good at practice yesterday or in the warm-up or whenever some random skating situation happened." "You don't play well with this person." "You ask for too much help on the track." And whatever else. Even if the reason is actually valid and true, if you don't trust your leadership, you won't accept their reasons as valid and true anyway.

To be perfectly frank (and why wouldn't I be after all this eh?), the majority of leadership in derby lacks vision and insight. I've learned a whole hell of a lot of lessons over my years in this sport and the one I encounter the most is that real lack of understanding of others' strengths and weaknesses on and off the track. That lack of understanding as to how to get a group of people to buy into something, make them great at it, and win with it.

These are just a few of the lessons I've learned from this ugly experience with the Mile High Club as well as from my many experiences with derby overall. I imagine in a year's time that I'll finally be able to look back at MHC in 2009 warmly without having the way it all ended a year later blocking such great memories from my view. At least that is my hope.

Until then, skate slow and go backwards.

Chapter 9: Freedom?

"Don't let a win get to your head or a loss to your heart." ~Chuck D.

The final step of the hunt was now at hand. There were three candidates in the running (if you count your prick of a narrator): the assistant coach, the B team coach, and myself. After however long it took for the team to vote, I get a phone call right after B team practice telling me I had lost in the vote. I wasn't surprised obviously, but that doesn't mean hearing that you've been successfully attacked politically in the shadows is any easier to hear either. There had been 19 votes in total for me (8 yes, 10 no, and 1 abstain), but this is where it gets even more interesting.

In the following months, I would find out that at least two of the skaters never even voted at all. So consider this math equation. There are only 20 people eligible to vote (supposedly), I received votes from 19 of those people, and yet 2 people never voted. 20-2=19? And that's just the two I know of; there may have been more than that as a few of those skaters were terrible about doing anything computer related. You're probably thinking how would that even be possible because a Yahoo poll or a forum poll don't even really allow for that to happen. Well, that's why you use Survey Monkey instead. Because you can give that link to someone not on the team to cast a vote or because you can just use a different computer to vote again. Of course something like this was how it all ended too. 8 chapters of a political, cowardly witch hunt and they can't even vote ethically? Yep.

So now you have me bumped out of a team I had a huge hand in building. So now you also have the former assistant coach as the head coach. A person who never contributed a drill to the team. A person that while a likeable guy, was never passionate about derby. A person that avoided conflict consistently and had been constantly in my ear that I should just wait because these last few months (the previous 7 chapters) weren't what I thought they were. I was just making shit up I guess. Truth be told, I brought him into coaching and he had successfully ridden my coat tails. He now was the head coach of a team he hadn't done much to build. I'd say that must be nice, but I personally can't even fathom ever doing that because I'm not wired that way. It is what it is though. The team voted him in and I guess being better liked instead of respected counts for more when a witch hunt is afoot.

And then there's our B team coach, who is the live-in boyfriend of Alexandra (former captain B). It's truly impossible to overlook this conflict of interest considering all that Alexandra had done to spearhead this whole cowardly episode. But what's a little taint afer all the team and its leadership had already done? It's totally cool at that point; why not? Our B team coach was at least passionate about derby and that I can respect. But I never cared for how things happened between MHC, the A travel team, and the B travel team. New MHC drills would show up at B team practices with new names because Alexandra would tell him about them. He didn't ask me or even Sukie (former captain A) what the drills were for or how they applied to our team and everyone knows that Alexandra doesn't know that shit. Then he would just throw them out to his team, making it seem like they were his ideas. He never stuck around after a scrimmage or came to an MHC practice to see new drills. Guess you don't need to when your girlfriend co-captain is just feeding you everything at home. Also never saw what to look for in a drill either; derby always seemed to be more like a fantasy sport for him. Having not played anything competitively on skates, it always seemed like he lacked the insight into what contact was like and what it was like to be in the action.

I do have to say that such intellectual thievery really bothered me and Sukie because it wasn't done ethically; we're all the same league, but at least ask the people who know what they're doing what new drills they have and then have the common courtesy to give credit where it's due. But that was never my experience in 4 years with the league when it came to anything under the DRD umbrella whether it be drills, committee work, or whatever else.

I realize that folks outside of that team probably think I'm just jealous or that I'm bitter about losing the vote in speaking about the two current coaches. That is not the case. It's a case of watching something you sweated blood to build, on and off the track, being given to people who did nothing to build it. It's a case of watching that same something play the exact same way all season in 2011 because they lacked insight and vision.

So you can say I'm jealous or whatever else; that's your personal right to have an uneducated opinion if you like. But anyone that thinks that should try putting in hours of your time earning respect and building a team on and off the track. A team that went winless in the first 6 months of 2008 to a third place medal at nationals in 2009. And then watch as that same team backdoors you and hands all of your work to others. If you can go through all of that (plus a team-initiated witch hunt )and then be warm and friendly to the people that did that to you, you can say whatever you want about me. Of course, if you go through all of that and respond like that, you probably are a living miracle because I would think having absolutely no spine would lead to death.

Just to wrap up the rest of this story (I'll post some final thoughts on this whole episode in another day or two), I submitted my two weeks notice to the league the same day as being told I had been voted out. I couldn't accept a lesser coaching role in a league where this type of thing could happen nor could I expect to peacefully co-exist with some of these cowards either. I didn't go out in a big ball of flames by telling this story to my league or filing some grievance against these people. Not because I'm that kind of awesome, but because I didn't want to put some of the skaters I cared about and respected through all of that.

And just to be crystal clear, I personally do not claim to be perfect. I make mistakes in judgment and in actions like everyone else. I also don't believe I should've been automatically voted back in as a head coach because I had always been the head coach or because of our past success. This story is also not the crucifixion of St. Angus. Even though I'm not perfect or worthy of being called a saint, I don't in any way believe that makes what these people did okay either. Anyway, this is the bulk of the story. Chapter 10 will follow with other thoughts and experiences since all this happened.

