Dear Editor,

As President of the Blanco Youth Football League I need to clear up some misconceptions about our league and the use of the high school stadium. Our league has always received great support from the school, Danny Rogers, and all other coaches. Last year Blanco hosted one home game, the bowl games, and the division championships. This year we are hosting the bowl games and division championships again.

Due to the drought we experienced the first part of the year, and some reckless individuals who did donuts on the field, it was not recovered enough to handle hosting home games for the regular season. Most people may not realize that when we host, we have 7 to 9 teams playing from 8:00am thru 7:00pm, which is equivalent to playing an entire season in one day. This amount of use in a single day on a weak turf can be permanently damaging. And the field deserves to be in good shape for our junior high, and high school JV & Varsity first.

Bill Mouser and Bryan Wyatt have always supported our league practicing and scrimmaging at the middle school. Danny Rogers has allowed us to use the high school practice field as well. In addition, Danny is allowing our league to build a new field at the high school for future use. When the season is over we can use all the volunteers and donations we can get to have the field ready for next season. Danny Rogers also told us that even if our field wasn’t ready, their maintenance crew would be working hard on the high school field to have it in the best shape possible next year for us to use again.

As far as our league changing the offense to what the school is doing, it was not a request by the school coaches. I had inquired with those coaches for their opinions, and was told that they would like us to, as they felt our kids would benefit in the long run. We had already felt that our kids struggled each year changing teams and coaches, and having to learn a new offense every season. The BYFL Board discussed and agreed to change the offense and have it standardized from Freshman thru Varsity levels. This way no matter which team kids wind up on they would already be experienced, giving the team a better chance of success. Our varsity kids this season will enter the 7th grade next year with experience that will be a big advantage over previous classes.

Once this decision was made, Bryan Wyatt held a coaching clinic for the BYFL coaches. Bill Tesch came to practices after the high school practices to help, and many other school coaches have continued to volunteer help. Many of these coaches have sons and daughters participating in football & cheer, and would have enjoyed them having home games as well.

I apologize to the players, parents, and coaches for not doing a better job in communicating these details prior to our season. I hope this clears things up, and we can get back to supporting and enjoying our kids this season.

Paul Elrod

BYFL President

pelrod86@yahoo.com