Chapter 8: The Dark at the End of Tunnel

"Punish me. I do not deserve it. But because I do not deserve it, I will accept it so that the world will know that I am right and that you are wrong." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.

Before I get to this conversation between myself and the current captains, there are a few things that need to be added so that some might understand what I had heard and what I knew going into that conversation. I had been told that Jane (current captain B going forward because someone was getting confused) had been campaigning for awhile for my assistant coach to be the head coach. This was not surprising because Jane had full control of the assistant coach and could have him do whatever she wanted. I watched this happen for the full 2010 season on their home team where he was coach and she was the captain. The puppet strings had been attached for a full year and Jane is all about getting her way without a fight. I also heard about Jane telling MHC skaters that they just needed to hang in there because the job was almost complete. Whatever job might that be I wonder?

Of course, where I get lectured for supposedly "rallying" the troops, here you have your current captain doing the same shit, thinking nobody knows about it. I wonder if she was told that was inappropriate. Nah, that doesn't fit in with the pattern of this tale. Jane had also asked Sukie (or former captain A) for all of our team's drills from the past seasons and had also asked the former captains for their thoughts and opinions on running the team. But I was left out of those discussions for some reason. Sorry, I forgot that you don't ask scapegoats for those things because we didn't even let the scapegoat tell his side of the story in the first place. So why on earth would we want to know what it was like running the team? Funny thing about Jane asking the former captains for advice on running the team was that the former captains still thought they were running the team through her because they were doing all the work for her. That's what happens when you work with some types of people.

And if we want to talk about drills, the bulk of those weren't really the former captains to give to be honest; that's especially the case for the things we did in 2010 as neither former captain showed much interest in contributing drills to the team. If it was something to do with glitter or dancing, then they had full rights to that because those were the main things they contributed in 2010.

The former captains had let their team and their teammates down with their attitudes, their "leadership", and their work ethic (or lack there of), but they were clearly not identified as a reason for this team's problems. I mean sure, they were told by the team what their shortcomings were and how they had affected the team. But upon hearing what the team's problems with them were, they chose to blame me. And upon blaming me, it was like they instantly absolved of those faults and the damage they had done to their team. It's almost like, gasp, the team heard what it wanted to hear about everything being my fault. And from there, the team and its new captains had just ran with it. Didn't matter that I often stepped up to make sure things got done, with the captains' approval, because when you lose, you weren't doing the right thing for the team. No no, it's a negative then because it's me or I'm a strong-willed man or whatever other bullshit people want to float. This is the culture of negativity that we had and though I never intended things to be like that, I get to own my piece of that culture being there too.

This is what I knew and how I felt going into this discussion with the current captains. We had a conference call to discuss things. I felt that Zorro (current captain A) made an honest effort to understand where I was coming from and why I was upset. I still believe that and she was trying to keep me from walking away before a vote had even taken place. Unfortunately, her words were consistently undermined by the words of Jane. I hear things like "I don't know how I could work with you." Or better yet, she goes out of her way to tell me that the team voted for the captains to have full control over things and for the coaches to have no say. This is what she tells me, essentially trying to throw things in my face for some unknown reason. Oh wait, she was upset by a couple of raw emails I had sent to the current captains where I talked about how shitty things were, how I felt like the team had stabbed me in the back, and how I felt about the captains enabling all of it by doing sitting back and leaving me with no voice. Hard to understand why I'd be upset I guess. So, let's get me on the phone so that you can grossly exaggerate the feelings of the team by manipulating a single vanilla voting option on a poll. Frankly, I don't even understand why she participated in the conference call because she had a clear agenda and it wasn't to bring me back.

Although, that's not really true. I would guess that her participation was solely so that she could later say that she was on the call and that she had tried to talk to me. That's her two-faced way of doing things and I had seen it for awhile as it is. I knew of her transgressions and bad feelings for others; things that were usually directed at her teammates in one way or another. I had seen the other side of this person. Zorro was the complete opposite of this though. I sort of wish that she wasn't a captain so that she never got thrown into the mud with the former captains or Jane. Although she was part of the problem to a degree with how the current captains had been treating coaches (guilt by association), I never felt like she was trying to drive me crazy or drive me out. I respected her for what she tried to accomplish and that respect still remains.

The rest of the conference call went like this. Me: I don't like this for this reason. Zorro: I can see that, but this is what I think the team is trying to say. Jane: Snide comment that undermines everything Zorro had just said to me. They tell me I have a day and a half to decide if I want to submit my name and that's the conversation. I thought about what Zorro had said because Jane's words would've only convinced me to burn a bunch of bridges while telling the league there's no fucking way I'm going to consider working with this group of people again.

In the day I took to decide, Alexandra (former captain B) was complaining about it being unfair that I missed the deadline. Why would she complain? Besides the obvious douchebaggery she had led against me, her live-in boyfriend, our B travel team coach, had also conveniently entered his name for consideration as an MHC coach too. But I'll follow up on this in the next chapter.

My decision was to submit my name. I didn't believe for a second that I would be voted in; why would anyone think they would after weeks of this sort of treatment? No, I submitted for personal closure regarding what had happened. I submitted to have that personal validation that the months of secret politicking and shady tactics would influence the voting the way I expected it would. I submitted also to give a few skaters an option other than just being stuck with the other two candidates. But I didn't expect to win. I even texted an MHC skater as much the day before I submitted my letter of intent. I had chosen to believe bullshit from some for weeks, but at this stage, I knew what was up.

Chapter 7: SOP Shenanigans

"Patience is a virtue until its silence burns you." ~Tunde Adebimpe

At this point, everything was left waiting on this coach SOP. The coach vote wasn't going to happen until the SOP was finalized and I wasn't really all that gung ho about returning given all that had happened and where things were clearly being steered. But I had confidants telling me to wait before making a "rash" decision. How being continuously disrespected by that team and treated like shit by friends could lead to a "rash" decision is not something I can logically understand. At the end of the day though, I am a fool for the concept of team and always have been. I relented from walking away and did wait for this SOP to be created and sent to myself and the assistant to review and give feedback upon.

Though I made a decision to wait, I felt completely betrayed by this team in my heart of hearts. Depending on the skater, I had worked with most of that team for 2 to 3 seasons and didn't really understand why things were being done this way. We were a top 5 league in the sport, had taken home 3rd place nationally in 2009, and were true innovators of a style of play that would completely change flat track derby going forward. Though we should have done a lot better at 2010 regionals, a couple of narrow, last jam losses versus all that had been accomplished prior lent no logic to this course of events. But I often deal in cold, hard logic (though not exclusively haha) and that left me blind to what this group of people had become. It made it easier to be blind because the few people close to me were telling me the piss coming down was just rain. That made it seem possible that my instincts, screaming betrayal at the top of their lungs, were inaccurate this time around. I wanted to give these people the benefit of the doubt because of the ties we had built in the past years. Giving people the benefit of the doubt is also a massive change in my personal philosophy on life and people because my life experiences have shown that benefit of the doubt just bites you in the ass later. I wanted to believe that the bulk of the team could see through the slimy tactics being used against me. I wanted to believe that the bulk of the team could see and at least quietly appreciate the things I had done for them.

Just so it's said once aloud, 2010 was far and away my best personal year as a coach. I had greater self-control, a better understanding of how to help jammers, and a greater sense of purpose to the whole league instead of just the travel team (though no one could say I neglected MHC at all). Of course, the access I received to help the rest of the league was only because of our success nationally in 2009. Before having success, I wasn't really allowed any sort of access to newer skaters or home team skaters. But knowing that the perception of the travel team within the league was that we were mean and clique-ish made me push to have a chance to work with skaters not on my team. Of course, I was never smart enough to run a regular league practice (haha); so, I had to do different things to help the newer skaters and the lesser trained of our league. Like an individual hitting practice where I would just take hits from skaters and try to help them with technique and such because one of our most arrogant MHC skaters had been consistently teaching our brand new skaters the wrong way to hit. And while all this bullshit was going down with my team, I was running some offseason practices where I would only work with non-travel team skaters (no A or B team allowed). While there was a big witch hunt directed my way first thing in 2010, that was also only related to things that I had done in 2009. I had also chosen to distance myself from the former captains intentionally because I didn't think it was right that the highest group of leadership in the league was perceived to be unapproachable and a clique on its own. That is not a reputation I wanted; so, I set about changing that reputation rather than taking the route of the former captains, which was the route of bitching about it but still doing the same things that lent credibility to the claims in the first place. So, I find it sickly ironic that the year I was on my best behavior and was across the board more approachable and helpful than any year prior was also the year where I would be under constant attack.

Back to the story at hand. The SOP took for-fucking-ever to even get the first draft done. The longer I was blown off regarding this SOP, the more agitated I was becoming. I still was receiving very little communication from the current captains, which only served to agitate me more. Then finally the SOP comes our way to look at. I found it hard to believe it would take so long to compile such a vindictive document. This document was a symbol of coaching castration. There were a couple of areas that were just thinly veiled personal attacks on me. In my mind, it said that captains ran everything and they chose what a coach was allowed to do. It set up a witch hunt mechanism where any skater could complain about the coach (didn't have to be all that legit a complaint either) and get the coach ran out the door if that's what they wanted to do. And yet, there was nothing added for dealing with captains who aren't doing their job, which is funny considering that I've dealt with that sort of captain in two of my three seasons. I wasn't surprised to see the SOP read as it did because all signs pointed to coaches being blamed for the team's shortcomings in 2010. Having said that, this SOP was still deeply offensive to myself and some of the language in this SOP had no business being in an SOP. I had consistently had to fight, and hard, to try to gain respect for the coaches in my time with the Denver Roller Dolls. I would be misleading people if I said this was a problem caused by the whole league. No, this was often a problem created by a few of the "privileged" ones. This document basically undid all of my struggle to gain respect for coaches as it removed any sense of worth or contribution a coach may have had and made them a puppet to the captains, which is what the team must've wanted. I had long felt like my league and the sport treats its coaches like second-class citizens and this document only served to put that in writing. Walk around on eggshells and hope you don't offend anyone, coaches, because the ruling class of DRD will witch hunt you right out the door if you even come close.

The league wasn't going to say anything about this piece-of-shit document either. Ever. Through brutal politics and nasty defensiveness, MHC captains had made themselves the privileged group within the Denver Roller Dolls and there was no one that would stand up and fight that kind of fight against them. Especially when they had chosen the controversial one, myself, to systematically execute shady politics against, there was no way they would be held accountable for it. It was always much easier for the non-MHC skaters to just go with the MHC flow and bitch about things behind the scenes than to stand up and be accounted for.

I'm again told not to make a "rash" decision because we can provide feedback on this SOP. Fool that I am, I did wait and provided feedback to the SOP. After again waiting forever for the team to vote on the proposed changes, they return the same basic document. The changes were minor and the message was still clear to me what they were trying to say without having the stones to actually come out and say it.

After thinking about this finalized document, I decided that I wasn't going to submit my name to be coach again. It was just too douche-y to be a part of and it was clearly being advertised that the team blamed me for our choke against BAD as it was. I texted the current captains about my decision first thing and then let a handful of other skaters know that I wasn't going to submit my name either. Somehow, no one understood why I was so outraged at this document. Somehow, no one else saw this document to be what it was. The current captains wanted to talk to me about my decision, but because they took so long getting things done, it was already Christmas weekend and the name submission deadline was coming up. I wish I could give them more credit for their effort to discuss things with me at this point, but the sad fact is that their way of doing things and the disrespectful way I had been treated the past couple of months had helped get me to this breaking point. They didn't have anything to do with the secret meetings; that much is true. But they were also the ones unwilling to use their leadership to do what was morally right. It's always a sad story if I am the one that can see the morally right decision and others can't.

Chapter 6: Hooray for new captains?

"There's people living now that ain't got no heart and ain't never had none." ~Joe Strummer

I had been told around the time of the "secret" meetings that the team had discussed doing something similar with the coaches for the 2011 along the lines of our rivals, Rocky Mountain. For those that don't know, that means the role of the coach would be more of a puppet and figurehead. I could take that as a personal attack if I chose to (because I'm no puppet), but I didn't spend any energy on this when told. It sure is funny how many team decisions on what to do with the coaches flowed out of those cowardly team meetings.

My sit-down with the former captains was pretty much the last time I would interact in-person with this team. The skaters had been using that skater-only email address to discuss things for weeks and the coaches were conveniently left in the dark about any and all of those things. All I was hearing from the current captains was some Flavor Flav shit: "I can't do nuttin' for ya, man; Flavor Flav's got problems of his own."

Then one day, out of nowhere, the current captains put up a new poll regarding the coaches. What did this poll ask? This:

Q1 - When should we close the SOP idea generation period & when should we elect coaches by?

Q2 - Are you willing to allow the coaches to provide feedback on the coaches SOP?

Q3 - Should the coaches be removed from the yahoo group during the official off-season?

Now if someone read that objectively, I don't know how anyone could come away from this thinking that coaches (or more accurately, a coach) weren't being scapegoated by the team. The team was going to re-write an SOP for coaches, decide whether the current, experienced coaches were allowed to give input, and then to also remove them from the yahoo group so that they didn't have to continue to use their skater-only email address. This took the politics to a new level as now the current captains are directly assaulting the coaches for the team. I use the plural version of coaches very lightly as my assistant coach was often meek and generally just along for the ride. Not sure if that was just him or if it had to do with being sold out by his home team captains back in 2009. They sent him to do a captain's job (at least on the home teams) of telling skaters they weren't going to play as much in the beginning of the bout for lack of practice attendance and when those skaters bitched at him, the home team captains sold him out and let him eat the brunt of it. Did this change how he would handle things go forward or was he always going to avoid conflict? No way of knowing.

The results of the poll were that the team "allowed" me and the assistant coach to provide input on what they decided to do with the coach SOP and that, as expected, we were removed from the Yahoo group. Using a skater-only email address is just a pain you know?

My complaints about how things were being done just fell on deaf ears with the current captains. Ditto the total disrespect for which I and the other coach (whether he wanted to see it or not) had been shown. The political machine was now completely in motion and nothing was going to stop it from getting whatever it is that it wanted. All the cowardice that had been put on full display was just in my mind apparently. My assistant coach was happy to wait and let the team do whatever it wanted to do, regardless of whether the methods were appropriate or not. I presume part of this outlook of his was because of his meek nature when it came to conflict with the team, partly because he hadn't been slandered as I had by skaters on the team, and partly because he planned to be a candidate for the head coaching gig for the 2011 season. Doesn't help your case to make waves right before a vote. Wait, did I forget to mention that all of these things had been done in advance of the team's vote on its coaches for the 2011 season? I sure did; how convenient of me! I'll tell the story however I want to. haha

The team had successfully created a box of injustice for me to live in until their witch hunt could be successfully concluded. After years of having the team's back, the team was now showing me how much they had mine.

Chapter 5: You Didn't Think the Story Was Over Now Did You?

"Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.

Upon hearing what had been done, I was livid. Truly livid. Because this was not done in an acceptable manner, there is no nice way to describe how those deeds made me feel upon hearing about the sort of cowardice and disrespect being used so liberally. To make matters worse for me, the whole team essentially participated in this by being there, whether they wanted to or not. By being there, each individual has to own it and live with it however they choose to do so. They can thank their former captains for putting them in that position. I personally imagine that denial was the most likely route taken.

Tangent alert! About a month prior to all this going down, I was at a league meeting where a friend of mine and a good player was voted off the league in a rather disgusting manner. She wasn't allowed to be at the meeting, but instead was allowed to write something for someone else to read. After her statement had been read to the group, a couple of people took it upon themselves to make it emotional and personal, assumably in order to sway opinions. That did all they needed to see her voted out and like my situation, she wasn't allowed to defend herself either. Though I voted to retain her, I still hate that I was there and have a link to such shady shit. It was and is shameful behavior, yet our league allowed it. I have to live with being there, knowing what happened and the effect cowardly opinions voiced to a voting group had on the outcome.

Back to my story, I don't know what was more frustrating in the days after finding out. The fact that it had happened and no one did the right thing and spoke to how inappropriate it was for the group to sit there and attack me when I wasn't even allowed to defend myself or to share a much different perspective than what they were given. Or the fact that after I found about it ON MY OWN, friends and colleagues tried to make feel like the bad guy. Why would I be upset by what had been done to me by the team? I heard things like "the meetings were a good thing" or "people wouldn't have talked about you if you were there". Seriously? To know that people had been brainwashed into thinking those meetings were remotely okay was baffling. How could such deliberate, deceptive character assassination be "a good thing"? How could friends of mine not understand my point of view? Why didn't they want to hear about how shady the team's actions were?

At this part, I could also point out that this turn of events actually had broken certain areas of my old league's code of conduct. But no one involved thought anything of it. I assume that's because it was me and my former league had already established a precedent that it was okay to change things when dealing with me. No one even had the spine to speak to me about what had happened; I was instead left to initiate (as usual) and discover for myself the sinister nature of my team at this point. Friends jst sat on the info and left me in the dark. That sure is what friends are for eh?

Later the same night I found about it, I voiced my outrage to current captain A (who I will refer to as Zorro going forward) about what had been done and I was at first comforted to know that she wasn't happy with what had been done either. From this conversation, a meeting between myself, the two new captains, and the assistant coach was set up. Looking back, this meeting only appears to have been an excuse for them to lecture and chastise me for saying things to skaters on the team and then those same skaters taking it to others on the team. Insert the definition of hypocrisy here please. How about those secret meetings where the whole team was allowed to talk about me without being allowed to be there? I asked them that. I was told, "There's nothing we can do about that now; you should do something for yourself." I would've considered that statement to be unbelievable had I not consistently heard the same garbage from the current captains over the following days. I asked, "How is it fair that skaters on the team were put in a position of having to defend me because I wasn't allowed to be there?" "That never happened, at least in my meeting" was the response I got. See how convenient two meetings with different people in attendance is? Makes for a great excuse later. I had people tell me specifically that they tried speaking up for me and defending me. I was told to only talk the two current captains about my issues, which is rather hilarious considering that they weren't listening, and that I also needed to have a sit down with the two former captains. Welcome to the systematic execution of two-faced politics (or a shit-stained double standard), my friends (or my strangers or my enemies depending on who's eyes are reading this).

This is rather amazing if one thinks about it. Leadership wouldn't help me, but I could only talk to leadership about my issues. No one, and I mean no one, else was ever held to such a standard. Not the former leadership or anyone on the team or the league for that matter. This part isn't surprising to me because this had always been the case with Denver. The Roller Dolls had a history of giving me different (ie fewer) rights than anyone else; so, why wouldn't a team within the same league pull the exact same shit? What was going to stop them from doing it? Sure wasn't going to be their consciences.

Tangent again, this time it's related to talking shit to teammates about teammates. I had apparently fallen secretly in love with Sukie at some point, at least according to Sukie. I was being different around her and to her; so, obviously the rational reason is love and jealousy of whoever the fuck she was dating at that time. I can't even make up such things. The rational reason couldn't be that I expect a captain to care about her team and her own performance and when she doesn't, that I don't have that much respect for her continuing on as the captain. That's just me being a fool I guess. Love will do that someone I suppose. And it was a secret because everyone knows that I'm afraid to express myself. This is just too hilarious and absurd at the same time not to mention it.

I would continue to ask the current captains to assist me in doing the right thing as leadership and setting something up for me to provide the other side or at least allow me to speak to the skaters over the following days. I was consistently told to do it myself because they didn't have the time. So I email something to the team and hear crickets back. Not a soul responds. Funny that because I'm pretty sure multiple people talked about me in those meeting. Strange that once people vent about you to the voting group that they don't want to face that person. It's almost like that's the easier route huh?

Only other thing I'll mention in this chapter is that I did have a sit down with the former captains eventually. They blamed the current captains for not sitting down with me sooner regarding what came from the skaters about me in those meetings and yet, the current captains told me to deal directly with the former captains regarding the secret meetings. That's a really lovely circle of non-accountability set up there. Current captains don't want to talk about it or own it and the former captains say they were afraid and that the current captains should've talked to me sooner. The other things the former captains said were of little importance to this story; they only served to show their true colors again and again. Those colors would be defensiveness, lack of accountability, and zero contrition for their actions against me.

The politics is about to ramp up now...

Chapter 4:The Wave of Vinegar

"Shadows and phantoms convene in the snow, among the low whispers are voices you know." ~Neil Fallon

Immediately after this meeting, I went with my assistant coach for food to try to sort out what had just happened in that meeting. Like me, he was bewildered by the things that were said at the end of the meeting; things that appeared to be setting me up to eat the majority of the blame. We talked for awhile and while I was weary of what had been happening over the past few months, I chose to give the benefit of the doubt to the team and the disturbing comments made to me. I figured that given only one week had passed since the team shit the bed at regionals, some venting may be necessary in order to be able to move on in a healthy manner.

Having no reason to think there was a sinister foundation being laid down against me at this point, we organized some footage watching for a month later. We would sit down and watch the BAD bout and also finish the team meeting from the prior month. The turnout for this was unexpectedly low and so I was told no additional meeting was necessary. I was personally fine with that as I was only setting up meetings at the request of some of the team. So this was just watching footage and identifying the numerous mistakes that had been made in the BAD bout. From there, everyone went home.

At the same time as this footage watching event, Alexandra had sent an email to the team for "team bonding". This email had a stipulation in it that read, "I'm thinking that this should be for girls only (sorry boys!)." At the time, I thought this to be no big deal as the team's completely idiotic obsession with glitter had never resonated well with me and I had no interest in being around such nonsense. Ignoring the obvious gender-based segregation and the implications that coaches aren't part of the team, I moved on very quickly from this stupidity. But I didn't know that this would be the first in a series of moves by the team and its female leadership to set me up.

What this deceptive little email was actually doing (as I would later find out) was creating two separate secret team meetings for the skaters to attend. Of course, this wouldn't be a problem to have a player-only meeting as it is acceptable in team sports to do so as long as it's done appropriately. What isn't acceptable is communicating to skaters through a MHC skater-only email address to set it up. What isn't acceptable is intentionally excluding members of the team (which coaches are to a degree) when people are going to talk about them (which the skaters did). What isn't acceptable is intentionally deceiving members of the team and being secretive little scheming douchebags. But at the time, I didn't know any of this was occurring or that our two wonderful former captains had set this up. Everyone on the team did a "wonderful" job of keeping myself and the other coach in the dark about this for weeks as well. Who wouldn't love that sort of respect? Additionally, because not everyone could make one day, they set up two separate meeting days. Very few people outside of the former captains attended both meetings, which is really an ideal way to disseminate different information to different people. Whether that was done intentionally or not, the results were undeniable in their effectiveness.

To go on a quick tangent to this, I shouldn't call them "secret" meetings. I say that because I was later told by Alexandra that the meetings weren't secret because of that MHC skater-only email address. When I pointed out that some skaters didn't know along with the coaches, I got no response. I was also told by both former captains, in a sit down we would have later, that their reason for taking that route was some sort of convenient fear they had of dealing with me. It wasn't because they were cowards that had the easier route of avoiding conflict right in front of them. No, it couldn't have been that. Or that they really feared doing the right thing because being accountable is difficult (see, there was a reason I brought it up in the beginning). No, not that either. It was because they were conveniently afraid of me. Considering I had worked with Sukie for 2 1/2 seasons and Alexandra for 2 seasons, I give no weight to fear being the reason to go the route they chose. It was convenient for them and allowed them to avoid doing anything respectable. Hell, that wouldn't really fit in with their reputations anyway.

Let's return back from that tangent shall we? Within a week of these team meetings occurring, the new captain selection poll closed and we had two new captains. I still hadn't heard a word about anything regarding these meetings; I had no idea what this group of people had done. Four days later, while attending the RMRG/DRD B team bout at the Bladium, all of the red flags I had been ignoring really started to scream out within my mind. I was at this bout with an MHC skater who (I thought) was a good friend of mine. I asked her what was going on and after some persistence, she proceeded to tell me about these meetings and what had been discussed. More importantly, she told me about one of the main focuses in the meeting. And that would be yours truly.

In addition to the team discussing me, another focus was the team finally trying to hold the former captains accountable. To which, quite predictably, both former captains blamed me for most of the things that went wrong. Neither captain had any sort of history for owning their own shortcomings. Wonderful at taking credit, whether theirs or not, they were just as wonderful at deflecting blame when there was blame to be had, whether theirs individually, the two captains together, or all three of us as MHC leadership. Their defensiveness was long a source of frustration and anguish for most of the team, but again, the team didn't want to address the problem and chose to ignore it like the big elephant in the room it was for months.

I wasn't aware of how the rest of the team really felt about their former captains as I hadn't truly seen their douche-y behavior until a few months before. Even then, it was just directed at me. The team didn't talk to me about it because it assumed I couldn't think for myself and that all three of us were the same. That's a pretty convenient cop-out. Most anyone that has met me knows that while I'm not the friendliest person ever (huge understatement), I think for myself and I'm more about the team as a whole than any single skater or two (even if they are the captains). Cliques are a huge problem in every derby league and they can be distastrous to a team. Had I been informed of how most of the team really felt, I would've addressed the problem with the captains, at the very least. No promises of how it would've went, but it would've been voiced for the sake of the team.

If you're a logical sort and you're reading this blog, you might think that the next course of action for the team would be to hold their captains accountable for their behavior, their lack of commitment, and their other shortcomings. You would be wrong in this situation though. They were still skaters on the team and through their manipulative words and ways of doing things, they essentially told the team that they were just poor little pawns of the true problem (here's a hint; its name rhymes with Schmangus Schmon).

Long story short, plenty of skaters walked away from those secret meeetings with a perception that I was being scapegoated by the former captains. I even heard the term witch hunt being tossed around regarding myself and what had been said and how it had been said. The short version of my character assassination read something like this:

"He's running everything and we (the former captains) have no say in the things that have happened. We, as captains, have no control over him and what he does. And oh yeah, he says mean things (apparently exclusively)."

Chapter 3: The Onset of Politics

"This is beginning to feel like the bolt busted loose from the lever." ~Tunde Adebimpe

Some of the team really wanted to have team meeting after regionals and it was set for the following weekend at our practice space. We had a decent turnout from the skaters and the first portion of the meeting was generally productive in my opinion. We talked about what the blockers may have done incorrectly and how to fix that along with a number of other relevant topics about our underachievement from the weekend before. It was a healthy dialogue and then the mood started to change around halfway through. Jane clearly steered the discussion to a different place.

Skaters began to talk about how the tension had affected them and how they didn't have a lot of confidence in each other the prior weekend. I added a comment along those same lines. Something to the effect that I had our jammer call off the second to last jam against BAD at 0-0 because based on how the rest of the bout had gone, I didn't have faith that we would have outplayed BAD in that jam. Something that was brutally obvious to anyone watching and part of my job as a real coach is to do what needs to be done to win.

This comment was taken by Jane and twisted to mean I had no faith in the team and that certain skaters could feel that. She would in fact reference how shitty what I said was over the last hour in her manipulative, backhanded comment sort of way. I was very unhappy that she would take things like that, but I also didn't feel that was the time or place to ask her to stop being a douche either as I wanted the team to feel free to express themselves without anyone becoming defensive. Later, I would realize that this decision was a mistake. I also listened to former captain B (who will be referred to as Alexandra going forward) and Jane say how my "screaming" at them on the bench the previous weekend wasn't helping them perform. This was an interesting take. I'm not known for screaming at my players (a referee or three yes) and the situation they were referring to was obviously when they butchered a jam and as they came off the track, I told them that wasn't good enough. I was never out-of-control of my emotions that weekend, even though I had plenty of reasons to just blow up. Rather than just accepting their play was poor, they introduced some irrational emotions into the discussion so that I could be their fall guy, the scapegoat for their own inadequacies. The most priceless part of this piece is my one-on-one discussion with Jane a few days later. While she had so casually sold me out in front of the team a few days before, she quite hypocritically tells me about how her teammates in other sports would say things to each other like "What the fuck are you doing out there?" and how that was an acceptable way to talk to each other on the bench in a team sport. That's one of two things in my book; either simple-minded hypocrisy or more likely, intentionally manipulating the different situations for a desired effect. Make it emotional in front of the team and then play it off in private to that person.

Jane also decided to throw out an uneducated remark about how nobody liked our team because of myself and the former captains. I don't believe being liked by your opponents is remotely necessary in a competitive, physical sport. I actually think that's a sign of mental weakness to want to be liked by your opponents. I'd much rather be hated and respected then to be loved and get no respect.

The meeting ended on a similar scapegoating discussion as well. Shortly after the above words finished, we somehow ended up discussing how I could give a skater a look as they came off track and it would make or break how they played that game. Seriously? While I don't doubt that was a true statement for some people, it's unfair to me and it also allows skaters to blame their issues on me and how they interpret my looks during a bout. Irregardless of how fair that is, that's not something I should have dropped on my shoulders right after two tough losses. The beginning of the cowardice to follow has its roots in this discussion. To say that my look could be the reason why someone wasn't playing well is a sign of human weakness if true; if false, it's a sign of the human condition, a condition that can't be accountable for one's own performance on track.

I told people that kind of control wasn't something they should give to anyone else, myself included. I also had to repeatedly tell skaters that I can't go out on the track to do anything for them. That's not my role; that is a captains' role to lead by example on track. And when your captains say don't go for the big hits and play together and then go out and consistently do the exact opposite, then they are leading by example, like it or not. But a coach can't do anything more than try to focus the team during timeouts and halftimes and get them to execute like they know how. That's all a coach can do; it's ultimately up to the players to change how they're playing.

Now I must ask the obvious question: Where have your captains been all year when this has been going down? I was supposed to create the new drills, run practice, organize the bulk of the travel, research our travel stipends, poll the team about potential opponents as I was the main interleague bout scheduler, run the bench during the bout, (exclusively) control my emotions because my intensity showing through apparently makes people wet themselves, worry about the bout warm-up, sit down with new skaters after their first MHC practice to introduct them to what the team is about and what the culture is like, constantly reach out to skaters so that maybe skaters would know they could approach one member of leadership, to motivate people at all times, and also to lead by example in bouts. So yeah, what the fuck did your captains do again?

Oh my bad. They were worried about winning afterparties, not bouts, and taking more pride in their ridiculous afterparty MVP status than in their own skating. They were mandating glitter parties for their new helmets and wasting all their energy on that rather than leading their team in practice and in bouts. They were spending 10 days in another country barely on skates, contributing very little positive to the wonderful league that hosted us. They were cold and unfriendly to the majority of that league and walked around like primadonnas that deserved something just by being there. What an eye-opener this was into what our former captains had allowed themselves to become. They were often the last ones to hit the track at practice and they missed a number of practices during our build-up to regionals. They were unconcerned about who I benched in all the prior years' bouts until one of them got benched for her terrible, uninspired play. They were leading by example at regionals by going for big hits and missing over and over again. Or bouncing off jammers and giving up. Or leaving their rear pair partner hung out to dry by going to the front, getting pushed out-of-play too easily, and then taking forever to return to the pack. They were inseparable and their own clique; the team knew it and insted of holding them accountable when we were winning, the team just didn't approach them.

I mean why would your captains need to be accountable for their decisions and actions? They're just your elected leadership. That's beyond foolish. It's much easier to let the coach own that too. If my captains can't live up to my expectations, then it's not their fault. It's someone else's to own. Typical.

Chapter 2 of the same story

"Human beings with all their faults and strengths constitute the mechanism of a social movement. They must make mistakes and learn from them, make more mistakes and learn anew. They must taste defeat as well as success, and discover how to live with each." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.


The best place to start this story is the single weekend that created the scapegoat atmosphere that was to follow. That weekend was the weekend of myself and my former team's greatest disappointment, the 2010 Western regional tournament. For our first bout, we had to play a physical team in Bay Area (BAD), but they weren't a strategic threat going in as the footage showed consistently. They were a better team than most of the teams we had played over the course of the year, but not better to a degree where we had to worry about changing our style of play. If we executed (physically and mentally) appropriately, we would have handled BAD just fine.

However, the month leading up to this bout was filled with lazy, disinterested practices from a number of our top skaters and that's only when they decided to attend. None of the new things we worked on throughout the season were being used in scrimmages or bouts. It wasn't for a lack of forward thinking or new drills either; I tried to add more layers to our foundation/signature style of play, but it just didn't take. Our scrimmages and bouts throughout the year were more about just doing the same old thing on track against our league and other WFTDA leagues because it still worked well. It was more about not having a fear of losing their roster position to anyone new coming up. It was more about politics, stupid fucking home team drafts, and unresolved ugliness between various leaders on the travel team. It was more about putting energy into stupid fucking dance offs to win afterparties than personal skills and execution. It was more about the two former captains losing their team and doing very little to get them back.


We were just going through the motions. I personally had tried to lay off the team for 2010 as I pushed them very hard in 2009. But that backfired as the team had become arrogant and complacent about their ability and no longer put in the work needed to be what they were truly capable of being. I tried too late into the year to give the team a kick in the ass and I personally failed to motivate this group for our biggest bout of the year. That's something I get to own equally along with everyone else on that team. In hindsight, this is just what we had become heading into that weekend.


If one watches the footage of that BAD bout, the knowledgeable eye will see a number of stupid things we did. We didn't play very slow (our style) and BAD didn't do anything to make us abandon our signature style either. We subconsciously decided to play dumb derby on track and that's not something we've ever trained to play. In a bout characterized by us going for big hits and missing consistently along with not using the high level teamwork we had created (ie we were playing like individuals), we ended up losing on the last jam by four points. There was some nastiness at half time between former captain A (who will be referred to as Sukie from here on) and current captain B (who will be referred to as Jane going forward) and the team as well, which I would find out about weeks later. Our rear blockers rarely hustled after the jammer and on the rare occasions that they did, they would quickly get pushed out of play and then take their sweet ass time coming back to the pack. That's what would become the most vivid memory of Sukie's performance that weekend as she consistently did this and found herself on the bench in this bout as well as the Rat bout for it. BAD was in great shape and wanted the game badly; that is why they won. My team choked and often just gave it up faster than your favorite porn star trying to set a gangbang record. But even with all the bullshit, we lost by four points on the last jam to a team that played its ass off (they had the gold sweat stains to prove it).


After this loss, we had two games the next day against overmatched opponents. But we came out unmotivated and let both teams hang in a bout they had no business being in at any time. We eventually put our foot down, but not because we wanted it. No, it was because we executed our same style and we weren't challenged by either team to change the way we wanted to play. After three consecutive bouts of unmotivated play and a feeling of tension amongst the top players, I chose to change how I was around the team going into the last day against a familiar foe in Rat City if for no other reason to try to actively change our shitty attitude. I was intensely focused on winning against this team and was not in the mood to be on my best behavior any longer. I went to this tournament wanting to win and knowing we could and should have won if we had played better and this last bout was potentially that victory that could allow this team to salvage some of its mojo.


Right or wrong on this day, I didn't respond to one of our skaters (then and still a good friend of mine) when she tried to say hello before the bout. Sukie would later say this was the reason the team didn't want to play against Rat City and she also said that extended across the whole weekend (in her mind anyway). When I pointed out that I was well-behaved and controlled for the first three bouts, it was then my fault for taking her words as she said them. Funny what sort of character losing can reveal. I'd like to say that this incident before the Rat City bout was the beginning of the witch hunt that would follow, but frankly, I can't say that it was. Could've been the middle for all I know; I was left out of that loop for some reason.

Just to wrap up this chapter and that weekend, we started well against Rat (29-4 first jam), went to the box a bunch, and lost our second bout of the weekend on the last jam. We had lead on a power jam and victory, while probably undeserved, was in our grasp. But our best jammer picked up her fourth minor on her first scoring pass and went to the box. That was the end of it and we officially lost by 8 points. Most teams in the country would've been happy to come out of a tough region with a 2-2 record with both losses by single digits on the last jam with our best skaters on the track. But not us. We had a lot of egos that couldn't handle losing like that or how they personally performed. And because we had (and still have) so many detractors in our national "community" and so many expectations to live up to, we couldn't be okay with losing and learning from it. When we couldn't live up to those expectations, there had to be a reason...

Chapter 1 of "Is This Your Knife, MHC?"

"Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.

This is a small section of my derby story, but is far and away the ugliest piece of my involvement with this great sport. After months of internal debate on whether to tell it, I decided it deserves to be voiced. This story also marks the return of my blogging, which is assuredly a piece of my derby past that often throws me into controversy. But I don't fear controversy; over my years of being involved in derby, I have watched drama and the threat of controversy used as a tool within my former team and league to keep the status quo for certain priviliged people. I have often taken on the role of speaking about things that no one wants to acknowledge; that combined with my disregard for potential controversy makes me the perfect voice for this story. It's actually even easier now that I have no league allegiances because people can't even make it about putting on a face for the sake of the league. No no, this will be told regardless of the predictable drama and character assassination that is sure to follow.

In my experience, derby leagues often repeat the same mistakes as another league. That is what it is. However, the story I'm about to tell is a mistake that's only repeated because it's a dirty little secret. Every effort is made by the parties involved to sweep the disrespect and douchebaggery under the nearest rug. If the story isn't out there, then of course the same mistakes will be repeated. And why not hide such things from your community? Owning one's actions is an incredibly difficult thing to do as it is and that's especially the case when one's actions are less than ethical. I don't believe that being accountable is a natural human characteristic either and if it's not natural, then it should never be an expectation. So part of my hope is that by discussing the ugliness I experienced from people I trusted and sacrificed for, maybe just one league won't do something along those same lines.

Personally, I've been accountable for my words and actions, more than most and usually to my own detriment. I can accept that being accountable doesn't sit well with people. I can also accept that my willingness to speak candidly about most any subject does result in my foot entering my own mouth from time to time and/or offending people. Or that my temper does get the best of me in the heat of the moment and later after some reflection, I need to apologize for my mistakes. I think that's all a part of being accountable. If one does not speak up for oneself or a team or just what they believe in, then that person will never be put in a position to be accountable.

Because of how much offense I took away from the actions of my former team and knowing that I'm not the only one to have this taste left in my mouth by a WFTDA team, my story will see the light of day. I won't pretend that I'm fully healed from what happened to me, but I intend on leaving as much emotion from this as possible. Having said that, I know there will be points where it's there as I'm not a robot yet. I'm also aware that people will read into this story however they want and that certain former friends and current barely friends will be upset with what I have to say or that I'm talking about it publicly. Frankly, I accept that potential consequence willingly as I firmly believe this subjects needs exposure and I can't allow the prospect of losing "friends" to dictate my heart on this matter. Luckily in this case, my personal catharsis happily coincides with exposing the disrespect that tends to permeate this sport. And so it begins.